Exceeding Expectations by Lisa April Smith
Publish Date: December 1, 2011
eBook, 300 pages
Fiction, Historical, Romance, Suspense, General Fiction
BSIN: B006GDK3NO
My Review:
Exceeding Expectations is a book that will do just that. The blurb sounds great but once you delve into the book you realize it is so much more packed into one book. It's fascinating, has interesting and diverse characters and a plot line that will draw you in from the first page.
As you know from most of my reviews characters are first and foremost to me, and
Exceeding Expectations has some wonderful characters. While the story starts off with Jack Morgan and he appears through the book, the real main character is Charlie, Jack's youngest daughter. I did not think I would like her at first. When you first meet her she seems spoiled and pretty useless. However, her growth in this story is amazing and makes the story astounding. Raul also offers great interest in the story. I liked him, he is nice and a great romantic interest. He seems to know just how to treat Charlie to get her to grow and change. He's not wishy-washy, and he acts like a real man without talking down to her or treating her bad. I really found him to be a very attractive man and perfect for Charlie in the book.
As for the plot, I love how Ms. Smith goes back and forth between the past and present in the story. The present is relative in the story since the present is in the 1950s. I love the setting and how the history factors into the story and the motivations of the characters. The plot moves along with the character growth, the suspense of Charlie trying to figure out what happened to motivate her father to commit suicide and the things she learns along the way. The romance also pushes the story along. It all adds up to make a book that really draws you in.
I felt as though I was right there with the characters in this book. I was fully invested in Charlie's life and trying to find out what had happened to Jack. The book has it all, suspense, romance, characters that truly care about others and characters that are truly evil. Ms. Smith has crafted an amazing book and I can't wait until the sequel to this one. Though I would like to note that this one ties up nicely with a few loose ends, but nothing that will leave you fussing at the author for leaving you hanging. Just some things left open that will make for an interesting next book. If you enjoy character growth novels set in the past with some suspense, then
Exceeding Expectations is for you. But make sure you set aside some time, because you won't want to put this one down.
My Rating: 5.0/5.0
About the Book:
It’s 1961 and Palm
Beach socialite, irresistible rascal and devoted father Jack Morgan
encounters genuine danger while staging his suicide to shield his
beloved daughters from disgrace. Next, meet his daughter Charlotte
(Charlie), an over-indulged 23 year-old struggling to cope with the
traumatizing loss of her beloved father, her sister’s resulting mental
breakdown and the discovery that she’s suddenly penniless. Fortunately
Raul, an admiring young attorney, appears to offer assistance. As
terrified as she is about daily survival, Charlie soon realizes that she
has to learn what drove her father to kill himself. With Raul’s much
needed ego-bolstering, the drive of necessity and unforeseen
determination, Charlie finds a practical use for her annoyingly lean 5’
11” frame. In time, this career finances her hard-wrought independence,
her sister’s costly treatment and an emotional eye-opening journey to
Paris.
Jumping back in time to romantic pre-WWII Paris readers
meet young Alan Fitzpatrick – aka Jack Morgan – lack-luster artist,
expert lover, irresistible rascal, and the bewitching girl who will
become the mother of his children. Not even Charlie’s relentless
detective work will uncover all Jack’s secrets, but in a fireworks of
surprise endings, she discovers all that she needs to know and more:
disturbing truths about her father, hew own unique talent, crimes great
and small and a diabolical villain.
About the Author (from Goodreads.com):
Author
Lisa April Smith lives with her husband, He-who-wishes-to-remain-anonymous, in
Eternal Playland, Florida, a delightful spot just off I-95.
Ms. Smith describes Eternal Playland as: "a little piece of level heaven
with occasional dampness, where the bugs are plentiful but respectful, and even
the smallest strip mall contains at least one pizza place and a nail
salon."
Before
discovering a passion for writing, Ms. Smith sold plumbing and heating and
antiques, taught ballroom dancing, tutored, modeled, designed software and
managed projects for IBM and returned to college multiple times to study anthropology,
sociology and computer science, in which she holds degrees, as well as psychology,
archeology, literature, history and art. Combine those widely diverse interests
with a love of travel and a gift for writing page-turners and it’s easy to understand
one reviewer’s unbridled praise for Exceeding
Expectations, “She (Ms. Smith) has a brilliance for conveying characters,
and the intellectual capacity to place them in historical settings that sparkle
with glamorous detail . . . that make it fun to read . . . ” But it takes much
more than lush settings, an eye for detail and a love of history to write a page-turner.
Read what another reviewer said about Exceeding
Expectations: “Lisa April Smith . . . has woven an intriguingly rich
tapestry of delightful well-developed characters into a perfectly balanced plot
bursting with riveting mystery, crimes of the petty and the horrible sort,
suspenseful twists, and romantic tension complete with love scenes that sizzle
and pop. . . Clearly, this author has, and wishes to share with her readers, what
the French call joie de vivre – not simply the joy of life – but an
all-encompassing appreciation for every facet of life.”
Chapter One of
Exceeding Expectations
January
2, 1962
Glancing down at the Porsche’s speedometer
Jack eased up on the gas. The nearest car was a mile back, but a cop could be
hiding around the next bend. Being stopped by the police did not fit into
Jack’s plan. He blamed the excitement. And guilt. Composing the single page to
his daughters had been agony. There was no nice way to say he intended to kill
himself. There were no comforting euphemisms for suicide. No words to excuse a
mortal sin. And worst of all, no way to ease the pain his beloved girls would
experience. But they, and everyone else, had to believe his intention was
absolute and irreversible or the plan would fail. After several miserable
gut-wrenching attempts, Jack wrote how much he loved them and said that this
was something he had to do to protect them.
Knowing he could rely on Petal’s steely
strength, Jack’s letter to his wife was more direct. He had explained that he
was doing this to save her and his girls from scandal and disgrace. And as he
was making this noble sacrifice, he knew she could be relied on to be good to
his daughters. Petal might not be the maternal sort, but no one could accuse
her of being tight-fisted. After reading the letter, his dying declaration, and
waiting for two Chivas Regal’s straight to take effect, she would call a few
select members of her powerful family, and her attorney. The results of those
calls would be a discreet obituary in The New York Times, another in the local paper, hinting at
a long-term debilitating disease, and no further investigation. A quiet
memorial service would be held in Manhattan,
Petal’s preferred place of residence, and she would be stunning in black for the
next six to ten weeks, depending on her social calendar.
The best thing about his plan was its
simplicity. He would wait until two or three in the morning when the roads
would be deserted, park the car on the middle of a bridge and disappear into
the night. The bridge and town had been carefully selected – less than a
five-mile walk to the railroad to prevent someone later recalling giving a lift
to a stranger. And the town had to be small – an insignificant speck on the
map. The smaller the town, Jack had reasoned, the less sophisticated the police
force. Fielding, Florida,
a town that lacked a drug store, supermarket, bank, and beauty parlor was
ideal. Serious crime in Fielding probably consisted of intimidating the kids
who tipped over outhouses on Halloween and jailing the same town drunk every
Friday night. A costly abandoned car, coupled with the later discovered suicide
notes, guaranteed Jack would be the topic of intense gossip for years, and the
object of a bumbling investigation for no more than a week. The Porsche would
get more attention than the lack of a corpse in an area where alligators
outnumbered house pets, and a Ford with all four fenders intact was considered
a damned fine automobile.
Once he boarded a train he’d be fine. Men who
rode the rails kept secrets. They were members of a tribe of vagabonds who
preferred the town around the next curve – adventurous men ready to share a pot
of tramp stew with another kindred spirit. And he was eager to join them. For
the last two and half decades, his life had revolved around his girls. Jack had
chosen that life and never once regretted it. A man couldn’t have finer
daughters than Amelia and Charlotte. But they were grown now and maybe he had
earned himself a change. He thought he might head for Texas, a leviathan-sized state where a man’s
past was not apt to be questioned. And Texas
was known for its horses. He loved horses — riding them, watching them trot,
canter, toss their heads, nurse their foals. Gorgeous, glorious creatures they
were.
After several hours of driving
through towns too small to boast a stop sign, Jack reached his destination. A
weather-beaten building with a concave roof housed the grocery that doubled as
Fielding’s post office. He gave his letters to a leathery man behind the
counter and gazed at a jar of pickles with interest. He had been so focused on
reaching his destination he had forgotten to eat lunch. “Is there a place
around here to get something to eat?” “Just Wiley’s. Kind of a bar/restaurant down
the street. Lost its sign in the last hurricane, but you’ll find it.”
An orange neon light in the window
erratically flickered Budweiser. Jack
glanced inside. It was more bar than restaurant, and grimy. Lacking an
alternative, he entered. A wall of vacant knotty-pine booths faced a long bar
backed by a mirror so streaked with fly droppings and smoke, that reflected
images appeared cloudy. Five or six patrons turned to note his presence and
then quickly resumed what they had been doing. Jack proceeded to the bar’s last
booth and took a seat where he could oversee the comings and goings. The gym
bag containing twenty-seven thousand dollars he stowed under the table.
A blowsy overweight waitress with an elaborate
hairdo and a too-tight skirt approached. “Need a menu?” she asked as she wiped
the table with a dingy towel.
“What time do you stop serving food?”
“The kitchen closes at eight.”
Jack removed his buck suede jacket and placed it
on the seat beside him. Assuming this place closed at midnight, he had five
long hours to kill. “Bring me a draft beer and a hamburger. And if you could
spare a newspaper, I’d appreciate it.”
She soon returned with his beer and a ten-page
weekly tabloid filled with notices of church events, and feed and grain ads. It
was a typical weekday night in a small town bar: plenty of griping and
boasting, lengthy recitations of what could have been and should have been, a
few stale jokes, more men than women, a lot of talk, little action.
“Would you turn up the radio?” a customer called
from the far end of the bar. “That’s me and Wanda’s favorite song.”
The bartender adjusted the dial. A twangy
melancholy western tune drowned out the dull background noise.
“Turn it down! Turn that blasted thing down!”
several customers shouted in unison.
The bartender found an agreeable level of volume
and conversation resumed. It started to rain about nine — a light drizzle at
first and then a steady hard-driving downpour. On her return trip from the
ladies room, a woman in her late thirties, attractive in a tired way, paused to
inquire if Jack would be in town for a while. He politely explained that he was
just passing through and she rejoined her companions at the bar.
“That would be eighty cents, including the beer.
Would you mind settling up now?” the waitress asked at nine-thirty. “I’m
leaving in a few minutes. Buddy, that’s the bartender, he’ll take care of you.
I’m going home to my kids.” Jack handed her a dollar and told her to keep the
change. At ten o’clock Jack went to the men’s room and ducked into a stall.
Removing the bills from the gym bag Jack distributed them around the money
belt. Twenty-seven thousand dollars. Money painstakingly gleaned from his
checking account in amounts that wouldn’t later arouse suspicion. It wouldn’t
finance the way of life he had been enjoying very long, but it could buy ten
new Chevrolets. More than enough for a fresh start.
Customers, who had been checking their watches
and shaking their heads for the last hour or more, decided the rain was not
going to let up. One by one, they finished their beers, turned up their
collars, cursed the weather and dashed into the street.
“Last call,” the owner announced to Jack and two
stragglers. “Closing at eleven cause of this miserable weather.”
“No more for me. I gotta go to work tomorrow,”
the older of the two remaining men announced. He wiped his mouth with the back
of his hand and paid his tab. Jack closed his eyes and listened to rain
pounding the wood roof. The last customer drank his beer and stared out the
front window at the unrelenting downpour. He was about Jack’s size and weight,
somewhere in his twenties – a kid. His light brown hair was home-cut and in
need of a trim. His pants were deeply creased and stained with what Jack
guessed to be grease. A handyman, or maybe a mechanic who worked nearby.
Jack grabbed the empty gym bag, handed a dollar
bill to the bartender, and headed for the door. The kid blocked the exit.
“My truck’s about a mile or so down the road. It
weren’t raining when I started out. I’d be grateful, mister, if you could give
me a ride,” the kid said.
Jack appraised the kid grinning back at him.
Crooked teeth vied with one another for space, and his tired green eyes spoke
of a resilience born of hardship. The faded denim shirt he wore over a grimy
T-shirt would provide no protection from the cold and rain. Jack looked at the
bartender owner hoping for some indication that this kid was a local, but the
bartender was busy counting the day’s receipts. “You having any trouble with
that truck?” Jack tapped his chest. “This old ticker of mine doesn’t work as
good as it used to,” he lied. “If you need a hand with that truck, I’m afraid I’m
not going to be able to help.”
“I got no trouble with the truck. Runs
dandy,” he assured Jack. “I left it at a farmhouse to be unloaded. Sold them
folks a cord of firewood. But they had to unload and stack it theirselves. That
was the deal. They unload it and stack it theirselves whilst I go into town.”
Jack weighed the risk. He had twenty-seven
thousand dollars in the money belt, but this kid didn’t know that. All he knew
was that it was pouring, it was cold and he needed a ride. Eleven o’clock was
far too early for Jack to carry out his plan. All that awaited him was two or
three hours of boredom in a parked car. “What’s your name, kid?”
“Folks mostly call me Iowa.”
“My name’s Jack and the Porsche across the
street is mine. Wait here. No sense both of us getting soaked.” By the time
Jack reached the car and jumped in, his hair and clothes were drenched. Mostly Iowa had fared little
better. “Which direction?” Jack asked his passenger.
“You’re headin’ the right way. Just follow the
road a piece. I’ll tell you where to turn.”
“Is it on the left or the right?”
“Left.”
“I expect you live around here.”
“Just passin’ through.”
They soon left the residential part of town. The
driving rain and incessant flip-flop flip-flop of the windshield wipers blurred
his vision. Jack tried the high beams and quickly switched back. Pointing to a
dim light on what appeared to be a house he asked, “It that it?”
“Nope. That ain’t it. It’s up yonder a bit.”
“When I first saw you, Iowa, I said to myself, now there’s a fellow
who knows his way around cars. You a mechanic?”
“I fiddled with cars some. Nothing as swanky as
this.”
For the next two or three miles there wasn’t a
break in the road — not a path, planted field, farmhouse or shed, only endless
sawgrass and pine trees. “That had to be some hike into town. Are you sure we
didn’t pass it? You did say it was on the left?”
“Yep. On the left.”
While Jack had been struggling to locate the
elusive house and truck, Mostly Iowa
had been facing right. Damn! What an idiot he had been! A solitary man wearing
expensive clothes and a flashy gold watch. A new Porsche – obviously his. A
mysterious gym bag that had never left his side. A transient loner who needed a
ride. “We must have passed it. I’m going
to turn around.”
“Just pull over here!” Mostly Iowa’s eyes were cold. His right hand
expertly cradled a knife.
Targeted like a deer by a hungry kid. Stalked!
Jack’s foot remained on the accelerator. “You don’t want to do this, Iowa. How about I slow
down to ten, fifteen miles an hour and you jump out? We part friends and forget
this ever happened.”
“You stop this here car or I’ll stick you like a
pig. It wouldn’t bother me none to kill you.”
Now Jack was a man who liked a good laugh as
much as the next guy, but irony had its place. Dying the very night he
scheduled his fake suicide was not his idea of a joke. Iowa
grabbed Jack’s right arm. “Stop this car or I’ll cut out your gizzard and leave
it for the birds.”
“I’m not stopping the car as long as you
got that knife,” Jack said in a calm friendly voice. He could feel the
frightening tip of the steel blade through his suede jacket. “Toss it out the
window and I’ll stop the car.”
Iowa
grabbed the steering wheel. The Porsche hydroplaned and fish-tailed, barely
avoiding trees on both sides of the road.
By intuitively releasing his grip, the finely
engineered racing car realigned itself. Jack glanced at his passenger looking
for some hint of humanity, still hoping to change the kid’s mind, yet very much
aware of the danger. “You’re going to get us both killed. We’re doing twenty
miles an hour. The ground is soft from the rain. Open the door and roll out.”
“Not a chance in hell, you miserable fuck.
You’re going to die.”
The knife slashed the jacket and dug into the
money belt. If it weren’t for the thick wad of bills, the blade would be boring
into his rib cage. Jack deliberately swerved the car right and then left. Iowa grabbed the wheel.
Using the butt of his right fist Jack smashed his attacker’s hand. Iowa howled with pain
and dropped the knife. He alternated curses with punches aimed at Jack’s head.
Jack fought to simultaneously keep the car on
the road with his left hand and ward off his attacker with his right. A pothole
caught Iowa
off balance. He slid away. Jack used the opportunity to use the bent right arm
that had been guarding his chest and lash out, landing an explosive blow with
his clenched fist. He could feel the bridge
of Iowa’s nose collapse,
hear the bones crack.
“Goddamn you! You jackass. You busted my nose!” Iowa fumbled beneath the
seat.
Seeing the dreaded knife reappear, Jack made the
only decision left. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” He braced himself and
floored the Porsche, aiming the passenger side at a massive oak tree. Iowa reached for the
wheel again, too late. The car hit the tree with a violent jolt, throwing both
men forward. A branch smashed the windshield a microsecond before Jack’s head
reached it. The glass shattered harmlessly, but his chest had struck the
steering wheel with an impact that left him gasping for air. The motor groaned
and sputtered as Jack waited with his eyes closed. His chest ached with every
breath. Tentatively touching his forehead he discovered a swelling throbbing
bump. Jack opened his eyes. Mostly Iowa
had not fared as well. He lay slumped against the door. Blood from the broken
nose bathed his face, neck, and shirt. Jack didn’t know if he was dead or
unconscious, but he wouldn’t be a threat for a while.
“Why didn’t you jump when you had the chance?”
Jack asked the limp figure. “Soon as I find out what kind of shape I’m in, I’ll
figure out what I’m going to do with you. If I can walk back to town, I’ll send
someone out to help. And that’s better than you deserve, you dumb bastard,
considering you were trying to kill me.”
Limb by limb, joint by joint, Jack tested his
extremities. His arms, hands, and fingers moved, painfully, but they didn’t
appear to be broken. He flexed one leg and then the other. “My legs seem okay,”
he informed his silent companion. His chest and shoulders ached. “Probably
cracked a few ribs and there’s a buzzing in my ears. Going to be sore for a
while, as well as black and blue, but I’m alive. What about it, Iowa? You going to make
it?”
Jack leaned across the inert body expecting to
hear a heartbeat. Nothing. Silence. The kid was dead! Jesus Christ! He hadn’t
intended to kill the kid. His goal had been to prevent his own imminent demise.
“Now look what you did, Iowa. You tried to kill me and you ended up
killing yourself. God damn dumb kid!” he said to keep his teeth from
chattering. “God damn dumb kid!” His entire right side throbbed and he was
trembling. “Got to get out of here.”
He tried the door handle. It turned, but the
bowed door would not budge. He threw all his weight against it and grimaced. It
groaned in sympathy and swung open causing him to crash onto the muddy ground.
The rain had subsided to a trickle. Jack wiped his hands on soggy moss and sat
down to think beside the demolished car.
There was nothing more that could be done for Iowa. His problems were
over. Jack’s problems had tripled. In a day or two, Petal and the girls would
read the letters he had mailed. A first-class plan wiped out because he wanted
to help out a dumb kid. Okay, he told himself, if faking his suicide by leaving
the Porsche on a bridge was no longer possible, he simply needed a new plan. A
new plan. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. The Porsche would be traced to him. They
would find a dead kid in his car. If he disappeared now he would be accused of
murder. Unless . . . Unless . . . Iowa was about his size.
The police would assume the body belonged to Jack Morgan if – if it was
unrecognizable. But how? The car and its contents would have to be burnt beyond
recognition. He could do that. Provided he kept calm, and no one came along in
the interim, it was a good alternative plan.
Jack removed the ruined suede jacket. It could
go on the corpse. A scrap of burnt suede would add to the illusion, as would
his wedding band. He had intended to sell it before he reached Texas, but it would be
better used now. As he removed the ring he noticed his prized gold watch. They
might look for it. It was too bad about the watch, but it too had to go.
The tight quarters inside the crumpled Porsche,
coupled with Jack’s reluctance to touch the bloody corpse made the exchange
time consuming, exhausting, and grisly. As a final touch, Jack traded shoes
with the dead man before shoving him into position behind the wheel.
An hour had passed since the crash and no one
had driven by. His luck was holding. Now he needed matches. Matches or a
cigarette lighter. His pockets yielded neither. His plan would fail because he
lacked a pack of matches that every bar and restaurant supplied free. Think, he
told himself. There had to be a solution. The Porsche’s cigarette lighter.
Would it still work? Leaning over Iowa’s
body, Jack located it and pressed it. Thirty seconds later it popped out
glowing red. God bless the Germans! Every twenty or thirty years, it took a war
to remind them who was boss, but they sure knew how to build a car. Jack looked
for something to start the fire. Downed branches were too wet. A dry rag. He
kept a towel in the trunk.
Jack walked to the rear of the car to unlock the
trunk but it wouldn’t release. He kicked it with his heel. Another sharp kick.
The trunk creaked open. A white, still-folded hand towel lay tucked in a
corner. A few more minutes and it would be over.
He stuffed as much of the towel as would fit
into the gas tank, then replaced the ignition key. As he was about to press the
cigarette lighter he remembered the knife. What if it were found with the
remains? Palm beach
socialite Jack Morgan didn’t carry a switchblade. He would have to find it. Ten
minutes passed as he searched the car and the corpse. He was about to give up
when he felt it lodged under the passenger seat. He folded it, tucked it into
his belt, and inserted the dependable lighter.
Half a football field away Jack leaned against a
tree and waited. Several times the flame appeared to die, only to flare up
again. And then the rag ignited with an enormous pop – followed by ear-splitting thunder. Roaring flames, the height of a
church steeple leapt from the car’s rear. Jack could no longer make out Iowa’s silhouette in the
flames. Just a few more minutes, he told himself. The smoke and heat from the
blaze reddened his face and seared his lungs. When it was time to leave Jack
strode away in Iowa’s ill-fitting shoes, away
from the wrecked Porsche, the town of Fielding,
and his past. Then he heard it. A train whistle. The magical hollow sound of a
train whistle. And it wasn’t far off. Damn, if he wasn’t a lucky so-and-so. One
of God’s favorite children. Jesus tolerated the pious, sober, and abstinent.
Yes, He tolerated the tiresome righteous and their smug unforgiving Christian
smiles. And He had little pity for the tyrant, the merciless, and the cruel.
But Jesus loved the ordinary sinner. Isn’t that what the bible taught? The
Almighty loved sinners. Without sinners there would have been no reason for
Jesus to come to earth and experience the joy and pain of mortals.
Intoxicating freedom mingled with the chilling
air. Jack could forget the chafing money belt, cheap ill-fitting shoes, sore
feet, and aching muscles. He had a new name and a thousand new possibilities.
The next time he found himself with a drink in his hand he would remember Iowa and raise his glass
to the tragic dumb kid.
“This one’s for you, Iowa, you miserable misguided creature,” he
would say. “May the good Lord take mercy on your soul and your time in Purgatory
be brief.”
FTC Information:
I received this book from the author for an honest
review. I do make money from purchases made at The Book Depository,
Alibris and B&N.com, but all money is used to fund giveaways and
shipping for giveaways from the blog.
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