This book was sent to Traveling With T for review consideration.

The Secrets We Carried

Summary: Readers who love Susan Wiggs and Susan Mallery will adore New York Times bestselling author Mary McNear newest novel. A young woman travels home to Butternut Lake, confronting her past and the tragedy she and her friends have silently carried with them for over a decade while also facing an unknown future.

Butternut Lake is an idyllic place—but for one woman, her return to the lake town she once called home is bittersweet…

Sometimes life changes in an instant.

Quinn LaPointe grew up on beautiful Butternut Lake, safe, secure, sure of her future. But after a high school tragedy, she left for college and never looked back. Becoming a successful writer in Chicago, she worked to keep out the dark memories of an accident that upended her life. But now, after ten years, she’s finally returned home.

Butternut is the same, and yet everything is changed. Gabriel Shipp, once her very best friend, doesn’t want anything to do with her. The charming guy she remembers is now brooding and withdrawn. Tanner Lightman, the seductive brother of her late boyfriend, wants her to stick around. Annika Bergstrom, an old classmate who once hated Quinn, is now friendly. Everyone, it seems, has a secret.

Determined to come to terms with the tragedy and rebuild old relationships, Quinn settles into Loon Bay Cabins, a rustic but cozy lakeside resort, where she begins writing down her memories of the year before the accident. Her journey though the past leads her to some surprising discoveries about the present. As secrets are revealed and a new love emerges, Quinn finds that understanding the past is the key to the future. 

 

Traveling With T’s Thoughts:

I’ve enjoyed the first three books in the Butternut Lake series- in fact, I thought it was only a trilogy, so when I heard about this- my interest was def high. Unfortunately, this did not work for me. Maybe it was wrong time, wrong book- but it was just ok. And I’ll probably not even really remember the plot in the next few months.

I really thought this was going to be good, but Quinn spends a lot of time lamenting, wringing her hands over THE SECRET, how no one can know what happened that night with her Gabriel her BFF.

When THE SECRET got mentioned 5 million times in just a few pages, I should have just put the book down. *sigh*

What I liked:

The cover. The series really does have pretty covers and some of that is what draws me to these books.

When Quinn buys a clue. Or a vowel from Vanna. 😉

 

Bottom line: In the end, I generally find that books that spend a lot of time with characters focusing on the SECRET that must never be revealed just usually wind up being ok books and the same happened here.

 

*This book was sent to Traveling With T for review consideration. All thoughts and opinions are mine alone.*

 

Pin for Later:

 

*Have you added The Secrets We Carried to your TBR list?*

 

Happy Reading and Bookishly Yours,

T @ Traveling With T