DESCRIPTION
A young woman abandoned as an infant on an Alabama porch is horrified to discover that she is the missing heiress to a vast Connecticut fortune—a birthright she is desperate to reject in favor of her Peachtree lane roots. Gracie Lynne Callaway—once left in a coal bucket on a front porch in a small Alabama town—discovers on her twenty-fifth birthday that she is the kidnapped daughter of a late new England financier and heiress to a fortune. When the tabloid press and her unwanted greedy relatives descend on her, she has to admit the quiet secure life she's known and loved is gone for good. As Gracie struggles to stabilize her world and come to terms with her new identity, she learns that belonging is not about where you came from but who you are. Publishers weekly Marinello's debut attempts, with minimal success, to marry a suspense plot to southern fried wit. As an infant, Gracie Lynne Calloway's mother left her on her uncle's doorstep in shady grove, ala. She grows up to be an outspoken tomboy with a killer pitching arm, a foul mouth, and a deep love for her sleepy hometown, but on her 25th birthday, private investigator Sam Fontana shows up with the news that Gracie was actually kidnapped from a wealthy Connecticut family and stands to inherit million. Gracie wants nothing to do with the money, aware that it will only complicate the life she loves, and she's proven right once paparazzi and greedy relatives descend. Then there's the matter of handsome Yankee Sam, who Gracie is undeniably attracted to. Though the tiresome trope of the headstrong tomboy waiting to be tamed by the right man is mitigated somewhat by Gracie's quick wit, the typecast supporting characters--meddlesome aunt, wise uncle, sassy friend--do little to distinguish this from the magnolia-scented pack. (Dec.)
