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Reviews

Ghosts on the Coast — Style Weekly Review

“...There's real darkness on the edge of this romance that hurls the lovers toward tragedy, as if the price to re-enter the innocence of Eden might afford Abby nothing but despair. This 2010 debut novel and portrayal of the historical Outer Banks offers a terrific option for beach reading; it's the sort of novel that can be charming without requiring an abundance of character complexity and depth. Abby's evolution ultimately parallels the positive aspects of how the South reconciled to change after the Civil War, a change that required a culture of ignorance to wash out to sea. - S”
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Bette-Lee Fox — Library Journal, Starred Review

“It’s 1868, and the natives of North Carolina’s Outer Banks think the Sinclairs’ summer residence on the beach at Nags Head is right peculiar. Seventeen-year-old Abigail Sinclair is enlisted by her parents to teach Ben Whimble, her father’s fishing guide, to read. Abby is being courted by medical student Hector Newman and is appalled at the dirty and perpetually barefoot Ben. But Abby is also restless and slowly sees in Ben more than just a willing pupil. Ben might be getting sweet on his teacher as well, but her father has involved him in a matter that doesn’t sit right with the Banker, knowing that freedmen and runaway slaves have long lived contentedly out on Roanoke Island. It’s just three years since the end of the war, and for some, that isn’t long enough. VERDICT First novelist Ducharme has laced her novel with the sounds and the smells of the North Carolina shoreline. Racism and Southern tradition run along parallel paths in this affecting debut, where gentlemen can be less than honorable and enslavement doesn’t always involve chains. Highly recommended for fans of Southern fiction.”


Stephanie Cowell — Author of CLAUDE & CAMILLE:
A NOVEL OF CLAUDE MONET and MARRYING MOZART

“A heart-felt and engrossing novel about the coming of age of two very different young people in the South just after the Civil War: a curious upper-class girl from an almost bankrupt plantation and a handsome young barefoot fisherman “made of sand and seawater” who comes to her to learn to read. What they learn from each other about tolerance and caring in those turbulent times will change their lives forever. A beautiful sense of this place by the sea, of a country in conflict, of death and redemption, and of new love.”


Karen Harper — Author of THE QUEEN'S GOVERNESS

“The Outer Banks House is a beautifully written and deeply moving story of a sheltered young woman's awakening to life, love and the injustice of discrimination against former slaves. In theme and impact, shades of Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn; in the evocative setting and fresh voice, a unique novel all its own.”