TUESDAY EXCERPTS: “THE NANNY”

Welcome to another Tuesday celebrating bookish events: First Chapter/Intros, originally hosted by Bibliophile by the Sea and now hosted by I’d Rather Be at the Beach; and Teaser Tuesdays hosted by The Purple Booker.

Today’s feature is a recent download:  The Nanny, by Gilly Macmillan.

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Intro:  (Prologue)

Water closes over the body.  Swallows it.  The rocking of the boat subsides quickly.  Its occupant waits until the surface of the lake is still.  Her breathing sounds shockingly loud.  She takes the oars and rows away from the site with determined strokes. Her arms ache and she thinks:  I can’t believe I had to do this.  I hate to have done this.

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Teaser: My frustration levels are at peak.  I might have had a shot at getting this job if Mother hadn’t interfered.  I want to empty the basket of strawberries over her head, smash the fruits into her face, and rub them into her hair, but I keep control (p. 56).

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Synopsis:  When her beloved nanny, Hannah, left without a trace in the summer of 1988, seven-year-old Jocelyn Holt was devastated. Haunted by the loss, Jo grew up bitter and distant, and eventually left her parents and Lake Hall, their faded aristocratic home, behind.

Thirty years later, Jo returns to the house and is forced to confront her troubled relationship with her mother. But when human remains are accidentally uncovered in a lake on the estate, Jo begins to question everything she thought she knew.

Then an unexpected visitor knocks on the door and Jo’s world is destroyed again. Desperate to piece together the gaping holes in her memory, Jo must uncover who her nanny really was, why she left, and if she can trust her own mother…

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What do you think?  I know I’m eager to keep reading.

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