Amazon.com
Both Lily Blake and John Kipling grew up in Lake Henry, New Hampshire, and both left after high school to pursue their dreams--singing for Lily and writing for John. Now the two have returned separately to seek shelter in the small lakeside town due to the disastrous results of paparazzi fever--Lily as a victim, John as a member of the press responsible for a tragedy.
Falsely accused and hounded by the press, her privacy violated and destroyed, Lily finds refuge in a cottage on the lake, while her sister and the other residents of Lake Henry close ranks, refusing to discuss her with the media hordes that soon come knocking. But Lily can't avoid John, who also lives on the lake and at first sees Lily's story as prime fodder for the novel that can break him into publishing. But soon the vulnerable, besieged woman elicits far different emotions from him, and John becomes fiercely committed to helping Lily find justice.
Layered with complicated family relationships and richly textured with the sights, sounds, and colorful characters of a small town, Barbara Delinsky's Lake News will satisfy longtime fans as well as those anxious to read a timely and thought-provoking tale from one of the genre's top authors. --Lois Faye Dyer
From Publishers Weekly
The deserved popularity of Delinsky's novels resides in her ability to create appealing, believable characters who don't need to drop names and fashion labels to earn the reader's attention. Cabaret singer, pianist and music appreciation teacher Lily Blake, 34, finds pleasure in singing, since it's the only time she's free of the stutter that's plagued her all her life. She also finds comfort in her friendship with Archbishop, now Cardinal, Francis Rossetti. Whether they're performing together at archdiocese events or the exclusive Essex Club in Boston, Lily knows she can depend on the priest for understanding and comfort. But when a malicious reporter fabricates a story that Lily and the Cardinal have an illicit sexual relationship, Lily sees her name dragged through the mud. Suspended by the school where she teaches and told by the Essex Club not to return to work, a besieged Lily retreats to her small New Hampshire hometown of Lake Henry. There she holes up in the cabin her grandmother left to her, and confronts her estranged relationship with her widowed mother, Maida. Lily finds an unexpected ally in 40ish John Kipling, once a ruthless big-city journalist himself but now editor of small-time Lake Henry's newspaper. He is equally outraged at the lies that invade Lily's privacy, and together they fight for justice. Delinsky (Coast Road) plots this satisfying, gentle romance with the sure hand of an expert, scattering shady pasts and dark secrets among some of her characters, while giving others destructive family patterns and difficult family dynamics to contend with. Nature, and how it colors small town living, is described in clean, unembellished prose that only occasionally lapses into an awkward attempt at rural New Hampshire dialect. Agent, Amy Berkower. Doubleday Book Club main selection; Literary Guild Super Release; Reader's Digest Condensed Books; Simon & Schuster Audio. (July) Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
In the latest from the author of Three Wishes, a nasty reporter has falsely accused Lily Blake of an affair with a cardinal, forcing her to retreat to her home town in New Hampshire. There she links up with John Kipling, another renegade from big-time media who's now running the local paper.Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From AudioFile
Political scandal is the theme of this book about Lily Blake, falsely accused of having an affair with a newly appointed cardinal, and John Kipling, a local journalist whose career has been destroyed by political stories that he wrote. Melissa Leo brings out the tension and anger of Lily's situation. Leo balances romance, interpersonal relations and intrigue as she creates vocal personalities for all characters. M.B.K. (c) AudioFile, Portland, Maine
From Booklist
Delinsky, author of the best-seller Three Wishes (1997), and more than 60 other novels, delivers an unusual plot and contemporary story line in her latest effort. Lily Blake's happy life is shattered after a rumormongering reporter accuses her, in print, of having an affair with a newly appointed cardinal. Although Lily and the cardinal were close friends, there was no love affair between them. The scandalous story has taken root, however, and Lily, besieged by reporters, finds that she is unable to return to her Boston apartment, where they are permanently camped out. Shunned by her friends, neighbors, and employer, who are all embarrassed by the false revelations, she soon realizes that she has no alternative but to escape to her hometown of Lake Henry, in rural New Hampshire. Vulnerable and wary, she makes the trip home, and once there, must dodge sneaky reporters and confront old demons in the face of a cold and unloving mother and a town that is still whispering about her youthful indiscretions. Despite her initial distrust and intuitive suspicions, she decides to ally herself with the town's handsome newspaperman (who has trust "issues" of his own) when he offers to help her exact revenge on the reporter who ruined her life. Neither as steeped in overblown sentimentality nor as chock-full of surprises as some contemporary romances, this hard-luck, happy-ever-after tale still will satisfy romance fans. Kathleen Hughes
From Kirkus Reviews
Worldwide bestseller Delinsky, with over 60 romances to her credit (Coast Road, 1998, etc., etc.), dreams up a plot with echoes of scandal. Lily Blake's name, pure as driven snow, is soiled seemingly forever by the Boston Post's Terrence Sullivan when he fabricates a tale about Lily and newly ordained Cardinal Rossetti having been loversplus maybe some hanky-panky with the governor of New York as well. Actually, Lily at 34 is a cabaret pianist/singer at Boston's posh Essex Club, as well as a part-time music-appreciation teacher at the Winchester School on Beacon Hill. Yes, sh-sh-sh-she (Lily stutters) and the cardinal did play the piano together at the Essex Club, which is owned by the cardinal's nephew, but an affair? The smeared woman, now an embarrassment to the Church and swamped by paparazzi, loses her teaching post, gives up her cabaret job, and goes back to her small hometown, Lake Henry in New Hampshire, where she joins up with John Kipling, editor of the Lake News, in an effort to regain her good name. Kipling himself has fled the big city papers he once worked for and now helps prepare a blade to run through Terry Sullivan. Delinskys legion of fans, as ever, will be happy. (Literary GuildSuper Release/Doubleday main selection) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Review
Flint Journal (MI) An enjoyable novel....Delinsky is one of those writers who knows how to introduce characters to her readers in such a way that they become more like old friends than works of fiction.
Book Description
Barbara Delinsky's powerful New York Times bestseller of hope and redemption introduces the unforgettable Blake sisters: strong, spirited Lily, and the resilient Poppy, the heroine of Delinsky's acclaimed novel, An Accidental Woman. After an unscrupulous reporter falsely accuses Boston lounge singer Lily Blake of having an affair with a newly appointed Cardinal, she's hounded by the press, fired from her job, and robbed of all public freedom. The humiliation and violation of privacy leaves her no choice but to retreat to her rural hometown of Lake Henry, New Hampshire. In search of refuge, Lily forms an uneasy alliance with John Kipling, a former Boston reporter with trust issues of his own. Now editing Lake Henry's local newspaper, John cannot ignore Lily's appeal or her plight -- even at the risk of taking on his former colleagues. Surprising and deeply satisfying, Lake News offers an intimate look at the complex relationship between an enigmatic man and a vulnerable woman, both struggling to find a new sense of community in a place they once called home.
Download Description
After she is wrongly accused by a devious reporter of having had an affair with a newly appointed cardinal, Lily Blake retreats to her home town in New Hampshire. Driven by the need to exact justice and clear her name, she forms an uneasy alliance with the editor of the local paper--a man with his own grudge against the mainstream media.
About the Author
Barbara Delinsky has published dozens of novels since the 1980s, including, most recently, An Accidental Woman, The Woman Next Door, The Vineyard, Lake News, Coast Road, Three Wishes, A Woman's Place, For My Daughters, and More Than Friends. Her newest novel, Flirting with Pete, is available in hardcover from Scribner. She is also the author of a nonfiction book titled Uplift: Secrets from the Sisterhood of Breast Cancer Survivors, available from Pocket Books. Published in twenty-five languages worldwide, her books regularly appear on the bestseller lists of The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and Publishers Weekly. Delinsky is a lifelong New Englander and she and her husband have three sons. Readers can write her at P.O.
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