In 1868, Abigail Sinclair, the 17-year-old daughter of a plantation owner, arrives in the Outer Banks to spend the summer by the ocean with her family. Her father, Nolan, spends time with a local young fisherman, Benjamin Whimble, who helps him find the best places to hunt and fish. Eventually, Abigail is asked to teach Ben how to read and write. A friendship blossoms between the two young people, even though medical student Hector Newman pursues Abigail and Ben has a long-time girlfriend. Their relationship becomes more complicated when Ben gets entangled in Nolan’s Ku Klux Klan dealings.
Interesting Facts
Last year, I came upon Diann Ducharme’s books in a bookstore in Duck when I was staying in the Outer Banks during a one-month road trip on the East Coast.
Even nowadays, the Outer Banks (OBX) remain a wild place: roads and trees are engulfed by the sand, houses are swallowed by the ocean, and wild horses roam free in the dunes.
The Outer Banks Trilogy includes The Outer Banks House, Return to the Outer Banks House and Home to the Outer Banks.
Diann Ducharme spent her childhood’s summers in the Outer Banks, North Carolina. She also got married there.1
It took the author 3 years to complete the first draft of The Outer Banks House, as she was writing when her second son napped and during weekends.2
Diann Ducharme was an editor and a reporter for 3 years at a local Henrico County newspaper in Virginia.3
Cécile Sune was born in Lyon, France, and her obsession with books started when she was 14. Her grandparents had lent her Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, and she spent part of the summer indoors reading. Needless to say, her tan didn't really improve that year! It was also around that time that Cécile fell in love with the English language. Several years later, in 1999, Cécile moved to Toronto, Canada, with her cat and 5 suitcases. Her love of reading greatly increased when she discovered that English books were much cheaper than French novels. In 2013, she decided to start a blog to share her passion. Cécile now lives in Ottawa, Canada, with her husband and their daughter, and works as a freelance translator (CS Revision).
One of my favorite literary genre is historical fiction. I have read quite a lot in recent years, and I thought I would share with you my top 10 favorites. Of course, I haven’t read all historical fiction available out there, so there might be great books that would deserve to be on this top 10 list. That’s why I will update this list from time to time. When I…
This historical fiction tells the story of 5 families in different parts of the world: Wales, England, Russia, America and Germany. It takes place before, during and right after World War I. Ethel and Billy Williams are siblings in the poor mining town of Aberowen, and they want to make a better life for themselves. Earl and Maud Fitzherbert are brother and sister in the English aristocracy but they don’t agree on…
I have always been fascinated by Henry VIII and his six wives. In fact, I have read several books on the subject. Catherine Howard: Henry’s Fifth Failure is the story of the king’s penultimate wife, from her birth to her death. She spent her childhood and teenage years with her step-grandmother, the Dowager Duchess of Norfolk. She was raised with other young nobility, and they could do pretty much what they wanted,…
