Afloat by Jennifer McCartney AFLOAT by Jennifer McCartney Published by Hamish Hamilton 22 February 2007 Click to buy Afloat Review, written by Dianne Redpath Jennifer McCartney dips her toe into the waters with her debut Novel AFLOAT. Beautifully written with enough narrative to let you feel you could be there and with the conviction that our writer has. Identify the passing of the season and the dynamic change within the group. Jennifer winds you through a cast of characters and a lifetime of memories, touching upon some painful discoveries in a sensitive and understanding manner. Written in two different timescales, you get to link arms with a young Bell as she embarks on a magical summer in Mackinac. Follow her to a romantic engagement overlooking the sea. Grow to know and love the characters from her youth as she dips in and out of her memory from an almost perfect summer. A summer, that ultimately ends in betrayal and survival. Empathise with an old lady as she lets you into her memories, dragging characters from 40 years ago and the feelings that lived with them onto the page. Watch with her the hours tick by until her visitor is due to arrive. Find yourself speculating on the purpose of the visit and the identity of the visitor themselves. Not one for reading even the back cover before embarking into a book this one had me rushing headlong through chapters, only to be proved wrong in my assumptions. A delicious, sexy, energising read that pulls you headlong into a vodka-fuelled party with the seriousness of adulthood on the fringes. Dust off your old bike, loosen your hair and ride headlong down the nearest hill.   ~ # ~