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A review by mrskatiefitz
Best Kept Secret by Ann M. Martin
3.0
Best Kept Secret is the story of Francie (granddaughter of Abby from Better to Wish and daughter of Dana from The Long Way Home), who is growing up in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Though Francie doesn't experience the same turmoil as her mother and grandmother, her story is marked by its share of difficulties. As a young girl, Francie is approached on the street by an abductor. She doesn't go with him, but neither does she report the incident, so she experiences terrible guilt when another young girl goes missing. The guilt of this incident follows her through the rest of her childhood, causing her to become preoccupied with being good and feeling safe.
Francie doesn't really have much of a role in her own story. Rather, she observes characters introduced in the previous books and comments on their relationships. Abby's free-spirited sister Adele, Dana's brother Peter, who has Down Syndrome, and Papa Luther, the tyrannical family patriarch all reappear in this book. I was also thrilled to note that Martin has not forgotten Fred, Abby's long-lost disabled brother who was banished to a home as a child. I expressed my hopes for this character in my review of The Long Way Home, and was not disappointed.
This book is the weakest of the series so far, and the least evocative of its time period. (I think this is partly because the time period is still so recent.) Still, reading these books is like watching an historical soap opera, and even when the writing is sometimes bland, the overall sense of being allowed to eavesdrop on 100 years of family history is hugely appealing.
Francie doesn't really have much of a role in her own story. Rather, she observes characters introduced in the previous books and comments on their relationships. Abby's free-spirited sister Adele, Dana's brother Peter, who has Down Syndrome, and Papa Luther, the tyrannical family patriarch all reappear in this book. I was also thrilled to note that Martin has not forgotten Fred, Abby's long-lost disabled brother who was banished to a home as a child. I expressed my hopes for this character in my review of The Long Way Home, and was not disappointed.
This book is the weakest of the series so far, and the least evocative of its time period. (I think this is partly because the time period is still so recent.) Still, reading these books is like watching an historical soap opera, and even when the writing is sometimes bland, the overall sense of being allowed to eavesdrop on 100 years of family history is hugely appealing.