This book started out slow for about the first half, but by the end I wasn't able to put it down. It's the story of four couples who call themselves the scrubs because they are all involved in the medical community of Charleston, South Carolina in some way. The main character is Anny who marries Lewis and is welcomed wholeheartedly to the group. The unquestioned heart of the group is warm and gracious Camilla; she is the one that is credited for holding the group together through a hurricane, deaths, fire and change.
Towards the end of the book there is a mystery to be solved and I was surprised at the conclusion of it, but the book itself is an excellent one and I would recommend it for reading when it's cold outside.
3.5 stars out of 5 ( )

This was decent, but not nearly as good as some other Anne Rivers Siddons books I’ve read. As usual, the location plays a large part in the atmosphere of the book. Here we get 3 different faces of South Carolina — old money Charleston, the beach, and the low country — and each does its part. Unfortunately, I wish she’d spent as much time on her characters as she did on the setting.

Anny is the center of the story. She’s not old money Charleston, but the leader of a non-profit who searches out the help of a doctor one day for one of her clients and meets Lewis, a successful surgeon 15 years her senior. He pulls her into his group of lifelong friends, the Scrubs, and soon they are all one happy family. Or so it seems.

The story crosses multiple decades and follows the Scrubs through the good times and bad — hurricanes, fire, death. It had the potential to be really emotional, but I felt like I never got a chance to know the characters before I was thrown into their lives and machinations. Lewis and Anny’s courtship is nearly non-existent. They meet and then bam! They’re married and life goes on. We’re told how deeply they love each other, but we’re robbed of the chance to see that love grow. And then there are the friends. Only a couple of them are really fleshed out characters, and not necessarily for the better. I even kept forgetting about one of the couples… whenever they’d be mentioned I’d think “Oh yeah, those guys”.

Unfortunately, practically all of the inciting events in this story are tragic. After a while, it felt like “geez, who else is going to die?” I appreciated the twist at the end, but I think it could have used a little more intrigue sprinkled throughout the story to keep us interested. ( )

A beautiful book about life, love, friendship, loss and life going on set in Charleston and its surrounds. ( )

-- The first character readers meet in ISLANDS by Anne Rivers Siddons is Anny. When she marries Dr. Lewis Aiken a coterie of longtime friends accepts her. The friends jointly own a beach house in South Carolina where they gather on weekends & holidays. Their lives are busy & comfortable. Children & grandchildren are mentioned. Characters consume regional fare (she-crab soup, boiled peanuts, & benne cookies, for example.) When the author introduces motorcycles I am disappointed. They contribute to air & noise pollution & disgust me as do cigarettes. However I enjoyed spending time with the friends on the water & in their homes & was interested in the novel's outcome. -- ( )

Anny Butler has always been a caretaker, a nurturer, first for her own brothers and sisters, and then as the director of an agency devoted to the welfare of children. What she has never had is a family of her own to care for. That all changes when she meets and marries Lewis Aiken, an exuberant surgeon fifteen years Anny's senior.

When they marry, Anny finds her family - not a traditional one, but a group of childhood friends from Charleston who are inseparable; who are one another's surrogate family. They call themselves The Scrubs, and they all, in some way, are connected by the cord of family. Instantly upon meeting them at the old beach house on Sullivan's Island, which they co-own, Anny knows that she has ultimately found home and family. They vow that, when the time comes, they will find a place by the sea where they can live together.

Bad things begin to happen - a hurricane, a fire, deaths - but still the remaining Scrubs cling together. They are watched over and bolstered by Camilla Curry, the heart and core of the group, always the healer. For the first time in her life, Anny allows Camilla to enfold her and to care for her with a kind of love and support that Anny has never experienced.

I loved this book; it was one of those books that you can get lost in the storytelling of it. I'm really beginning to enjoy Anne Rivers Siddons as an author and look forward avidly to the next book of hers that I read. I have added three more books by Anne Rivers Siddons on to my Wish List and give Islands by Anne Rivers Siddons an A+! ( )