Product Description

Ethan and Jorie, the perfect couple, have been married for 13 years, and are still very much in love. But 13 years ago, Ethan committed a brutal rape and murder. A young girl's phone call exposes him, and nothing will ever be the same for them again.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #60256 in Books
• Published on: 2002-04-04
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 304 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Alice Hoffman's Blue Diary is a gripping tale of good and evil, of ordinary families whose lives are wrenched apart by death. It questions whether you can ever really know anyone, even members of your immediate family you have known all your life, and whether you would be able to find it in your heart to forgive someone you love and respect when they are accused of a crime so terrible that it smashes your whole world to pieces.

Jorie and Ethan Ford are a golden couple blessed with an 11-year-old son, Collie, living a decent, quiet life in small-town Massachusetts. Ethan is a pillar of the community--a handsome, good man, whose life revolves around his family, his work as a carpenter and his roles as volunteer fireman and Little League coach. Since he first walked into her home-town, her life and her bed 13 years before, Jorie has never lost the feeling that she is special, singled out by fate to live a charmed life with a man she still desires and a son she adores. And then, on a glorious Monday morning in June, Jorie's fate turns and her life as she knows it is changed. One wonders whether the hand of fate will offer her any kind of salvation and if she can come to terms with the unimaginable.

Kat Williams, Collie's next-door neighbour and best friend is mature beyond her years. In her short life, she has had to cope with the loss of her father, a distant mother and a sister who attracts, and dispenses with, boyfriends as flies to a light, but who has taken to self-mutilation to heal her numbness. Is Kat the only one who can instinctively feel when something, or someone, is wrong? Charlotte, Jorie's best friend since childhood, knows when something is amiss, but her own terrible losses and lack of self-worth cause her to mistrust her feelings and internalise blame.

In the pages of this (relatively) short novel, Ms Hoffman manages to cover the singular emotions involved in so many different relationships--from parental, marital, sibling, friendship and even criminal-victim. The writing demonstrates enormous intelligence and endless compassion, an ability to cut through the sharp edges of humanity and look deep into a person's soul. In spite of its dark, disturbing theme, Blue Diary is an inspiring story of the enduring spirit of human love. Carey Green

The Times
‘Like her contemporaries, Hoffman has an acute eye for detail… Hoffman writes with heartbreaking clarity’

Daily Mail
‘Alice Hoffman is simply brilliant’

Customer Reviews

Captivating and emotionally charged
I hadn't read the synopsis of this book very carefully so the focus of the story came as a bit of a surprise to me, as I was expecting more of a crime story. Saying that, I was very pleasantly surprised. Having read only one of Alice Hoffman's previous books (At Risk) I didn't know all that much about her style of writing, but I find her prose almost magical at times and I loved the way she avoided so many stereotypical episodes that would have ruined the story.

I normally don't like stories with too many details about too many people as I generally find that they clutter a book. That was not the case in Blue Diary, rather the opposite, it showed how a lot of people were affected by Ethan/Bryon's crime and the many different ways in which the town reacted.

I particularly found the characters of Jorie and Kat compelling. Jorie was the wife of a man she knew nothing about. In a few minutes her entire world falls apart and she struggles with herself to not only justify the overpowering love she's felt for her husband for all those years, but also with her doubts about her own ability to judge someone's character. She accepts his guilt, but she still doesn't want to believe that he's a bad man. I kept wondering what she would do and it isn't until just before the end that she finds out his true character and then she makes her decision. Kat on the other hand is the one who turns Ethan in and she spends her summer holiday not only on the border between childhood and budding womanhood, but also dealing with the immense guilt she feels about ruining her best friend's life. She's also burdened by her mother's and sister's inability to deal with her father's suicide a year earlier.

This book was such a pleasant surprise and I highly recommend it.

SO TRUE
All I will say is that I cried at the ending of this book and I have read many books in my life... only a handful have had that effect. Alice Hoffman has done herself proud. There are lessons to be learned in reading this book. One of them and the most powerful is that even if you don't see them right away, there will ALWAYS be consequences, even ones you could never have thought of. The characters all find that you must ultimately take responsibility for everything you do, both 'good' and 'bad'. A very moving tale. Read it.

Evocative
Having never come across Alice Hoffman before I didn't know what to expect. I found her style of writing utterly captivating - I could taste the strawberrys and hear the blackbirds. If you like descriptive, lyrical writers who can put you in the place with their words - read this. After reading this in 2 sittings I am now desparate to try another of Alice Hoffman's books.