Cocoa Beach audiobook

I met my husband in the least romantic setting possible: a casualty clearing station in northern France in the middle of February. A cold drizzle fell and the air stank of human rot. I suppose this constituted a warning from Providence, though Providence needn’t have bothered. I had always known better than to fall in love. I had always known love was something you would later regret. Miss Virginia Fortescue is a good and decent person. In 1917, a twenty-year-old with a knowledge of cars, thanks to her father, she volunteered in WW I as an ambulance driver on the front lines in France. In this world of darkness she also found a bit of light, in the person of a dazzlingly charming English doctor, Captain Simon Fitzwilliam. Sparks fly. Of course there are obstacles to be overcome. What about Virginia’s presumed immunity to such blandishments? What about his reputation as a womanizer? What about reports of his having a wife and child back in England? We know very early in the story, from encountering the quote cited above, that barriers will be crossed. We can also expect that trenches will be dug, ordnance will be employed, and opposition will be fierce. Beatriz Williams - from Bustle.comThe relationship between Virginia and Simon is certainly central, but the real meat of this novel lies in a mystery. Cocoa Beach, Florida, June 1922Someone has cleared the ruins away, but you can still see that a house burned to the ground here, not long ago. The earth is black and charred and the air smells faintly of soot. Virginia got news a short time before that Simon had died in that fire. She left New York with her two-year-old, Hazel, to see for herself what the situation was with the family holdings down there, and try to find out what Simon had been up to during his time in The Sunshine State. She is soon joined by Simon’s ne’er do well brother, Sam, and their sister Clara. From her arrival, Virginia is out of her element. Simon’s lawyer takes care of her initial arrangements, but was clearly expecting the grieving widow to be compliant and demure instead of inquisitive and assertive. The 20s was a time of great social change. Women stepping out of traditional roles more and more was a key element of the period. Virginia slowly finds and fits-in pieces of the puzzle. There are three streams to the tale. The contemporary (1922) setting in which Virginia is trying to make sense of everything in south Florida alternates, more or less, with a look back from Simon and Virginia meeting and courting during the war, to the point when they are separated. The third element is Simon’s letters to Virginia from Florida, hoping to gain back her trust and affection. In order to figure anything out you need facts. You need people to tell you truthfully about what they know. You need records that have not been falsified or misplaced. Virginia finds herself one of the only straight arrows in a quiver full of boomerangs. Did Simon lie to her about his brother Sam? Did he lie to her about what happened to his first wife? Is Sam lying to her about Simon? Is Clara telling her all that she knows? Simon hinted in his letters at dodgy doings in Florida as he tried to salvage the family business, and says he was trying to get out from under such entanglements. Was that true? And when she is approached by a federal agent, can she believe what he tells her? To add to the challenge, how much can Virginia believe her own memories? She had been seriously concussed in the war and that had some lasting repercussions. She has cause again, in her post-war experiences, to wonder at her own perceptions and recollections. But as squishy as Virginia’s take may be from time to time, of more concern is the maelstrom of dishonesty in which she finds herself. Mrs Virginia Fitzwilliam is no hand-wringing damsel in distress. She is a tough broad contending with dark forces in her attempt to find truth. One of the great successes of this novel is how Williams keeps you flipping the pages, eager to know what happens next. She manages to sustain an impressive level of tension throughout, offering a steady supply of small questions to be answered, small battles to be fought, in building up to the big finale. Who can Virginia believe in this perfidious paradise? And what clues can she unearth to keep from being sent wandering off into minefields? Cocoa Beach is part of a trilogy (so far) of 1920s books linked by a Revenue Service agent named Marshall, among other connections. He is a secondary character here, more prominent in The Wicked City. Virginia’s family story was told in the wonderful novel, A Certain Age, in which hers is among the secondary roles. She dashes off for Florida at the end of that. We get bits of that story as some details of her father’s travails are sprinkled in. You don’t need to have read that book before this one, but if you have not, there is definitely material in this one that is very spoilerish for that one. If you intend to read Williams’ group of Jazz Age books, begin with A Certain Age.Gripes are few. Beatriz Williams writes of various historical periods. This is the third Williams novel I have read, (there are plenty more) all three set in the 1920s. Each has a core male-female relationship, and I suppose a bit of the romance-y material is unavoidable. Descriptions of how manly this or that guy looked to Virginia made me mentally drum my fingers hoping for it to pass quickly. (I do recognize that this is an unfair gripe.) But I have also learned in reading these books that the romance, while structurally and motivationally important, is kept within reason. I read and enjoyed Cocoa Beach for the tension, the danger, the need to know what’s gonna happen next. Also, the cover seemed a miss to me, informing readers of little about the content of the book, beyond the setting in time and centrality of a young woman.That said, Cocoa Beach is a compulsive page-turner, a perfect fun summer read. You may pick up a bit of knowledge about what a few parts of the world were like a century ago, endure, or enjoy, a bit of large-scale and smaller-scale warfare, but mostly you will read this for the fun and excitement. And that’s no lie. Review first posted – April 7, 2017Publication dates-----June 27, 2017 - hardcover-----May 15, 2018 - trade paperback =============================EXTRA STUFFLinks to the author’s personal, Twitter and FB pagesMy review of Williams’ 2016 release, A Certain Age

Falling in love and marrying during a war usually turns out to be a good thing, but for Virginia Fortescue Fitzwilliam it wasn't working out.Virginia fell in love, married, and then spent hardly any time with her husband. The war is over, she still hasn't seen him, and then she returns to the United States to her father and her sister. Her family has secrets, and she finds out Simon does too. Simon seems to be the perfect manipulator and liar.We follow Virginia and Simon Fitzwilliam as the book goes back and forth from WWI to after the war and as their love affair blossomed and faded and the secrets Simon held were revealed.After three years of not seeing Simon, a fire in Cocoa Beach claimed his life, Virginia went there to settle things, and her adventure in Florida begins...well if you want to call it an adventure. An adventure is to be fun, but Virginia runs into trouble and more secrets.COCOA BEACH had beautifully detailed writing. It was a bit slow at first, but the story line was marvelous as always and filled with mystery.COCOA BEACH is another winner by Beatriz Williams that keeps you turning the pages wanting to know what really happened and what really was going on. Something sinister was brewing throughout, and the end will have you saying: What? Who was the bigger liar?ENJOY if you read COCOA BEACH...a marvelous, thoughtful read with mystery and a lot of questions. 4/5This book was given to me free of charge and without compensation by the publisher in return for an honest review.

Virginia is definitely a strong woman. When we first meet her she is driving an ambulance in France during WWI. She left her family home and all of her secrets behind in New York and ran away to France to help with the war. While there she meets a British doctor, Simon, who will change the whole course of her life. The book moves between Virginia's days in France and five years later when she moves to Florida to try to find out what happened to her husband and to settle his estate. This move puts her life and the life of her young daughter in danger and she continues to face challenges as she tries to solve the mystery surrounding his death.This was a fantastic very readable book. The author knew both time periods very well and managed to give us a look at life in the early part of the 20th century as she crafted an immensely interesting mystery plot. I highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys historical fiction.Thanks to goodreads for a copy of this book for review. I've never read this author before and I enjoyed this book so much that I'm now ordering her older books to read.

This was brilliant!!! It was set during and just after the First World War. It had all the ingredients that I love in a book, thrills, secrets, twists and turns. It never really gave anything anyway until the last chapter and even then you think “has it finished “? I love Beatrix Williams books and this one didn’t disappoint.

When I started to read Cocoa Beach did I not know that the previous two books A Certain Age, The Wicked City were loosely connected to this book. I only realized that when I started to read The Wicked City. Do I regret reading them in reversed order? Not at all, although I wish I could read them all again since I absolutely loved reading the books. Coca Beach takes place both in after-war Florida and on the battlefield of France during WW2. It's in France Virginia Fortescue meets the dashing Captain Simon Fitzwilliam who she falls in love with. But, five years later is she living alone with her daughter after leaving Fitzwilliam after marrying him.Now, there is nothing I love more than a good mystery and here we get several. What really happened to Simon Fitzwilliam in Florida, why did Virginia leave him and could Virginia be in danger?As much as I enjoyed this book was there moments towards the end of the book when I thought Virginia took things for face-value a bit too much. Honestly, woman, how about not trusting someone you hardly know and believe what he said. Do some investigations yourself instead. However, I do love the twists in the story towards the end of the book and the open ending, well now I know why Beatriz Williams left the story hanging that way...

This was the inaugural pick for Instagram's Salt Water Reads Book Club back in July and it was the PERFECT choice!Let me just say I have never read a Beatriz Williams book before and I am SO happy I finally did! I LOVED it! It combines two of my favorite genres: historical fiction and mystery. The writing style is compelling and I love the alternating chapters between Virginia's time in France and her time in Cocoa Beach. I found myself flipping through the pages trying to find out what happened to Simon. These are complex characters that kept building until the very end! The VIVID descriptions of the place and time transported me there. I could see every facet perfectly clear. Every character, every setting, it was IDYLLIC. The ending did confuse me a bit but thanks to the Salt Water Reads discussion, the author provided some clarity which led me to purchase THE WICKED CITY and A CERTAIN AGE - both prequels to COCOA BEACH. Yes, you can read this as a stand alone novel but I was so engrossed in this story that I had to tie up some loose ends and buy these books. I am officially a fan of Beatriz Williams. And yes #BeatrizBinge is absolutely a thing!! One last thing, there is something really interesting written in the Author's Note at the end of the book about the Maitland Plantation. I suggest you check it out when you finish the book. It's details like this that make me LOVE the novel that much more!

Review to follow!

Good book! Starts a little slow but picks up. The ending was a cliffhanger.. who were the two people? The ending is what made me give it a 4!

Favorite Quotes:I’d never received a compliment like that. Certainly not from a grown man, a man of mating age. I didn’t even know that kind of man, other than that he existed, a separate and untamed species, kept in another cage from mine on the opposite end of the zoo. And that was well enough with me. I had no interest in mating. Having survived such a childhood, I thought myself practical and resourceful – and I was, by God!Because while houses burned down regularly, and people died all the time, I had never imagined that Simon could meet his end like that. You could not extinguish my husband in mere flame. I simply wasn’t possible. My Review:Cocoa Beach was a mesmerizing read. Beatriz Williams has more than mastered her craft. Her words imbued her characters with a luxurious texture and her lush and effusively detailed scenes pulled me right inside the narrator’s head. I could see the cigarette smoke curling, smell the orange blossoms, hear the car engines, and feel the reverberations of bomb explosions. But the characters – oh the characters! I was spellbound and confounded by them. I frequently waffled and felt conflicted, as I did not want Simon to be as wicked, greedy, unscrupulous, or as untrustworthy as Virginia was being led to believe. But someone was lying and I could not decide on whom as his entire family proved to be as slippery as eels with their words. Saying a lot while saying nothing precisely, which required considerable skill and talent from the author to maintain. As with her other books, Cocoa Beach provided a substantial and meaty read with a complicated plot full of twists and turns as well as complex and alluring characters, and a maddeningly paced storyline to keep me on the hook as my wheels kept spinning while only digging me deeper and deeper into the Florida sand. Ms. William’s tantalizing words kept me engrossed, luring me into an intricate web of deceit and intrigue with several separate yet related mysteries going at once. The writing was densely populated with richly embellished sentences and heaving with opulent and evocative details. She could conjure entire communities in a paragraph or detail the act of obtaining and taking an aspirin for an entire page. This was not a fast or light read but an intense and enthralling tale to savor.

Virginia Fortescue's life hasn't really been easy. Her mother was murdered when she was just a child and obviously this has impacted her tremendously. As an adult, she has spent a lot of time driving ambulances in the war. While at the war, she met Dr. Simon Fitzwilliam and sparks flew. They got married and had a child, but things got complicated and they became estranged. Virginia gets news that Simon has died in a fire at his house in Florida. Virginia hurries down there to see what exactly happened and the more she discovers about Simon, the worse it gets. It doesn't help that Simon's twin, Samuel, is also down in Florida sending her mixed messages about Simon and Agent Marshall is constantly warning her to go back home as she and her daughter could be in danger. The more Virginia uncover about the truth surrounding her husband, the more she wants to find out despite the dangers involved. Cocoa Beach by Beatriz Williams is a suspenseful thriller set in Prohibition age Florida that kept me on the edge of my seat.Read the rest of my review here:http://www.confessionsofabookaddict.c...

I am so glad that I took a gamble and bought Beatriz Williams newest book: COCOA BEACH: A NOVEL. This turned out to be my favorite novel of hers, so far. My second most loved novel by Ms Williams is: ALONG THE INFINITE SEA, it takes place during and after WW Two. Her newest novel, just published this month, takes place in France between 1917 and 1919, and then in America. American, Virginia Fortescue, drives an ambulance through the muddy fields of WW One France. This is how she meets the British Captain Simon Fitzwilliam, a Doctor, in the barn that's a British Hospital. It's quite obvious, from the first time they meet, that sparks fly between them. Virginia is with the newly formed American Red Cross. She drives recuperating patients, to the American hospital, a once upon a time real castle, with a moat and drawbridge, even! Driving one day, a bomb explodes in front of Virginia's jeep, knocking her out cold. She's taken to Captain Fitzwilliam who takes care of her, and her serious head injury. They've fallen in love, and begin to have an affair. Simon is the twin brother of Samuel. He's the oldest, but their British Estate has gone downhill along with the family money, so there's not much he wants to inherit there. He plans to go to Florida, where the family owns some thousand acres of land near Cocoa Beach, an old orange grove. Virginia, now Mrs Fitzwilliam, goes home to her Dad's home, when she finds out that she's pregnant. Simon, Samuel, and their sister Clara Fitzwilliam have convoluted and extremely confusing lives. So what is all this confusion about, and why? Then, Virginia and her daughter don't go down to Florida, where Simon is, for three years. Why? Well, you will have to read this romantic, psychological thriller to find out the answers to those questions. I will say that Ms Williams wrote her several stunning and complex main characters, with real emotional profundity. These are definitely well-written characterizations and they won't disappoint you! It's a very rare book that makes my heart race and my hands sweat! However, the nearer I got to the ending, when all of them are in Cocoa Beach; that's exactly what happened to me! This novel is full of blackmailers, liars, pretenders, bootleggers, and other criminals; who have all come to settle on the cheap land in Florida. The ending of this book, was left open enough that there has just GOT TO BE A SEQUEL!! I TRULY HOPE SO, ANYWAY!! If you don't read this Beatriz Williams book, you are unquestionably going to miss out on her best book, yet: COCOA BEACH: A NOVEL...... and so much more!!! Fantastic story!

“Maybe little girls should have a chance to see the world a bit, while they’re still young enough to see it in wonder.” Virginia Fortescue Fitzwilliam, Cocoa Beach Cocoa Beach by Beatriz Williams is told in alternating time periods, in France during WWII and 5 years later in Cocoa Beach, FL. This was my first Beatriz Williams novel and it won’t be my last. I found that most of the chapters ended on cliff hangers and then switched back and forth between the two time periods, which left my anticipation continuous from start to finish. Cocoa Beach was full of drama and with every one of them I was left wanting more answers. Despite WWII and life immediately after WWII being truly desperate times, I found charm in the pages of this book. The romance between Virginia and Captain Simon Fitzwilliam is what true love stories are made of, but was it real? I found myself constantly questioning the characters motives and trying to decipher the truths from the lies. Cocoa Beach is packed from the beginning to the end with rich history, frantic situations and character developments. While I found the entire book to be highly detailed and thoroughly satisfying I did find the ending to be a bit rushed. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t hate the ending, I just wanted more. I wanted it to be treated with the same finesse the rest of the book was. This ending was one to be savored. I will say after completing the book and doing some research on the ending, I discovered the part I was most confused by related to another one of Beatriz Williams' novels, The Wicked City. If you enjoy historical fiction that combines charm, betrayal and anticipation, Cocoa Beach by Beatriz Williams is for you!I give this one 4 suspenseful stars out of 5.

Another highly enjoyable book by Beatriz Williams. Typical of her books, Cocoa Beach has plenty of scandals and secrets. Virginia met Captain Simon Fitzwilliam while she was an ambulance driver during the war in France. Five years later she and her daughter arrive in Cocoa Beach having been told that her estranged husband has died. Virginia seeks to learn more about Simon's life while they were apart. I did find this story a bit more confusing than many of Williams books. There is a lot going on particularly at the end. I highly recommend reading A Certain Age and Wicked City first since Virginia and other characters in this novel tie to these books. I still had a little trouble at first remembering the connections. I did find the book much more satisfying once I remembered more about the prior two books. I am very excited about reading her upcoming sequel to Wicked City , The Wicked Redhead.

This is a book that I never would have picked up on my own. It was the first pick for the saltwaterreads Instagram book club. Even as I started reading it, I had my doubts about whether or not I'd like it. Once I made it a couple of chapters in I was hooked. Cocoa Beach is beautifully written and thoroughly researched. I never, ever saw that jaw dropping twist coming at the very end. I wasn't expecting it to be "that kind of book," so I was pleasantly surprised when I reached the big reveal. I would absolutely read another one of Beatriz Williams books!

I hadn't read Ms. Williams last book, A Certain Age, yet, but I knew I had to do that before I read this book because her characters always make peek appearances in future books. I really need a detailed family tree of connections, please. But, I was really glad I did. While I really liked the characters of Sophie and Octavian in A Certain Age, the story itself didn't keep me on my toes like Cocoa Beach did. The entire time I was reading Cocoa Beach, I was unsure whether Simon was good or bad. Would he be Virginia's one true love or her huge mistake. I love how the trials of her childhood (that we learned about in Certain Age), came back to haunt her and her choices in this book. It really kept me on my toes until the last moment. As always, you get drawn in to the time period that Ms. Williams writes about and into her characters lives as if they were your next door neighbor. This was a thoroughly enjoyable and well written summer read.