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 Barbara Bergin is featured in Texas Techsan
Reviews and Such
Endings is now being reviewed by some noteable sources. Check out what folks are saying. Feel free to click the link and jot down your own two cents!
. Endings Review on SingleTitles.com
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Review: ENDINGS by Barbara Bergin * November 2007 * Reviews * Sunstone Press Genre: contemporary ISBN: 0865345198 Page Count: 268 Price: $28.95 hardcover Reviewer: Donna Zapf Sensuality Rating: Sensuous Star Rating: 4 Stars Author's Website: http://cataurl.com/IGMsr Debut author Barbara Bergin captures her readers and keeps them enthralled until the last page is turned with her novel ENDINGS. Dr. Leslie Cohen suffered an unbearable tragedy when her entire family was killed in a car accident. To deal with the anguish, she has isolated herself by selling her house, giving up her medical practice, cutting off contact with former friends and leaving town. Her life is now comprised of going place to place as a locum tenens physician, covering for other orthopedic surgeons. Her latest month long assignment is in Abilene, Texas for Dr. Hal Hawley while he has cancer surgery. But on the way to Abilene, during a rainstorm, Leslie herself is in an accident with a truck hauling a horse trailer. Miraculously, even though Leslie’s rental was totaled, the only injury was her sprained ankle. The other driver, Regan Wakeman, a local rancher and contractor, will soon become an important part of Leslie’s life. Leslie Cohen has several rules she keeps to insulate against experiencing debilitating emotional pain again. But one by one her rules are broken as she becomes personally involved with Hal, his wife and especially Regan. Even her nightly ritual of remembering her husband and children do not keep the feelings at bay that she is developing for Regan. Divorced, and not looking for commitment, Regan discovers he is falling in love with Leslie. Barbara Bergin draws on her expertise as an orthopedic surgeon and horse woman to add depth and reality to her story. She vividly describes the settings, which are vitally important to the story. Her characters are completely developed and fleshed out so that the reader is fully attuned to their psyches. At least you think you are in sync, but Ms Bergin, magnificent writer that she is, delivers a twist that will leave you ruminating long after the book is finally closed. ENDINGS by brilliant new author Barbara Bergin is a realistic love story that challenges the very existence of endings and happily ever after. Posted by - Visit Website Buy The Book . Endings Review on Amazon.com
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5.0 out of 5 stars Beginnings and Endings, January 17, 2008 By Dr. H.P.Sullivan -- See all my reviews (REAL NAME) Endings Endings reminds us that a physician is capable of writing more than just prescriptions. This is a first - and one hopes, not last - effort by a Texas-based orthopedist, Barbara Bergin, who draws extensively upon her experience as a surgeon and as a championship horse rider. But while the practice of orthopedic medicine and the love of horses figure prominently in Endings this novel fundamentally has to do with the reality that lies beneath the superficies of our lives - a reality that encompasses the complexity of our human relationships, of love and loss, of matters present and past - of experiences which we may easily own and want to relive or which we may seek to escape. In short, Endings is a complex and challenging book.. The novel is also a love story - not a "romance" - but a story of love lost and love found, as ephemeral as that may ultimately prove to be. The protagonist, Leslie Cohen, an orthopedist who, through personal tragedy, has become a nomadic practitioner - a locum tenens - filling in here and there throughout the country when others go on vacation or medical leave (as is the case in the novel), literally accidentally meets (a collision on a wet Texas highway) an engaging rancher-cum-builder with whom she develops a relationship, in spite of herself. There is "love making" that is intimate in detail and convincing in passion - but without the kind of perfervid expression that often mars the depiction of sexual engagement in "romance" novels. Leslie Cohen, as nomad, has entered into a journey - but it is a wandering both into the present and into the past. In some sense, she is at a stasis, stuck at a point in time, at which the past and present seem to fuse, beyond which she cannot pass. But is she stuck? Is there a present, and has there been a past? This is the ingenious point of the novel. It would be egregiously wrong for a reviewer to say more. It falls to the reader to get to the ending of Endings to understand and to plumb the depths of this narrative. From a purely stylistic point of view, the author has a clear talent for creating in her central character a subject locus, a strong point of view, for the telling of a story that embraces in rich detail a broad canvas of the natural world (like Leslie Cohen's wondering about the destiny of vagrant scrapes of paper, wind-stuck on an Abilene fence) and of a shared humanity (as in Dr. Cohen's compassionate treatment of two "illegals" horribly injured while attempting to hop a freight train). While we are brought into the inner world of the protagonist, the narrative does not lapse into tedious introspection, and while we join with the protagonist in viewing her world and the people in it, the author does not fall into any kind of omniscient narration. This is a novel that deserves many re-readings! By Rachel Moyer (Shawnee on Del, PA) -- See all my reviews (REAL NAME) Endings was an exceptional read for those of us who want to discover alternatives for what life had dealt us. The main character is all of us at one point of our lives because it offers escape from reality as we know it. The ending of the book is unexpected and leaves the reader not only surprised but with wishful and hopeful thoughts. Excellent story! By Mitchell S. Herring "Nancy Herring UT" (Smithville, TX USA) -- See all my reviews (REAL NAME) AS a person who is not an avid reader,I was "hooked" on ENDINGS.AS I am acquainted with Dr. Bergin,I was able to travel through the process of publication with her in an exciting way. Her eyes lit up whenever she was discussing her book, and NOW I know why. ENDINGS is full of down-home charm. Abilene is described perfectly...dusty and windy.Since I don't read much,I'd read an hour or two,put the book down,start to do dishes or some other boring chore,look at the bookcover and became drawn into Leslie's soul again.I loved the characters,especially Doc and his wife.They just don't make them like that any more. The "hero" Regan was too good to be true...a gentleman in every way.He wore down Leslie's defences,but at the same time,Leslie brought out a side of Regan that he hadn't seen in years. This is not a syrupy relationship,but a beautiful one. Just as I was sure that I knew how this story would be one of those "happily ever-after ones" and it might still be...there came along the last part of the book,and I wonder about all the happenings that came racing back into my brain. Barbara was brilliant when she named her first novel,"ENDINGS". I need to start reading it again.:) . |