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Sunnyville
Marion Legrand arrives from France with her daughter after receiving a cryptic letter from her ailing sister Mimi, unaware of what lies in store for them in Florida. They are assailed by a coterie of oddballs at an “otherwise stable no-nonsense age discretionary retirement community”. It’s late-life crisis at Sunny Glen Palms, and from the golf greens to the clubhouse the veil of the American psyche is lifted, revealing the sometimes breezy sometimes topsy-turvy world of retirement. Oh I’ve wasted my mind don’t you see, says Libby Alsatian, I’ve killed my mind and I have to fix it. Right here!’ The residents’ problems run the gamut from Alzheimer’s disease, existential angst and anti-depressants to a major glitch in the plans for Flora Wheeler’s monumental one hundredth birthday party.
267 pages, Paperback
First published December 13, 2013
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About the author
Ricko Donovan
6 books16 followersRicko Donovan is an award-winning singer/songwriter and folk music multi-instrumentalist. He has published two novels, Sunnyville and The Broken Promised Land. Sunnyville was a Nashville Lifestyles Magazine's 2014 Summer Reading List pick. His short story Smokes was included in the Ohio Review. Sun of Sunnyville is scheduled for release in November 2024. He lives in Hot Springs, Arkansas.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
December 5, 2016
My original Sunnyville audiobook review and many others can be found at Audiobook Reviewer.
In his debut novel, Ricko Donovan explores live, relationships, and death in a 55+ retirement community in Florida in 2004. The action takes place on the golf course, by the community pool and at the club house where the neighborhood is gearing up for Flora’s 100th birthday party. Flora is temporarily looking after her great-great-granddaughter, Melinda, a teenager who is wise beyond her years, is struggling to fit in with her own age group, and has a difficult relationship with her hardworking mother. Newcomers Marion and her daughter, Elise, are visiting from France to care for Marion’s sister, Mimi, who’s been hospitalized after a stroke.
It took me a while to get into this. A lot of characters were introduced and the perspective kept switching frequently. I found it difficult to keep up with who’s who, their connection and some of the dialogue. It became more engaging the more I listened, but I have to admit I never felt emotionally invested in the characters. I’m not sure whether it’s just that I was perhaps not the right audience for this. For some reason, I had expected this to be more humorous than it was. But the strongest emotion this story evoked was actually anger at the character of Frank. His wife is increasingly gripped by dementia on top of a diagnosis of bipolar disorder. He’s the only carer. Now, I realize caring on your own for a loved one whose mind is slipping and who may act erratically and/or is depressed is an immensely stressful and difficult job. But Frank deals with it either by denial or by whining about being late for golf, he locks(!) his wife in the property, and even when she pleads with him to accompany him to a social outing, he leaves her home alone while he goes off socializing. Because she may embarrass him!
The ending was rather abrupt and left some things open to the interpretation of the listener, such as the storyline about Frank and his wife or Melinda and her mother. Honestly, being part of these characters’ lives for ten hours didn’t make me want to rush out and buy a place in such a community in preparation for retirement, but I guess that wasn’t the author’s intention here.
The author is also the narrator, and I assume it’s his first experience of narrating an audiobook. As such, he was doing a reasonable job and you could tell by his enthusiasm this story obviously means a lot to him. He gave his characters different voices and while the female voices didn’t always sound natural, he was keeping all the characters consistent. The pace was quite fast and sometimes it became noticeable that breathing became an issue during long sentences. My issue with the production was the music. It linked chapters and/or announced a switch of perspective. Unfortunately, the music and the narration overlapped making it difficult to hear some sentences.
I’ve found this review rather difficult to write, as I appreciate how much effort the author must have put into the writing of the book and the narration of the audiobook, and I would have loved to rate this higher. But this represents my honest review and as mentioned above, maybe I was just the wrong audience.
Story 3 stars. Narration 3 stars.
Audiobook provided for review by the audiobookreviewer.com
In his debut novel, Ricko Donovan explores live, relationships, and death in a 55+ retirement community in Florida in 2004. The action takes place on the golf course, by the community pool and at the club house where the neighborhood is gearing up for Flora’s 100th birthday party. Flora is temporarily looking after her great-great-granddaughter, Melinda, a teenager who is wise beyond her years, is struggling to fit in with her own age group, and has a difficult relationship with her hardworking mother. Newcomers Marion and her daughter, Elise, are visiting from France to care for Marion’s sister, Mimi, who’s been hospitalized after a stroke.
It took me a while to get into this. A lot of characters were introduced and the perspective kept switching frequently. I found it difficult to keep up with who’s who, their connection and some of the dialogue. It became more engaging the more I listened, but I have to admit I never felt emotionally invested in the characters. I’m not sure whether it’s just that I was perhaps not the right audience for this. For some reason, I had expected this to be more humorous than it was. But the strongest emotion this story evoked was actually anger at the character of Frank. His wife is increasingly gripped by dementia on top of a diagnosis of bipolar disorder. He’s the only carer. Now, I realize caring on your own for a loved one whose mind is slipping and who may act erratically and/or is depressed is an immensely stressful and difficult job. But Frank deals with it either by denial or by whining about being late for golf, he locks(!) his wife in the property, and even when she pleads with him to accompany him to a social outing, he leaves her home alone while he goes off socializing. Because she may embarrass him!
The ending was rather abrupt and left some things open to the interpretation of the listener, such as the storyline about Frank and his wife or Melinda and her mother. Honestly, being part of these characters’ lives for ten hours didn’t make me want to rush out and buy a place in such a community in preparation for retirement, but I guess that wasn’t the author’s intention here.
The author is also the narrator, and I assume it’s his first experience of narrating an audiobook. As such, he was doing a reasonable job and you could tell by his enthusiasm this story obviously means a lot to him. He gave his characters different voices and while the female voices didn’t always sound natural, he was keeping all the characters consistent. The pace was quite fast and sometimes it became noticeable that breathing became an issue during long sentences. My issue with the production was the music. It linked chapters and/or announced a switch of perspective. Unfortunately, the music and the narration overlapped making it difficult to hear some sentences.
I’ve found this review rather difficult to write, as I appreciate how much effort the author must have put into the writing of the book and the narration of the audiobook, and I would have loved to rate this higher. But this represents my honest review and as mentioned above, maybe I was just the wrong audience.
Story 3 stars. Narration 3 stars.
Audiobook provided for review by the audiobookreviewer.com
September 23, 2018
This book had such potential but alas, it was page after page of the mundane lives of a bunch or seniors living at a retirement community called Sunnyville. Occasionally there was a little excitement but it was followed by another day of the same 'ol, same 'ol. It dealt with some meaty issues of the elderly, like Alzheimer's, but never went deeper than the surface. Way too many characters, NO quotes on dialogue which was probably meant to be a style of writing but it didn't work. I really wanted to like this book. I had heard the author sing/play at a local establishment (which is where I bought the book). I actually thought it might be a comedy judging by the cover but it just felt like reading every second, of every day of a bunch of grouchy (mostly) seniors. It would have made a perfect SHORT STORY as Donovan is a decent writer; just boring.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews