La Quinta Cove

Sail

by James Patterson

Katherine Dunne decided to take her three children, Carrie —a college student, Mark—a high schooler, and Ernie, age 10, for a vacation on the family’s sailboat in order to try to improve her relationship with her children. Ever since the death of their father, things had not been good with the family. Katherine worked too much at her profession as a heart surgeon and the children resented their new stepfather. She talked her former brother-in-law, Jake, into captaining the boat for the trip that was to cement the relationship between mother and offspring.

From the beginning the trip got off to a poor start, with the children bickering and complaining. The boat developed mechanical trouble and they ran into a fierce storm, which threatened to sink the boat. They sent out a signal to the Coast Guard giving their location and requesting help. After being battered by the storm, they determined that help was not forthcoming. In celebration of their survival from the storm, their uncle tossed the kids into the sea and they were all swimming and playing in the water when the ship blew up. Jake was severely burned in the explosion. They began to suspect that this was not all coincidence when the Coast Guard never did respond to their SOS. After spending days in the water, Jake died of his burns and the family finally drifted to an uninhabited island.

Who would stand to benefit if they were never found? Who would inherit the millions left to the family from her first husband? These and other questions will be answered as the story continues.

This was a good, quick read and was well written in the enjoyable style of James Patterson, one of my favorite authors.