Woods’s first novel in her new Ocean Breeze seriesis touching, tense and tantalizing.’
—RT Book Reviews on Sand Castle Bay
‘A whimsical, sweet scenario…the digressions have
their own charm, and Woods never fails to come back
to the romantic point.
—Publishers Weekly on Sweet Tea at Sunrise
I’m so delighted to have the second Sweet Magnolias book available again to coincide with the new Sweet Magnolias series on Netflix, starring JoAnna Garcia Swisher, Brooke Elliott and Heather Headley. When I first came up with the idea for a series about three lifelong friends who’d been through thick and thin together, I had no idea how many women would be added to this core group over the years or how readers would come to love that bond and the entire community of Serenity, South Carolina. I hope Netflix viewers will embrace them, too.
As women, I think we’ve all come to understand that next to family, our friends are the most important people in our lives. And friendships that have stood the test of time, with women who know our history, our mistakes, our dirty little secrets and love us just the same, are the strongest bonds of all. Friends are there to boost our spirits when we’re having a simple bad day or a crisis of monumental proportions. They can make us laugh, celebrate with us, cry with us and remind us that even on the worst day life is still worth living.
If you’re just meeting Maddie, Dana Sue and Helen for the very first time, I hope you’ll love getting to know them. If you’re renewing your friendship with them, I hope it brings back a smile or two. Most of all, I hope you have warm, wonderful friends in your life and that you treasure every minute with them.
All best,
Sherryl
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Epilogue
The smell of burning toast caught Dana Sue’s attention just before the smoke detector went off. Snatching the charred bread from the toaster, she tossed it into the sink, then grabbed a towel and waved it at the shrieking alarm to disperse the smoke. At last the overly sensitive thing fell silent.
“Mom, what on earth is going on in here?” Annie demanded, standing in the kitchen doorway, her nose wrinkling at the aroma of burnt toast. She was dressed for school in jeans that hung on her too-thin frame and a scoop-neck T-shirt that revealed pale skin stretched taut over protruding collarbones.
Restraining the desire to comment on the evidence that Annie had lost more weight, Dana Sue regarded her teenager with a chagrined expression. “Take a guess.”
“You burned the toast again,” Annie said, a grin spreading across her face, relieving the gauntness ever so slightly. “Some chef you are. If I ratted you out about this, no one would ever come to Sullivan’s to eat again.”
“Which is why we don’t serve breakfast and why you’re sworn to secrecy, unless you expect to be grounded, phone-less and disconnected from your e-mail till you hit thirty,” Dana Sue told her, not entirely in jest. Sullivan’s had been a huge success from the moment she’d opened the restaurant’s doors. Word-of-mouth raves had spread through the entire region. Even Charleston’s top restaurant-and-food critic had hailed it for its innovative Southern dishes. Dana Sue didn’t need her sassy kid ruining that with word of her culinary disasters at home.
“Why were you making toast, anyway? You don’t eat it,” Annie said, filling a glass with water and taking a tiny sip before dumping the rest down the drain.
“I was fixing you breakfast,” Dana Sue said, pulling a plate with a fluffy omelet from the oven, where she’d kept it warm. She’d added low-fat cheese and finely shredded red and green sweet peppers, just the way Annie had always liked it. The omelet was perfect, a vision suitable for the cover of any gourmet magazine.
Annie
