Hotel Saint Clare by Kathleen Heady.
A Caribbean island paradise, a place filled with happy carefree people whose only concern is the pleasure of the tourists. NOT. Appearances are superficial. Lust, greed, envy, jealousy, murder… all can be found within the Hotel Saint Clare and Nara Blake: young, beautiful and inexperienced, meets them all when she takes on the job of hostess at the hotel. Fortunately, not everyone falls into those categories, and help and support and the promise of romance help Nara into her new life.
Review by Mary C Thompson: 5.0 out of 5 Stars. Still as riveting as the first time! Reviewed in the United States on November 18, 2021. Verified Purchase. I am rereading Ms. Heady’s books to prepare for reading Sacrifice. I really like her style.
Review by OldGoatHerder: 5.0 out of 5 Stars. Ms. Heady does a wonderful job with character development and with visualization of the … Reviewed in the United States on October 1, 2014. Verified Purchase. Hotel Saint Clare is a very well written story by Kathleen Heady. Ms. Heady does a wonderful job with character development and with visualization of the tropics. The book helps tie together The Gate House and Lydia’s Story, also by Heady. I love the way she brings Nara to life. This is a kick off your shoes and relax kind of story.
Review by LProd: 5.0 out of 5 Stars. Keeps you turning pages. Reviewed in the United States on June 30, 2014. This book was refreshingly different, not only for the setting but in how the plot develops. This book centers around 22-year-old Nara, a native of the islands who is trying to find her way in the world. She begins working at the Hotel St. Clare and quickly moves up the ladder due to her intelligence, business acumen, hard work . . . and, since I won’t give any spoilers, let’s just say because of a pretty shocking development. Heady does an excellent job keeping up this underlying sense of menace, particularly from a certain slimy character. I was holding my breath a few times and hoping Nara would be okay. Just when you think that things have begun to smooth over for her, there are new, astonishing developments. It will lull you into a nice easy, engaging pace and then suddenly drop you down a roller coaster ride with some of its twists and unexpected turns. Beautifully written, it is a quick, easy read that will keep you guessing. I loved Nara–she was spunky and smart and didn’t take her youth or her beauty too seriously. She is a character who is easy to love and root for and I hope to see more of her in future books. This makes for a great summer read or a great winter read given how Heady puts you right in the tropics with the incredibly well-written setting. Don’t miss it!
Review by David B Coles: 5.0 out of 5 Stars. Thinking of life in the Caribbean? Enjoy. Reviewed in the United States on June 25, 2014. I’ve always liked the thought of a life on a Caribbean Island. It suggests racial tolerance, harmonious lives, music, and shear enjoyment. The reality is almost certainly different and, as Kathleen Heady suggests in Hotel St. Clare, there are less pleasant aspects of life which crop up in any community.
Nara Blake, dissatisfied with her life as a school teacher, aspires to something better. She takes a position as hostess in the restaurant of the top Hotel St. Clare and very soon impresses everyone with her professionalism and intelligence – not to speak of her fresh beauty and youth which attracts the ageing owner’s interest as well as that of the hotel’s chef.
Nara is the latest in a long line of such attractions and sidesteps the owner’s advances adroitly only to begin falling for the chef’s charms.
Now darker events crowd in. Illness, murder, threats, and Nara finds herself up to her ears in jeopardy as those she thought of as allies show their true colours and her position at the hotel becomes a dangerous place to be.
There are friends though. The old man who knows everything about the island, his sometime lover and their son – he with the green eyes and strong arms…
Review by Sandra Cody: 5.0 out of 5 Stars. The story is strong and the characters are a believable mixture of good and bad. Reviewed in the United States on June 28, 2014. A young woman steps out of the sea, shaking the seaweed from her hair. Two boys gathering shells at first think she is a mermaid. Thus, begins Hotel Saint Clare, setting the stage for a story that is never far from the natural elements of life on a Caribbean island. The young girl is Nara, who has arrived to work in the hotel on the big island. Nara grew up in two different worlds: the world of wealth and privilege of her father and the more earthy world of the island people; she is a strong character who respects both worlds, but is determined to find her own place in the life of the island. This is a story of intrigue, of mystery and danger. True to its Caribbean setting, there is a hint of voodoo, but Heady never lets the magical element or the island people slip into cliché. The writing is crisp and clear. The descriptions give a feel of the lushness of the setting, but are written with a light touch that does not overpower the story.
Review by Augustus M. Cileone: 5.0 out of 5 Stars. Intriguing mystery amid tropical island life. Reviewed in the United States on October 8, 2014. The narrative of this book flows so that you want to keep reading about these interesting and unique characters. The novel provides a fascinating insight into the mysteries of the people living on the island where this mystery takes place. I feel like I want to know more about how their lives will turn out in subsequent stories.
Review by Mary Thompson: 5.0 out of 5 Stars. Great Book. Reviewed in the United States on March 12, 2022. If you like a little bit of romance mixed up with a little bit of intrigue and mystery. You’ll love Kathleen Heady’s books. Hard to put down.
Product Details:
Paperback: 162 Pages
Publisher: Sage Words Publishing (June 24, 2014)
Language: English
Adult Readers: Mysteries (Contemporary)
Amazon Print:
https://www.amazon.com/Hotel-Saint-Clare-Kathleen-Heady/dp/0991501446/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=
Customer Ratings:
https://www.amazon.com/Hotel-Saint-Clare-Kathleen-Heady/dp/0991501446/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=#customerReviews
About The Author: Kathleen Heady grew up telling stories – to pass the time, or just to exercise her imagination. She spent her childhood on a farm in southern Illinois, where she was fortunate to have parents who encouraged her to study, read, and learn about the world. Besides rural Illinois, she has lived in Chicago, Costa Rica, Colorado, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and now North Carolina. Her current new “challenge” is learning to play the ukulele.
Kathleen has spent most of her professional life as a high school teacher, teaching English, Spanish and social studies. She shares her “almost a tree house” home with her husband and two cats, Tang and Sirius Black. She has a daughter, two sons, two daughters-in-law, a grandson and a granddaughter who are all really cool people.
Amazon Author’s Page:
https://www.amazon.com/Kathleen-Heady/e/B002NNJI9Q/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1?qid=1542752760&sr=1-1
Professional Website:
http://www.kathleenheady.com
Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/kathleenheadyauthor/
Twitter:
http://twitter.com/Katwrite9
Author’s Page At Book Marketing Global Network:
https://bookmarketingglobalnetwork.com/kathleen-headys-books/kathleen-headys-books/
