cover image Over the Rainbow

Over the Rainbow

Marjorie Eatock, M. Eatock. Zebra, $4.5 (0pp) ISBN 978-0-8217-4032-3

After enduring years of her husband's infidelity and an unpleasant divorce, 50-year-old Marian Carson has become a self-sufficient woman and vice president of Mountain Insurance. When a storm wreaks havoc in a Midwestern town on the Mississippi River, Marian flies in to help with claims. Once she recovers from culture shock (not a sushi bar in sight), Marian enjoys small-town life, especially the company of ``cow jockey'' Don Worth. This budding friendship puts her on the wrong side of local matriarch Hilda Holtzenstein, who fancies Don as an escort for her daughter Emma-Lina. But the town's historic old schoolhouse poses a conundrum: Residents want to preserve the storm-damaged structure, but for reasons Marian cannot fathom, Mountain's local agents advocate demolition. Topping it all, Marian's daughter Diane, unreconciled to her parents' divorce, arrives with an unpleasant surprise. While both the small-town setting and the mature romance of Marian and Don are enjoyable, urbanites will wince at Eatock's ( The Time of Her Life ) unconvincing portrayal of Marian as a city slicker, and the resolution of a decades-old mystery strains credulity. (Jan.)