This book was recommended to me because I loved Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid. It is a story that includes surfing, but is much more about three women's (a mother and her daughters) struggles to define identity, family and home. The author weaves the perspectives of the three women together in a captivating way. This work of historical fiction spans from WW2 until the 80s and reflects the cultural dynamics of those times.

I thought I wouLd enjoy the book based on its description but I really didn’t care for the main characters and what happened to them.

California Golden was an interesting premise, about two girls raised during the Vietnam Era by a mom who got pregnant young and struggled with her loss of freedom. It highlighted generational struggles that can be passed down to our children and about wounds and bitterness that can cause significant damage in the life of those we love.

I wanted to love this book, and I did read it very quickly because I needed to know how it ended, but I found that it started a little slowly and was a little bit predictable.

Overall a great story of love lost and found between family and the importance of finding oneself but also not forgetting those around you.

Thank you to net galley and the publisher for allowing me to have this ARC.

Unputdownable…. That’s the best word for the newest book by Melanie Benjamin. This wonderful historical fiction takes place during the time of the Vietnam war where boys were sent to the horrors of Vietnam and back him bigotry and prejudice ran wild. Carol was a super athlete in high school and when she found herself pregnant and then married at 19 she needed something to call her own. Surfing became that thing for Carol, who would end up being singularly focused on herself instead of her two daughters. Her two daughters both grow up trying to deal with feeling unloved and unwanted, causing both girls to have their fair share of trouble.

This book reminded me of one of my favorite books, Malibu Rising and had the same “unputdownable” factor. Thank you to the publishers and to Netgalley for allowing me to read this advanced copy.

California Golden rates a solid 3 stars for me. I enjoyed the various settings and time period but felt it was a little light and fluffy for my taste. I can see this appealing to people for a summer/beach read.

This book is the feeling of sunshine encapsulated. I loved how it transported me, and truly, Malibu was a character in itself. I love an atmospheric novel. This is my first from the author, and I am enraptured by her voice.

Very readable.
Love, responsibility
to yourself, others.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I write haiku reviews on Instagram but am happy to provide more feedback.

When you think of California in the 1960’s, what comes to mind? Sunshine, surfers, bonfires, hippies, drugs, parties? This book has all of that and more but with a deep family dynamic going on.

Carol Donnelly is a superstar competitive female surfer at a time when there was no such thing. The expectation then was that women should be in the home and tending to their family. Mindy and Ginger are her two daughters desperately seeking their mother’s attention and rarely finding it. They are on their own most of the time. This family has got issues, y’all. We watch all three grow and struggle to find their place in the world.

Themes of motherhood, complex sisterhood, jealousy, unrealized dreams, forgiveness, sense of belonging, and love run through this story. I wanted to shake these women one moment and give them a big hug the next. But I rooted for them the whole way through.

I’m a born and raised California girl so I really enjoyed this! 😎

Thank you to NetGalley and Delacorte Press for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I was really intrigued by the premise of this book and I’m glad I gave it a chance. I don’t usually love historical fiction, but once I got about 35% of the way through, I had trouble putting this one down. It started extremely slowly for me.

It follows the Donnelly women, Carol, Mindy, and Ginger. Carol is a surfer and she married young. She wasn’t the best mother to her kids, preferring to be on the beach. This book follows them for a couple of decades as they grow and change, and it’s told in three parts.

I really thought Carol was a terrible mother and I didn’t excuse her behavior. In her book when she admitted she was jealous of her daughter and said such vicious things, it was unforgivable. Honestly I don’t know how Mindy moved past that. She really got the short end of the stick, always cleaning up after everyone else. And Ginger… ugh.

I didn’t love the characters but I thought the story was interesting and each character was complex enough to keep me reading.

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

When I downloaded this book at the recommendation of the publisher, I wasn't sure I would enjoy it. It's historical yes, which I read a lot of, but it takes place later than most of the historicals I read, in the 1960's. I don't read many books taking place in the 60's, it's before I was born and also from what I've read a very tumultuous time.
I could tell you this takes place in California and is one of those surfing novels and that's true but it's so much more than that.
It's about sisters, pretty young when this starts, and it follows their path as they grow and mature.
It's also about the sister's relationship, one is a giver and carer and the other is a receiver and the one taken care of by multiple people throughout her life.
We also see the girl's relationship with their mother, these girls practically raise themselves while their mother surfs. Not your typical PTA mom. The girls don't want to be like their mother who ignores everything in life but surfing but to some degree they both are. One even surfs competitively for a time. It's the 60's vibe tumultuous times, surfing and waxing your board, family relationships broken by lies and neglect and unconventional women. Very emotional as we see the girls finding themselves in life and their evolving relationship with each other and their mother.
Well worth the read and recommended!

Pub Date 08 Aug 2023
I was given a complimentary copy of this book.
All opinions expressed are my own.

California Golden (2023) is the story of women competing in a man’s sport -surfing. It begins with the waves crashing on that golden California shore and ends with the golden edges of that dream permanently tarnished. The Donnelly girls all costar in this surfing safari, mother Carol and daughters Mindy and Ginger.

Carol was the original surfer chick when no other women were on the waves. But her dreams were dashed as she got locked into 1950’s suburban life with Tupperware parties and two young daughters. But Carol was not the PTA mom in Van Nuys. She was hardly around and eventually abandoned her family to go to the place it all started – in Hawaii – where no one took her seriously till they had no choice.

The two daughters were inseparable as twins – until they weren’t. Mindy, like her mother, took to the waves, winning surf championship after surf championship until a moviemaker wanted to star her in Gidget type movies. Mindy D, the girl with the curl, became the new sensation and a mini-celebrity -until years later when her time passed and she had to beg to accompany a USO tour to Vietnam and come to terms with who and what she left behind.

Meanwhile mom Carol bristled at being told she was too old for surf moviedom and disappeared again. Little Ginger was afraid of the surf and glommed onto a surfer, Tom, eventually clinging to him as they lived like vagabonds in a shack and later in a Laguna Beach commune. Tom beat her and said he really wanted the older sister. Ginger didn’t want anything but him – no matter what.

The novel tracks the trajectory of their intertwined but separate lives, they’re rises and falls through life. It tracks them through the Fifties and the Sixties and shows each of them in their glory and their imperfections. It is a well-written, charming, and often heart-wrenching tale.

This reviewer received an advance copy from the publisher for review purposes.

I really enjoyed California Golden by Melanie Benjamin. I had read some of her other books and wasn't sure about this one as I usually read older historical fiction. I was quickly pulled into the story of a family - choices, mistakes, and consequences. I liked that we were able to have insight into all three of the Donelly girls' lives and their perception of the events that formed their lives. Balancing family, societal expectations, and being true to yourself must have been very difficult in the 1940's and 50's. The info about the surfing culture was very interesting to read about.

I appreciate NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

I was very excited to receive this ARC from Netgalley! I love summer, surfing movies (I say movies because I’ve never actually surfed), and anything beachy. I read this book pretty quickly and enjoyed it for the most part!

Why 3.5 stars:
- Malibu Rising mixed with Blue Crush mixed with Forrest Gump
- Got my Beachin’ playlist back in full effect
- This was the first time I’d ever seen the word ‘kook’ used outside of Outer Banks! I guess that’s a normal term for people in the surfing world??
- Right off the bat, Tom Riley gave me culty, psychopath vibes. All the red flags.
- I really liked Jimmy for Mindy (until he royally pissed me off!) but their story took some interesting turns… one I did NOT see coming
- Some parts of the book were extremely frustrating but I liked how it all came together in the end
- It’s a story of self-preservation, sacrifice, destiny, and family

“Being alone, she decided, was more terrifying than whatever lurked beneath the surface of the sea.”

I recommend this book if you’re looking for something nostalgic and summery! Thanks so much Netgalley and Random House Publishing for this ARC!

Set during the 60's & 70's California surfing culture, this is the story of Carol, a young woman with dreams of athletic excellence, who finds herself a wife and mother at too young an age. At the expense of her daughters Mindy & Ginger, and of her marriage, Carol is almost single-focused on her obsession with being a surfer. I found it painful to watch how much Mindy & Ginger craved their mother's attention even overcoming their fear of the water to become surfers as well. I can empathize with the feeling of being trapped but, having never been a mother, I couldn't imagine being so self-focused as to not really see your children or worry very much about their welfare.

As distasteful as I found Carol, I was very interested to see how this story unfolded "California Golden definitely qualified as a beach read for me; it kept the pages turning. Thank you to Netgalley and Dell for an ARC edition of this novel.

Carol Donnelly never wanted to be a mother and often abandoned her two daughters in favor of riding the waves in southern California. Her daughters, Mindy and Ginger believe the only way they can gain their mother’s love is to join her on the surfing circuit. Mindy takes to it naturally, while Ginger is less comfortable and never quite reaches the heights her mother and sister do. I had high hopes for this book. Unfortunately it did not deliver. The narrative jumped around, the characters were a bit wooden and too many questions were left unanswered. In summary, the story was just Ok. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for giving me an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Unfortunately, as much as the synopsis appealed to me, the writing did not. It fell a little flat for me. Most likely I'll try it again to see if giving it a second chance when I'm in another headspace will work but for now, it's just a two for me.

This book immediately pulled me in and I could not stop reading until I finished it . Loved Melanie Benjamin’s writing style so I will definitely check out some of her other books ! Highly recommend.

This story takes place in the 1950s-1960s in California during a time when surfing and sunning were popular pastimes. Ms. Benjamin paints a vivid picture of the beach, the ocean, and an atmosphere of lazy days and partying nights.

Mindy and Ginger were raised by their mother, Carol, who was a surfing pro in her younger days, but she could never give up the beach scene, even to the extent of forgetting to parent her two girls. Mindy, as the older sister, tries to protect Ginger, but eventually just allows Ginger to find her own way in the world. Ginger falls in love with an older man who treats her abysmally. But she’s willing to put up with it because she idolizes him.

Mindy chooses the ritzier lifestyle and gets into modeling and small time tv.

The sisters not only lose touch with their mother, but with themselves too. They don’t agree with each other’s lifestyle so just choose to go their own ways.

The pacing tends to be slow in some parts, especially towards the end when parts of the story are retold from Carol’s point of view.

The characters were well rounded, each with a unique personality. I enjoyed this book and highly recommend it. Four stars. Thank you, NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for the advanced copy. This book is due to be published on August 8, 2023

California Golden delves into the relationship between a mother and her two daughters against the dreamy backdrop of 1960’s surf culture in California.

I was sympathetic to each of the daughters while reading about their upbringing, and as they grew up and grew apart after being each other’s rocks throughout their childhood. They seemed determined to become nothing like their mother, but in the end they came to the realization that they were so very similar to her.

For most of the book, I didn’t understand Carol and how she was so selfish and neglectful to her children, but I ended up having sympathy for her when the story recapped her history and how she came to be a mother. It’s sad that societal expectations at the time were that every woman was destined to be a mother and wife, and how once that happened you were expected to give up your own hopes and dreams.

I enjoyed this book, and it was a treat to be immersed in this time period. Overall, the book was well written, but there were a few times I found myself skimming paragraphs to get to the dialogue.

**Special thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for sharing this digital review copy in exchange for honest feedback**

The Donnelly sisters grow up enduring their mother’s absence—physically, when she’s at the beach surfing, and emotionally, the rare times she’s at home. To escape questions about Carol’s whereabouts—and to chase her elusive affection—they cut school to spend their days in the surf. From her first time on a board, Mindy is a natural, but Ginger, two years younger, feels out of place in the water. As they grow up and their lives diverge, Mindy and Ginger’s relationship ebbs and flows. Mindy finds herself swept up in celebrity, complete with beachside love affairs, parties at the Playboy Club, and a USO tour in Vietnam. Meanwhile, Ginger, desperate for a community of her own, is tugged into the dangerous counterculture of drugs and cults. But through it all, their sense of duty to each other survives, as the girls are forever connected by the emotional damage they carry from their unorthodox childhood.

Being a child of the 50's and a teenager in the 60's, I can totally relate to this book. The characters are multi-layered and the author does a wonderful job of describing them. The California counter-culture is also aptly described. In the author notes, the author states that the characters were loosely based on a real surfing family. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a chance to read this book. It was very different from books I have been reading, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.