Book Review/Windless Summer
Windless Summer
By Heather Sharfeddin
Delta Trade Paperback Original
Bantam Dell Publishers
Paperback $14.00
By BILL DUNCAN
The News-Review
Heather Sharfeddin can take a reader into a run-down motel room and create a scene so real the reader can smell the stale, musty air inside. She does that in “Windless Summer,” her third novel where she takes the reader inside the Rocket, Washington motel owned by her protagonist, Tom Jemmet.
Rocket, Washington was a summer playground for windsurfers on the Columbia River until climate change suddenly caused a windless summer turning the thriving tourist town into a boarded up ghost town. Businesses are closing and its residents are moving away.
Tom, a lonely widower with a troubled daughter, struggles to keep the motel open. Thus begins a plot that will take the reader on a roller coaster of emotions in Sharfeddin’s third novel which could be described as a mystery story wrapped around love, family and devotion.
Sharfeddin lives in Sherwood, Oregon near Portland and had her first novel, “Blackbelly,” published in 2005, followed quickly by her second novel. “Mineral Spirits,” all, as with this novel, set in rural areas of the Pacific Northwest. Her genius is taking everyday events that happen in rural life and creating a plot that becomes a page turner.
Sharfeddin’s gift for minute detail is what makes her storytelling interesting. She is a born observer of small things, a talent which enhances the writing skills she has shown in all three of her novels. As an example, at one time in her life she worked as a hotel maid and what she saw she mentally recorded for later use – and that experience authenticates many of the scenes in this book.
“I started my career as a storyteller in the first grade,” she said. Her writing is so descriptive the reader can almost see algae growing in the Jemmett Motel swimming pool as she describes how Tom debates on draining it or just skimming it one more time. Instead he just puts up a sign saying the pool is closed.
Tom is haunted by the death of his wife, Maria, who died in the motel pool. His autistic Daughter, Sienna, has withdrawn into silence. Charlene, the town’s mail clerk helps Tom care for his daughter and when she sees the pig sty bachelor pad Tom calls his living quarters comes on like a white tornado and makes it homey. In doing so, she removes what she calls as six years of grime.
“Windless Summer,” is a book populated by strange characters, all playing a larger than life role in the plot. Lauren, the town vet, is in love with Tom, but with all his burdens, he barely notices. His friend, Hap, the town’s newspaper editor here’s rumors about some mysterious happenings in Room 6 at the motel where guests report unusual experiences after spending a night there. He fabricates a story about Room 6.
The town is already buzzing about mysterious happenings at the motel, including Maria’s death and the strange behavior of Sienna. The story spreads and soon tourists flock back to Rocket, not to windsurf, but intrigued by the mystery of Room 6.
When a death occurs in Room 6, Tom loses it and Hap confesses he fabricated the story to help save the dying town and bring back the tourist. Like all good stories, the moral is one should be careful what they wish for. While the river is dead calm, the new tourists come looking for mystery and the town pays a terrible price as a result.
(Bill Duncan can be reached at bduncan@nrtoday or by writing to P.O. Box 812, Roseburg, OR 97470)