The Bridge

The Bridge is the newest release from NYT bestselling author Karen Kingsbury. The publisher is Howard Books. From the back cover.~

Number one New York Times bestselling author Karen Kingsbury delivers an instant classic with this heartwarming Christmas story about a hundred-year flood, lost love, and the beauty of enduring friendships.

Molly Allen lives alone in Portland, but she left her heart back in Tennessee with a man she walked away from five years ago. They had a rare sort of love she hasn’t found since.

Ryan Kelly lives in Nashville after a broken engagement and several years on the road touring with a country music duo. He can still hear Molly’s voice encouraging him to follow his dreams; Molly, whose memory stays with him. At least he can visit The Bridge—the oldest bookstore in historic downtown Franklin—and remember the hours he and Molly once spent there.

For thirty years, Charlie and Donna Barton have run The Bridge, providing the people of middle Tennessee with coffee, conversation, and shelves of good books—even through dismal book sales and the rise of digital books. Then in May, the hundred-year flood swept through Franklin and destroyed nearly every book in the store.

Now the bank is pulling the lease on The Bridge. Despondent and without answers, Charlie considers the unthinkable. Then tragedy strikes, and suddenly, everything changes. In the face of desperate brokenness and lost opportunities, could the miracle of a second chance actually unfold?

The Bridge is a love story set against the struggle of the American bookstore, a love story you will never forget.

I was lucky enough to get an early copy of The Bridge from NetGalley. I’m a big fan of Karen Kingsbury and was really excited to read a book set in my backyard. I live in the Nashville area and was here when the hundred-year flood hit. I can picture exactly where The Bridge is located in Franklin, and know how much damage occurred in that area.

Kingsbury gives her readers another winner with The Bridge. This book is all about second chances and I openly admit it brought me to tears several times. Ryan and Molly met and fell in love at school in Nashville, but an outside force comes between them and Molly ends up moving home. While Ryan and Molly both move on with their lives, neither has ever forgotten or stopped loving the other. Ryan and Molly met Charlie and Donna Barton at The Bridge and would spend hours there reading to one another. Five years later, Charlie and Donna are about to lose The Bridge due to damage from the hundred-year flood that hit Franklin. Charlie becomes so despondent he truly feels like Donna would be better taken care of if he was dead. While Charlie does see that is not the way to fix things, he has a major car wreck on the way home and ends up in ICU in a Nashville hospital. Hearing about Charlie’s wreck brings Ryan, Molly and many of the former Bridge shoppers to the hospital to offer help to Donna and Charlie. I loved that Ryan and Molly finally got to reconnect and learn the truth about what had torn them apart all those years ago. They still had some trust issues at first, but they were given a second chance at love and didn’t want to waste it.

I had tears of sadness and joy while reading The Bridge, and totally felt uplifted when I finished reading. The official release date for The Bridge was October 23, 2012 and can be purchased from your favorite bookstore or online retailer.