THE SUMMERHOUSE

If you could change one decision in your life and do it over, what would you choose? Three strangers share their stories and their dreams; twenty years later, they share their heartache and disillusionment. Melissa Hughes draws us into the stories with her calm, pleasant, slightly accented voice and steady pacing, building towards the end, with several suspenseful points along the way. She does a marvelous job narrating each woman's story, with voices that both create and complement the images presented to us: Leslie is soft and gentle, looking to comfort and find compromise; Madison is cold, brittle, hard, and angry--a gray shell of the woman she could have been; Ellie is bitter, resentful, and self-conscious. And, by the end, we care very much about which choices they make. W.L.S. (c) AudioFile 2002, Portland, Maine [Published: AUG/SEP 02]