Paging Aphrodite: A Novel - Softcover

Green, Kim

 
9780385337199: Paging Aphrodite: A Novel
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0385337191 ISBN 13: 9780385337199
Verlag: Delta, 2004

Inhaltsangabe

Four strong women from different walks of life in Australia, London and San Francisco, they've all come to the breathtakingly beautiful isle of Corfu seeking the same thing—refuge. Between marriage woes, dead-end careers, and demanding families, these women need a vacation—a little sun, a few shots of Sambuca, and a couple of sexy Greek men will surely allow them to relax, right? Maybe not.

Australian Claire Dillon is 46, still has amazing legs, and is ready for a change. Her husband is having an affair with a 29-year old masseuse, and her gay son is looking for a father figure in a series of unsuitable boyfriends. When she takes off for Corfu in the middle of disaster, everyone says she's gone mad—and she's out to prove them right.

Parker Glass' marriage lasted eleven days, not exactly what the perfectionist interior designer from San Francisco had dreamed of. After a breakdown at work, her partner firmly suggests she use her scheduled honeymoon time for some much needed sun and relaxation in the Greek Isles. At first, the vacation seems just the thing for getting her life back on track... but sometimes the cure is worse than the disease.

Anya Soberanes is convinced she's cursed—how else could she still be looking for her soulmate? When her aunt finds her unconscious in her San Francisco apartment after inadvertently overdosing on sleeping pills and telenovelas, her parents give her an ultimatum: either take a vacation with her friend's sister Parker, or check into a mental-health facility. As Anya discovers, facing her fears is easy in Greece—it's making her dreams come true that's the hard part.

25-year old Londoner Kelah Morris wants more than anything to publish a brilliant novel and prove to her editor mother that she's destined for more than selling popcorn at the cinema. All Kelah needs is an escape from her overbearing parents, dead-end job, jailbird brother and just-published friends to free herself of her infamous writer's block. Butshe doesn't factor in the possibility of wild career success and true love on her island getaway.

Together, these four women discover that sometimes you need to get away from it all to discover what you really need.

Die Inhaltsangabe kann sich auf eine andere Ausgabe dieses Titels beziehen.

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Kim Green lives in San Francisco with her husband and daughter.

Aus dem Klappentext

Four strong women from different walks of life in Australia, London and San Francisco, they've all come to the breathtakingly beautiful isle of Corfu seeking the same thing - refuge. Between marriage woes, dead-end careers, and demanding families, these women need a vacation - a little sun, a few shots of Sambuca, and a couple of sexy Greek men will surely allow them to relax, right? Maybe not.

Australian Claire Dillon is 46, still has amazing legs, and is ready for a change. Her husband is having an affair with a 29-year old masseuse, and her gay son is looking for a father figure in a series of unsuitable boyfriends. When she takes off for Corfu in the middle of disaster, everyone says she's gone mad - and she's out to prove them right.

Parker Glass' marriage lasted eleven days, not exactly what the perfectionist interior designer from San Francisco had dreamed of. After a breakdown at work, her partner firmly suggests she use her scheduled honeymoon time for some much needed sun and relaxation in the Greek Isles. At first, the vacation seems just the thing for getting her life back on track... but sometimes the cure is worse than the disease.

Anya Soberanes is convinced she's cursed - how else could she still be looking for her soulmate? When her aunt finds her unconscious in her San Francisco apartment after inadvertently overdosing on sleeping pills and telenovelas, her parents give her an ultimatum: either take a vacation with her friend's sister Parker, or check into a mental-health facility. As Anya discovers, facing her fears is easy in Greece - it's making her dreams come true that's the hard part.

25-year old Londoner Kelah Morris wants more than anything to publish a brilliant novel and prove to her editor mother that she's destined for more than selling popcorn at the cinema. All Kelah needs is an escape from her overbearing parents, dead-end job, jailbird brother and just-published friends to free herself of her infamous writer's block. Butshe doesn't factor in the possibility of wild career success and true love on her island getaway.

Together, these four women discover that sometimes you need to get away from it all to discover what you really need.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

Chapter One


Parker

“The bus stop is about twenty-five meters from the bank across the square. It is open from seven a.m. to eleven p.m.,” I read.

The guidebook was clear on this point. The village was not. I looked around the plaza, which was not unpretty, with flowers and bits of green poking up out of the cobbled paths. The only thing 25 meters from the bank was a leathery-looking man with a donkey and milky blind eyes selling cheap leather briefcases and backpacks. Anya glanced at me timidly. She was wearing too-tight black synthetic stretch pants and a blouse with sweat stains under the arms. It was at least ninety degrees. Her outfit irritated me.

“I’ll just ask someone,” Anya said.

“Whatever you want to do.” I snapped the guidebook shut.

Anya teetered off on platform sandals toward a knot of women in what looked to be black nuns’ habits. I fanned the bench with some newspaper, sat down, and tried not to freak out.

She’d been driving me nuts since we left San Francisco International Airport, what felt like sixty-eight hours ago but was actually closer to fourteen. How the hell did I get into this mess? What had started out as a little involuntary R & R courtesy of my nonrefundable honeymoon booking, Dr. Moron and meddlesome Molly had morphed into a bona fide Hellenic horror show.

I’d gotten a call from my sister Carda a week before we were set to leave for Corfu. In between crying jags and obsessing about Neil, I filled out my packing spreadsheet in Excel.

“Park? It’s Carda.”

“Hi,” I said. I was debating whether to bring 30 or 45 sunblock.

“I have to talk to you about something.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I know I’m going with you to Greece to help you get over the Neil thing and all, but I was wondering—”

“First of all, Cardamom, Neil and I aren’t a thing, and second, there’s nothing to get over. We’re married, and we have an apartment and a life and I’m sure once he gets this out of his system—” I sounded shrill and stopped myself abruptly. I’m a firm believer in the adage that showing weakness makes you more of a victim. Play your cards close to your vest and no one will know for sure what they’re dealing with.

“Okay. Sorry. Sheesh. I didn’t mean anything. Don’t be so oversensitive, Park.”

“Fine, I won’t be oversensitive. Look, I’m really busy packing. What do you want to ask me?”

Carda had been appointed my minder for the trip by unanimous family vote for the precise reason that her presence tended to infuriate me ever so slightly less than the other members of clan Glass. There was no point in trying to get out of it—once Leo and Sue took you up as a cause, they would picket, strike, rally, and protest until you came around. I suppose on some level I knew they had my best interests at heart. That, and the slim likelihood of their other children taking care of them in retirement if I went insane.

“Well, I got an e-mail from Jake a couple days ago. You know, the guy I met at Burning Man last year? He was still going out with this batik artist called Sonia then, but I guess they broke up, and he’s organizing a trip to the Lost Coast for a bunch of people. It’s, um, next week.”

“Uh-huh.” I fingered my pill case. Does one have to declare Class IV narcotics?

“So, what I wanted to tell you was, I gave my ticket to Anya Soberanes. She had vacation time saved up. Isn’t that awesome?”

I dropped the case. “No, Cardamom, it’s not awesome. It’s kind of crappy, actually. Are you telling me you’re not coming with me to Greece?”

“Well, Park, it’s like . . . you see . . . Jake and I, we have this amazing bond. Jake says we must have been friends in a former life. I checked with my astrologer, and she said a soul mate would reenter my life this year. I guess I thought you’d be happy for me for a change—”

“I barely know Anya! I’m not going to Greece with her!”

“You don’t have to yell at me!” Carda shouted.

“Tell me you didn’t promise Anya she could come with me.”

“I sort of transferred the ticket to her name already,” Carda mumbled.

“What?”

“I said, we already put the ticket in her name.”

“Well, transfer it back. Or, better yet, forget you were ever coming. In fact, forget you ever knew me.”

“But, um, Anya already asked for the vacation time and got her passport from her safe-deposit box.”

“Well, I guess she’ll have to go somewhere else. Hey, I heard there’s a losers’ trip to the Lost Coast,” I said meanly.

Carda was silent. I could feel guilt creep up my neck.

“Fine,” she said finally, before I could apologize. “Then you tell her.”

“I’m not telling her. You tell her. You’re the one who gave the ticket away.”

“Nope.”

There’s one thing about Carda: She may be flaky, but she’s almost as stubborn as I am. I tried to imagine recuperating in the company of earnest, overweight, terminally insecure, Spanish-soap-opera-watching Anya Soberanes and felt my chest muscles constrict.

“Okay, whatever. She can go,” I muttered.

“Oh, Park, I’m so glad! I’m sure you’ll have a lot to talk about with Anya.”

“Tons.”

The last time Anya and I had a meaningful exchange was in 1979, when Danny Fischbein dunked her braid in green paint at the Campaign Against Apartheid meeting our parents had dragged us to. She cried so hard she hyperventilated. I had to coax her out from under the table with a slice of my mom’s veggie loaf.

“Parker?”

“Hmm?”

“You’re the best sister and I love you.”

“Hmm.”

Thus, this is what my honeymoon had come to. Instead of having good athletic sex with Neil under a canopy of bougainvillea, I was shepherding around a vestal virgin with a faint mustache while my supposed husband raised barns in another hemisphere.

Anya came running back, looking, if possible, even sweatier. “Parker, the grandmothers told me to go to the next block. There’s another square there, where the bus stops.”

Grandmothers, huh? Funny, I thought they were nuns.

Sleep didn’t come that first night. I was prepared for it and had a couple of Halcions lined up along the nightstand, next to a cylinder of Greek bottled water and my favorite essential oil balm of lavender, marjoram, and Roman chamomile, which I’d rubbed on my temples per the instructions. At least the room was clean and nice. Actually, the villa was the best thing that had happened so far: a couple of minutes beyond town, on a twisty road canopied with olive trees that wound its way down to the beach. White and spartan and flanked by pungent flowers in magenta and red, with the requisite bright blue door, it was costing us fifteen dollars a night each. Anya had surprised me by laughing when our landlord, Mrs. Gianniotis, threw out a number as we stood with our suitcases in front of the charming house. Anya’s teeth had flashed, straight and very white. She’d wrapped her long ponytail around her fingers, laid her hand gently on the stout woman’s shoulder, and whispered a counteroffer. Apparently, she was good at it, because after she and Mrs. Gianniotis haggled and came to an...

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Verlag
Delta
Erscheinungsdatum
2004
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0385337191
ISBN 13 
9780385337199
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
368
Kontakt zum Hersteller
Nicht verfügbar
Verantwortliche Person
Nicht verfügbar

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