Beyond the Bougainvillea

by Dolores Durando

She found her place in a turbulent era of deep passions, heartbreaking sacrifices, and grand dreams.

When scholarly, smart Mary Margaret is sixteen, her father marries her off to a drunken neighbor in return for a tract of land. The year is 1924, and Mary Margaret's motherless childhood has already been hard as a farm girl on the desolate prairies of North Dakota. Abused and helpless, the new Mrs. "Marge" Garrity seems destined for a tragic fate.

But Marge is determined to make her life count, no matter what. Her escape from her brutal marriage takes her to California, where she struggles to survive the Great Depression and soon answers the lure of the state's untamed northern half. There, embraced by the rough-and-ready people who built the great Ruck-a-chucky Dam on the American River, she begins to find her true mission in life and the possibility for love and happiness with an Army Corp engineer of Cherokee Indian descent.

This vivid saga of one woman's life in the early decades of a turbulent century is told from the heart of a true storyteller in the grand tradition of women's sagas.

Author Dolores Durando knows Marge's world very well. She grew up ninety years ago on the plains of North Dakota.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, Romance, Contemporary, Historical, Ebooks, Womens

260 pages, Paperback

First published February 15, 2011

About the author

Now the prairie grasses cover the old North Dakota homestead where the blacksmith shop, with the housekeeping room in the back, once stood. I lived the first five years of my life with my loving grandpa in that back room. I played among the muddy boots of the farmers who sat around the pot-bellied stove, spitting Copenhagen, watching it sizzle as my grandpa worked the bellows and hammered the plowshares.

Now, at 90 years old, I live comfortably and enjoy painting with water colors, sculpting in alabaster, earning a few blue ribbons at juried shows, and for the first time, writing.

Reviews

[MissSusie · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is the early 1930’s and the Midwest has been hit with the drought and the great depression is starting. Marge’s young life in North Dakota is anything but happy but when things are at their worst she is rescued by some good people, the kind of people Marge never knew existed. With their help she goes off to California to start her new life. I enjoyed Marge discovering all the new things in the world outside of the North Dakota farm she grew up on, like pull chain toilets, bubble baths, and different ethnic groups.

I fell in love with Marge she is a strong woman yet so kind and loving towards everyone. Her life motto “What’s done is done, now get on with it.” It is how she lived her life no matter what life threw at her she picked herself up and dusted herself off and got on with it. The way she lived her life was inspirational I would love to have her as a friend and can only hope I could treat others with an ounce of the kindness and grace Marge showed to others.

The author of this book is a 90 year old woman and this is her first book and I hope that she writes more! Marge is a character that will stay with me for a long time and I am so sad to be leaving her now that the book is over. This book is at times sad and painful but so very inspirational and uplifting. I highly recommend this one it is a great story whose characters will stay with you long after you put this book down!

5 Stars
I received this book from netgalley & the publisher

[Nenette · Rating 3 out of 5]

A debut novel for a 90-year old writer! Wow! Reading this book was almost like listening to the author tell it live. Now, there are two sides to that comment: It was free-flowing and almost spontaneous. However, the spontaneity was a little too much in some parts. In my opinion, there were a lot of jumps; i.e. I often found myself reading one scene, and all of a sudden I was in another, without so much a paragraph break. If it were a live story telling, I would have interrupted with quite a number of "hold-it-there."

Barring the above, this is a good, almost-epic saga of one woman who rose from the depths of her tragic experiences. The setting might have been almost a century ago, but the lessons it impart will stand, and so does the inspiration it gives.

[Tara Chevrestt]

I made it thru 20 percent before I quit. The characters are all super duper wonderful, kind, and generous or super duper bratty, drunk, or mean. I got tired of the heroine being so good and so wonderful despite the fact that almost everyone else was incredibly cruel to her. Get real.

Just not for me.

[Misfit]

Free on kindle right now if anyone is interested.

[Teri Pre · Rating 3 out of 5]

Parts were excellent, other parts dragged.

[Christy B · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book got SEVEN 5-star reviews on Amazon. I think I'm seriously missing something.

[Charlotte · Rating 2 out of 5]

Mary Margaret (Madge) was born into an abusive family and, by the age of 17, has been married off to a classic alcoholic predator. With the help of friends, she escapes this marriage and disappears to California, right on the edge of the Great Depression. Her dream is to finish her high school education and to be able to build a life for herself, far away from both her home town and the abuse that has shaped her life up to now.

There's a lot to like about Madge, who has been through enough trauma that you can't help but root for her, particularly as her warm heart forces her into helping out with the messy lives of the people around her. The history that she's walking through is also fascinating, covering the Great Depression and not shying away from the cultural mishmash of the early 20th century in Los Angeles. Much of the novel is as much a history of early Los Angeles and the surrounding country as it is about the characters in the novel.

If anything, the novel tries to do too much and the characters suffer for that. But while there were aspects of the writing that did not appeal to me, I kept returning to the novel to find out more about this fascinating period of history.

[Heather · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beyond the Bougainvillea is a bit depressing. If things could go wrong to the poor main character they did. The story itself is quite good and I enjoyed it, but there were a couple glaring issues. There are a lot of typos. More annoying, though, is the writing style. She’d suddenly change the scene with no indication whatsoever. Characters would be having a conversation and then suddenly one of the characters would be thinking back on something that happened long ago. At times I found it hard to keep up with what was going on. I often felt like I must have been reading with my mind wandering and not paying attention to the words (which I do sometimes), but every time I’d flip back I’d find I had comprehended what was written just fine. It was the author who skipped ahead or changed what was going on for no apparent reason. It just made it a bit awkward to read. It’s still a good enough book and I cared deeply about what happened to several of the characters so I don’t regret reading it. (Plus it was the first book for the author and she was 90 when it was published which is pretty incredible.)

[Connie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent story. Even more excellent when you realize it was written by a woman over 90.

[Lorraine Campbell · Rating 2 out of 5]

Morality tale whose basic message is trust no one, especially if they turn to alcohol, but if you play your cards right, you'll at least luck into a pile of money along the way. Very disappointing.

[Judy & Marianne from Long and Short Reviews · Rating 3 out of 5]

Much like the bougainvillea with its beautiful, fragile blooms that conceal vicious thorns, Marge’s life has underlying thorns that tear at her—sometime bodily but more often they tear at her heart and soul. Her strength, ’to keep on keeping on’, in the face of adversity inspires. Her abusive father had often told her, “What’s done is done, get on with it” and Marge uses that advice to survive.

Abused repeatedly by two filthy old drunken men, even before she was seventeen, she accepts help from strangers to escape from her “hell’ in North Dakota and goes to California where others help her also. She gains strength and a strong sense of self as she adjusts and copes with life during the Great Depression. As the story progresses, the reader has the joy of seeing her pay forward the caring and generosity others showed to her when she was in dire need.

Many secondary characters play major roles in Marge’s life. Gangly, seventeen-year-old Ben Olson from Kansas touches a special spot in her heart as she rides the train to California, while Dr. Tom, her benefactor in North Dakota is of immeasurable help to her as is Ruth Gunderson who spirits her away from her abusers and cheers Marge’s actions as she departs for California to live with Ruth’s sister Annie and family.

In California, the reader learns Annie gave up dreams and much of herself for respectability when she married Boots Malone. She caterers to her inflexible husband, Boots and to her spoiled daughter, Susy. The Malones and Boots’ boss, police Captain O’Malley all shepherd Marge along as she learns to cope in a world totally different from her world in North Dakota.

Nina, the Indian woman, and her four hungry, ragged children show Marge how prejudice and vengefulness sap the very humanness out of people. The connection she has with them changes her life and influences her decision to go to northern California.

Cotton Eeagle, the Cherokee Indian engineer that Marge meets after she is a successful business woman, rocks her world and brings her to the heights and depths of emotions, but most of all he gives her the baby girl that fills Marge’s world with joy. Then an indiscretion from the past wreaks havoc with their lives and sends Cotton into a state that shatters their once magical marriage.

Dolores Durando brings a difficult time in American history to life as she recounts Marge’s journey. I felt like I was on the outside looking in a lot of the time, being told about rather than being immersed in the action. Of course, I would have loved spending more time with Marge and her ‘true love’. The foreshadowing of their getting together was seen throughout the book, but how they relate to each other would have been great to read about.

Beyond the Bougainvillea showcases the struggles for survival during the Great Depression while recounting the life of one young woman who persevered with the underlying belief that “What is done is done, get on with it”. Marge’s industry, innate sense of humor, strong sense of justice, and compassion for others, a compassion that reaches out to help the disenfranchised, leads to her finding her own happy-ever-after.

originally posted at http://longandshortreviews.blogspot.c...

[Phanee · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rating: 5/10

Beyond The Bougainvillea is the story of Mary Margaret, known throughout the book as Marge, as she tries to deal with all the hardships life seems to throw her way. The book starts off during the early years of Marge's life, when she is living with her father in North Dakota, where - essentially - she is a personal slave of her father's. When she is sixteen, her father marries her off to a complete idiot of a man, who is way to old for Marge and treats her just like her father does. As a result of various circumstances and occurrences, as well as from the help of the people she is closest to, she ends up in California. From then on, Marge takes her life in her own hands.

When I finished this book, I was a little awestruck and not necessarily in a good way. While reading the book, you meet hardship upon hardship upon hardship, until you actually reach the point of wondering, 'What worse thing could happen?'. And then, surprise, surprise, it does happen... It's all tragedy: friendships gone bad, loves gone awry, fathers behaving like complete and utter idiots (though maybe that's too mild a word). Interspersed between all the bad happenings, there are also a few happy and positive moments, but they don't last long at all.

One thing I really did not like about this book was the fact that the author seemed to jump years ahead in just one sentence. By that, I mean that she would start of a chapter at 'Time X' and then, nearly half-way through it, we would find ourselves fast-forwarded to 'Time X+5'. She devoted chapters and chapters to all the things that went wrong and then, couldn't devote a few paragraphs about the years in between. I'm not sure I am making much sense, but if you read the book, you will see what I mean.

The book's redeeming quality would have to be Marge. She is such a strong character. At times, she came across as a bit of a bossy-boots and a know-it-all, and it seemed to me as if she was a bit of a meddler, too. I honestly have no idea how she kept on wanting to live with all the things that happen around her.

So, I'm not really sure what to make of Beyond The Bougainvillea, as you can probably tell. The only thing that I am sure about is that I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would.

Originally posted at: http://funny-wool.blogspot.com/2011/0...

[Shari Larsen · Rating 2 out of 5]

This story takes place in North Dakota and California in the 20's and 30's. Marge lost her mother when she was 11 years old, then at 16, her father marries her off to a drunken and abusive man. But with the help of the town doctor and a kindly neighbor, Marge is able to escape to California, and she is determined to put the past behind her and make something of her life.

When tragedy strikes the family she is living with there, Marge is on her own. She befriends a Native American woman, something that was frowned upon by society at that time, and later, they both travel to the northern part of the state, where a new town is growing where the Ruck-a-Chucky Dam is being built. Marge builds a life for herself there, and has a chance of love and happiness with an Army Corp engineer of Cherokee descent.

I liked this story, but found some flaws in it. Marge seemed to be a little too well adjusted and "perfect" considering her abuse in her childhood and teens, and parts of the story just didn't seem to "flow". One example is when Marge asks for help buying a new pair of shoes for her job which starts the next day at 6:30am, but then the story goes on about a long shopping trip, and she doesn't actually start the job til a few days later.

The woman who wrote the story was 90 years old at the time, and this is her first book. I have to give her credit for going for it at an age where many others would have decided they were "too old" to try something like that. I think if she would have had a better editor, it would have made all the difference, because the basic storyline was a good one, just not executed that well.

She did do a great job with the historical details, and describing what it was like to live in those times in those places.

This was a Kindle freebie, and while I did like most of the book, I would have been very disappointed if it had been a book I actually had to pay for.

[Gabby-Lily Raines · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started reading the book (a review copy I received from the publisher) not too long before heading to bed, thinking I would read a few pages just to get started, then pick it up again the following evening. That was my intention. What happened was that I finished the book in one sitting and, with a couple of hours before my day usually begins, I figured to catch up on sleep some other time.

I have enjoyed reading all of the books I have read in one way or another and I am glad to have read them all (even the ones that weren't entirely to my personal taste for whatever reason), but the books that I have read that wouldn't let go are not that many. Beyond the Bougainvillea is one of them.

It is a saga, yet is a story that has the feeling of sitting by a cozy fire at the same time. The characters - good, bad, and ugly - are splendidly told and, for the most part, have the feeling of people you might know next door or down the street (some of whom you might want to know better, some of them not so much). It is also a story of making do with what you have and mayhap having it turn into something better.

Great debut read.

(Cross-posted to Lily's Reviews, Librarything, Amazon.com, and Barnes & Noble)

[Klaudyna Z. · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was just okay for me. It seems as if Marge had a pretty rough childhood but in the end, she seemed really lucky because people were just inclined to give her any help and money that she needed. It doesn't seem like she ever suffered financially, which somewhat irritated me. The only good part about that was that she usually used the money to help other people and for doing good things. I thought that when her marriage to Cotton fell apart was somewhat strange because it seemed as if Cotton was the one angry at her, even though he was the one that messed up. And then the end, I totally saw coming but it seemed very abrupt and I almost wish that the book didn't end there but that it kept going and that Marge and Ben had found their happily ever after. We were all just left to assume. I would have given this book 2.5 starts because I don't think it was that bad that it should have gotten 2 but I don't really think it deserves a full 3 either.

[Elizabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

A first book by a 90 year old author. The story starts out in North Dakota where Marge is a teenaged girl whose mother is deceased. She lives with her drunken father and a drunken friend of his. Her after forces her, at16, to marry this friend. Her difficult life becomes more difficult and is marked by a great deal of abuse. The time period is between the two world wars. Marge is rescued by a neighboring woman and eventually this woman helps her escape to California. Marge has a guardian angel in the local doctor, who helps support her until she can get on her feet in California. Marge is resilient but se also has an incredible amount of good fortune in the people who surround her. At times it was hard to believe she could have such good luck but maybe in 90 years the author has met such people.

[karen otto · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is such an inspiring read -- the story, and the story behind the story.

Marge Rearden starts as a young girl in North Dakota who survives unimaginable abuse and distress to move ahead to California during the height of the Depression. There she witnesses the wild ride of a developing state in turbulent times. Ms. Durando makes it entirely plausible that one person could meet such diverse friends - Mexican, American Indian, Chinese, Irish - during the wild boom of California in the 30s. As the end drew near, I found myself hoping for more to come in Marge Rearden's story.

Ms. Durando is a first-time novelist at the age of ninety -- a story within itself!

[Diane · Rating 1 out of 5]

It was very generous of the publisher to release a book by a 90-year-old first-time author - I give the woman a lot of credit for undertaking this project. However, her publisher did her a great disservice by not having the book properly edited. While the story was somewhat interesting, the writing was so poor it was distracting. There were mixed metaphors, sentence fragments, unattributed quotes, missing verbs, etc. Also, there were several incorrect historical references (cinnamon bagels in the 1930s - seriously?). The editor should be flogged for letting this book go to print in such condition.

[Rosemary Cantrell · Rating 3 out of 5]

There were things I really like and things I did not. This starts in North Dakota, a young girl abused by her father, married off to his friend, and in peril. She manages to escape to California, where she goes from one adventure to another. Some of her experiences were interesting, others were downright ridiculous. This was really an episodic novel and some of the jumps were hard to believe. It is good to see a character become something more than what she appeared to be at first, but I did get tired of her getting kicked in the teeth again and again. I have to go so-so on this one - loved parts and bored with other parts.

[Marty · Rating 2 out of 5]

I received this book with the understanding I was to do a review. I find it difficult to say it was a good book, because there was nothing really wrong with it other than it was boring and very predictable.
The story of a young girl who because of a bad home life seeks a new life in California. The story goes from one quick plot to another, characters come and go quickly and you care nothing for them. While this might be OK for younger readers, it was just filler for me.

[Leah · Rating 2 out of 5]

The style of writing was not my style. She was all over the place with her characters. I didn't like the author adding what EVERY person was thinking. She jumped from person to person which would get confusing. I liked the very beginning. I thought it was very heartfelt in the beginning with Marge and that is the only reason why I finished the book. I wanted life to be better for Marge. It was just one depressing thing after another for Marge. Not a reread at all.

[Mich · Rating 3 out of 5]

maybe 2 stars... when i started this the best way i could describe it was 'simple'. it kept my attention mainly b'c it starts out during the depression and the location moves west. dont read it with great literary expectations.. its NOT there
it was free on kindle. dont pay lots for it if u do read
unless i was dreaming when i finished reading, there was a blurb at the end and the author is 90? THAT might make it readable all by itstelf!

[Jenny · Rating 2 out of 5]

I got this as a free download onto my Kindle. It was categorized as a "romance" which I completely disagree with. There was very little romance in this entire novel. The writing quality was inconsistent, and I'm not normally interested in novels that follow someone's life for twenty years, this wasn't an exception. Good on the author for trying something new, it wasn't my cup of tea, but I did feel it was worth finishing. I enjoyed the twist at the end.

[Cathy Klein · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book spans the life of Marge Reagan and brings it back full circle. Marge is a strong & feisty woman that is very likable and you want to know what is going to happen next. She is the kind of person that makes lemonade when life hands her a bunch of lemons. She eventually becomes friends with Nina who you will love to hate, but that also breaks your heart a little. This was a good story that wraps up nicely.

[Jennaberry · Rating 1 out of 5]

what dribble. the writing is jumpy and confusing, the characters are non-dimensional and boring. what porbably annoys me the most is how overwhelmingly PERFECT the heroine is, how beautiful, how kind, how well adjusted, despite the, you know, years of abuse and rape. the entire novel feels like something written by an ignorant teenage girl.

[Rocket Moe · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some parts of this book were interesting but the characters were one-trick-ponies. Good people were always good. Bad people were bad theoughout. Trouble makers were always trouble. Once I got used to that though... The biggest disappointment of the book was it's abrupt end. It was as ifthe author got tired and just stopped writing.

[Jerrica · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was different from anything I've really read. The author jumps around some and gives the thoughts of characters outside of the main characters, which I found interesting. I felt like the ending could have been a little better...I just felt like it ended suddenly. I would wish for a part two...

[Judy King · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well-written book with well developed characters and a surprising plot line. It's even more surprising to discover this is a first book by a woman of 90. the plot line nearly perfectly illustrates the novel's ideal motion-bearing framework. Very well written. What a life of tragedy -- what a strong spirit to stand beneath that sadness and extreme challenges. Well Done Dolores Durando.

[Nicole · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book, I don't know why it recieved so many bad reviews?? It reads like a life saga, but easier and read much faster than one. I just got done reading Gone With the Wind, and although this is definitely not the literary equal, it was easier to read and, in my opinion, just as enjoyable. Give it a shot!

[Kbee · Rating 3 out of 5]

set in 1920's
It was just ok! A lot of rambling on. When times were bad they were bad but came good to fast and to easy for reality. I don't think a girl her age and innocent as heck could of make it on her own in a city she never new in those years. I almost stop after a quarter in but hung in to see what she'd become.