Book Love: The Last Train to Key West by Chanel Cleeton

There have been a lot of historical fiction passing through our house recently which is unintended but has been delightful!  I haven't read the previous two books in this series but for some reason was drawn to pick up this one: The Last Train to Key West by Chanel Cleeton.  The entire time I was reading this there was a significant amount of snow on the ground.  I don't know when we last saw grass (2+ weeks ago, at least).  I haven't walked outside without a coat and not froze (I did walk outside without a coat this morning to take pictures of the snow but it was very very cold) in...months.  Since November?  We are in the coldest, snowiest parts of winter.  And I found great comfort in reading a book set somewhere warm and sunny.

Sunny, we get (today it was!).  Warm...well that's thanks to heat in the house, lots of layers, and blankets.  

This book covers the overlapping (barely) stories of three women who cross paths in Key West diner (diner's specialty: Key Lime Pie, of course).  One woman is a pregnant waitress with an abusive husband who dreams of getting away.  Another woman is newlywed to a man she barely knows and suspects has unsavory ties back in New York.  The third is on the hunt for a long-lost brother of hers who she thinks is working down in the area after serving in World War I.

These women don't have a lot in common other than being in the same place on the same day and all searching for something in her unknown future.  

Then, there is a hurricane.

Parts of this reminded of the movie Waitress (the pregnant waitress with an abusive husband part).  Part reminded me of the book, possible my all-time favorite, A Hundred Summers by Beatriz Williams (the hurricane and 1930s setting).  Parts reminded me of the many books I've read with strong female characters in times when women weren't really supposed to be strong.  Having all those touch points, even though I hadn't read the previous books in the series, gave me enough of a foundation to enjoy it.

Every historical fiction book I read seems to contain some nugget of history that I had never heard of previously.  This one was the mess the government made of taking care of veterans after World War I.  There were marches on Washington and eventually many men were sent down to the Florida Keys to work.  They stayed in camps with horrible conditions and made to do hard labor.  In this case, working on a railroad that stretched over the water (before the hurricane, the book says you can still see remnants of it across the water, I am fascinated by visible remnants of things that are no longer fully there.).

It's hard to say too much about the three women without giving away too much of their stories.  It's easy to see why a poor, pregnant woman would want to escape an abusive husband before the baby is born.  Why a woman who barely knows the man she has married has many questions about his life.  And why a woman would be searching for her lost brother who lived through the trauma of war.  All of these women are looking for something, someone, and wondering how to go forward in life.  Their stories were fascinating and I was always eager to pick this one up.

I was entertained and so enjoyed this book, even though there were many hard parts to it.  It made me long to visit a beach again but also appreciate the life I have here.  It was an excellent (and chaste!  I'd rate it PG) read for the middle of a very cold, snowy winter. 

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