Islands

By Sara Stamey

Book Overview

"Welcome to Paradise," archeologist Susan Dunne hears on arrival at the Caribbean island to research petroglyphs and unravel the mystery of her brother's drowning. This sunny tourist mecca conceals... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0972498613
• ISBN13: 9780972498616
• Release Date: January 2003
• Publisher: Tarragon Books
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.5" x 0.8" x 5.5"

Customer Reviews

Authentic and Intriguing

This novel takes place in the US Virgin Islands, which the vacation marketers sell as a stereotypical Caribbean "Paradise." I used to live there, however, and there's more lurking below the surface than warm, sandy beaches and long, alcohol-heavy drinks beneath the palm trees. Stamey takes the reader to those places the glossy brochures don't show you, places that are much more interesting, and, for the novel's intelligent heroine, dangerous. Reading this novel transported me straight back to my former island home; her recognizable characters and exquisite descriptions obviously come from experience. I could almost feel the heat and humidity dripping from the pages. Ahhh...the story even unfolds in "island time," and if you don't already know what that is, read the book and savor it!

Two generations loved it

I love this author's writing. And it shocked me when my collage-age daughter picked up Islands, and couldn't put it down. I wasn't shocked that she liked a book so well written, I just thought it would be at least three more years before she and I had anything in common again! I'd like to see more from this author.

Sultry, Sexy, Psychic Suspense

This is a terrific book! Susan Dunne arrives on a Caribbean island with a grant to study petroglyphs. But her agenda also includes an investigation into her brother's "accidental" drowning on the same island a year earlier. Almost immediately Susan finds that the island's sunny, touristy exterior conceals (barely) a dark, mysterious underbelly where nothing is as it seems, and it is into this world that she is inexorably drawn. Attempts to remain "objective" are swept away, and Susan is forced to confront her own dark secrets, and the psychic powers that the island seems to magnify.Stamey's writing is beautifully evocative--her own experience living in the Caribbean and as a SCUBA instructor shine though--and the characters are all strong.Everyone I know who has read this book has loved it--in fact the most common comments I hear are, "This should be a movie!", and, "When's the sequel coming out?."...

Islands creates a voodoo of its own.

Sara Stamey's "Islands" is a masterful amalgam of murder mystery, anthropology, voodoo, and scuba diving. Add to this already potent mix wonderful character development and a deft rendering of the physical environment and you've got a real winner of a novel here. I highly recommend it!