By Mary Kelly
When I first started out as a student, I thought my taste should gravitate to the “serious” and “important” works of literature. I kind of wanted to be that person that read Kafka or Joyce on the train or went to a poetry reading. I even wanted to wear a beret. I was hoping that I would be considered a “deep thinker” and an “intellectual” reader. I guess I wanted to be the early 1980s version of Rory Gilmore. No one needed to know that although I read widely on occasion (and sometimes with a gun to my head), I secretly loved books by the likes of Erica Jong, Jacqueline Susanne, and Sydney Sheldon. If it had a wild plot, sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll, I was a fan. I could chew these books up like candy. It was my secret shame reading list.
Robin Bradford is currently the collection development librarian for fiction, Large Print, DVD, music and world languages for the Timberland Regional Library System in Washington. Prior to moving to Washington a few months ago, she was the fiction collection development librarian for the Indianapolis Public Library. She has worked in a variety of libraries, academic and public, in a variety of positions, from student assistant to librarian. The one thing that has been a constant throughout, however, is a love of reading. When she isn’t working, or tweeting, or blogging, or reading, or at a conference focused on books, Robin is looking at the map and planning her next adventure.
Secret Sisters by Jayne Ann Krentz is the story of two childhood friends, Madeline and Daphne, who experienced a terrifying attack and have done their best to move on with their lives. Madeline runs a chain of luxury hotels and Daphne is a designer. But the secret that they share reunites them as adults and they journey back to a small island off the coast of Seattle, the site of their childhood trauma. Using Nancy Pearl’s Readers Advisory methodology, let me tell you about the doorways that I found most appealing. I was drawn to the character of Madeline, a successful career woman who struggles with intimacy and lost track of her childhood friend.