Second Act

Author:

Steel is up there as one of the most commercially successful authors of our time. She has written 182 novels, each of them has been a bestseller, and she has sold over 1 billion copies of her books in 69 different countries. She calls herself bi-cultural, French and American, and knows both languages in addition to Italian and Spanish. She was honored as an officer of the Order of Arts and Letters by the French government and a knight of the Order of the Legion d’Honneur in Paris. Steel has 9 children, she’s been married twice, and she currently lives in San Francisco and Paris.

Learn More about Danielle Steel

Three words to describe this read:

Repetitive- I found that Steel sometimes used the same words and phrases to describe characters and scenes throughout the book. Although its such a small detail, it made me feel like the book wasn’t edited properly.

Obvious- There is an idea that writing should show the reader new information and let them come to their own conclusions instead of directly telling the reader what they need to know. Steel seemed to tell instead of show. This made it easy to guess what would happen next and the resolution of the story.

Sweet- Despite a few things that I didn’t like, the story itself is nice and the characters are mostly likable. It was a good book to read on vacation.

Quote:

"He wondered why he didn't love her. She was perfect in many ways, intelligent, interesting, well-traveled, glamorous, charming when she wanted to be. He enjoyed her company and was used to her, but there was a part of him she never reached, and he knew she never would. He was never sure how sincere she was, and no matter what happened, she never touched his heart.”

This quote was my favorite because it felt like the moment when Steel went deepest into the development of the main character. He didn’t have many flaws, but it was interesting when she did show his faults.