Carol White (4)

Dina is looking forward to celebrating her birthday when her husband Mark declares he wants a divorce. He’s moving to Key West with his young, rich girlfriend. Dina finagles a promise from him to help support her country club lifestyle for one year, after which she’ll sign the papers.

As a resident in an exclusive Boca Raton gated community, she has hosted numerous dinner parties for Mark’s business associates in the past. Why not start a private catering business? She needs the money and loves to cook, and so her idea blossoms. Soon she’s running a successful operation along with Dex, the hunky delivery man who acts as her assistant.

Dina grows from a doormat wife to an entrepreneur, finding love along the way and a purpose in life. You’ll laugh at her foibles and root for her success. Engaging secondary characters, mouth-watering food descriptions, and dynamic relationships will keep you riveted to the page. From One Place to Another is a buffet for the senses!… (mere)

I received this book from the author to read and review. It seemed that it would be quite different from what I usually read, and I was not in error on that point.

Carol White writes with confidence, which is obvious by the way she tackles the dialogue and personalities she created. In From One Place to Another she throws open a door into the elaborate, wealthy lifestyle of a country club in Boca Raton, Florida, at which her main character half-heartedly thumbs her nose.

Dina Marshall knew she was a very good cook. In order to help her husband build his business, she became immersed in creating gourmet dinners in their home to attract clients. It was working well until the evening she and her husband were dining out on her thirty-sixth birthday. Mark delivered news that would totally change her life — he was leaving her for a younger woman – that day. This was a complete shock to Dina who thought they were moving forward together in life. And how could he on her birthday?!

Carol White captured well the roller-coaster ride of a jilted woman’s emotions. Dina tried all she could to get her husband back, was drawn into other circumstances and relationships, waited expectantly when she learned all was not as her estranged husband thought it would be in his new life. (Don’t worry, I won’t spoil the story for you.) In the meantime, she developed her own catering business in order to keep up the lifestyle to which she had become accustomed, but also to impress her husband while waiting for him to come to his senses.

That last point is the main focus of From One Place to Another. It was written with descriptions of the exotic food and elaborate meals Dina prepared, the craziness that ensued, and the hilarity of the best laid plans gone wrong. One thing that Dina does is make lists, and – good or bad – she makes lists all through this crisis time in her life.

I must mention that bad language is used in several places, and there is also a thread of heated romance throughout the story.

Although I was appalled at the behaviour and habits of some of the people for whom Dina catered, I enjoyed this book. Actually, I was appalled at some of Dina’s behaviour and I grew to not like her very much. Perhaps, given the set of circumstances she was dealt, her actions and reactions are understandable, but the comical, tragic turn of events that befell her biggest, most important catering job seemed justified. The author told it well, winding humour in and around as the tension built. Dina’s spirited attitude made for entertaining reading that kept drawing me back until I finished the book. (My reading time is rarely uninterrupted.)

Carol White wrote From One Place to Another in a way that pulled this reader into the very room where each scene unfolded, making it not simply an act of reading the words but with a sense of being there. I like that.… (mere)