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A pending divorce sends Nan and John to their South Carolina beach house, where Nan gathers belongings after the home’s sale. While there, Nan spies a woman who resembles a long-lost childhood friend. Thus begins Nan’s reminiscences of Catherine Wiley, a mysterious, troubled child who harbored a terrible secret. Nan and her mother, Wanda, tried to socialize the grim Catherine, abandoned by her parents to the care of ailing, aging grandparents. Then, a visit to Myrtle Beach in that summer of 1957 turned tragic when a beachside circus tent went up in flames and Catherine disappeared freakishly during a storm – or did she? Sherry Austin has created a masterful Southern Gothic that leaves an otherworldly portal slightly ajar – leading to “where the woodbine twines.”

Reviewed by Susanne W., South County Regional

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