"I'm that kind of person. The worst kind of person. I'm a beach person," claims the narrator near the outset of the hilarious Save What's Left, Elizabeth Castellano's fictional tell-all about Kathleen Deane's descent into beach-town mayhem. The 50-something recent divorcee sells her Kansas home and purchases, sight unseen, a fixer-upper beach house on Long Island. The problem, of course, is that Kathleen is not the kind of beach person she imagined she'd become--strolling sandy shores and soaking in the sun--with the purchase of this new home following her husband's unexpected departure. Instead, she bemoans, "I'm now the kind of horrible person who genuinely cares about what so-and-so had to say about the traffic from the chowder festival," and has a box full of paper complaints that "began as minor grievances but are now exhibits in a money-laundering scheme."
It's easy to romanticize small-town, beachside life; who hasn't dreamt of giving it all up in favor of a simpler way of living? But in her debut novel, Castellano reveals something like a hidden underbelly in this too-common dream: bickering neighbors, ugly construction, never-ending parking nightmares. As the capers of Kathleen's neighbors, though, become more and more over-the-top, Save What's Left becomes something of a parody of beach-town living, packed with laugh-out-loud moments of absurdity, and touching moments of community and camaraderie found in unexpected corners. An easy, breezy delight from start to finish, Save What's Left is a charming, comedic tale of one woman's quest to reinvent herself--and perhaps reinvent her new town in the process. --Kerry McHugh, freelance writer