I first picked up one of Karen White’s books in an airport gift shop on a flight a couple of years ago.  It was going to be a long flight and I needed something new and different.  I needed an author and a book that I had never read before to keep my mind off of my newly acquired dislike of flying.  I found The Beach Trees.  It totally held my interest as I flew South from the Pacific Northwest.

Last night, I finished Karen’s newest book, The Time Between, set mostly on Edisto Island in the beautiful South Carolina lowcountry.  There aren’t many writers who can move me to tears – or laughter – with the written word, but Karen did both in this book.

I also remembered the happy time spent with my husband and youngest child on Edisto Island many years ago.

Here is the inside cover synopsis of The Time Between, just in case you’re interested in a good read…

“New York Times bestselling author Karen White delivers a novel of two generations of sisters and secrets set in the stunning South Carolina lowcountry.”

“Eleanor Murray will always remember her childhood on Edisto Island, where her late father, a local shrimper, shared her passion for music.  Now her memories of him are all that tempers the guilt she feels over the accident that put her sister in a wheelchair – and the feelings she harbors for her sister’s husband.

To help support her sister, Eleanor works at a Charleston investment firm during the day, but she escapes into her music, playing piano at a neighborhood bar.  Until the night her enigmatic boss walks in and offers her a part-time job caring for his elderly aunt Helena back on Edisto.  For Eleanor, it’s a chance to revisit the place where she was her happiest – and to share her love of music with grieving Helena, whose sister recently died under mysterious circumstances.

An island lush with sweetgrass and salt marshes, Edisto has been a peaceful refuge for Helena, who escaped with her sister from war-torn Hungary in 1944.  The sisters were well-known on the island, there they volunteered in their church and community.  But now Eleanor will finally learn the truth about their past:  secrets that will help heal her relationship with her own sister – and set Eleanor free…”

I remember the Botany Bay road below.  An amazing place…

Edisto Island images here.  Photos above from the Edisto Island, S.C. promotional site.