When the Sun Goes Down

Written by Gwynne Forster

Narrated by Kim Brockington

Winner of a Romantic Times Career Achievement Award, Gwynne Forster was elected into the Affaire de Coeur Hall of Fame for her acclaimed body of work. Her talent for laying bare the complexities of human relationships is evident in this emotional tale of siblings discovering what it means to be a family. After millionaire widower Leon Farrell dies, his three grown children are dismayed that their father's will cannot be found. As tensions rise, they must learn to come together-or face being torn apart for good.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
• Release date: Nov 18, 2011
• ISBN: 9781449843557

Gwynne Forster

Gwynne Forster is an Essence bestselling author and has won numerous awards for fiction, including the Gold Pen Award, the RT Book Reviews Lifetime Achievement Award. She holds a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in sociology and a master’s degree in economics/demography and has traveled and/or worked in sixty-three countries. She lives in New York with her husband.

Reviews for When the Sun Goes Down

[arlenadean · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

By: Gwynne ForesterPublished By: DafinaAge Recommended: AdultReviewed By: Arlena DeanRating: 4Review:"When the Sun Goes Down" by Gwynne Forester was a wonderful written novel about the Leon Farrell family. It was the death of Leon Farrell when it all came out about a family that looked good on the outside but when you are able to get inside this picture...my, my, my what will we find...a father whose life changed for his family in their treatment after his loss his 'beloved wife.' There were three children, Edgar, the oldest, next their was Gunther and then the baby sister Shirley. We find Edgar was the 'rebel' who lived his life by is own terms only leaving Gunther and Shirley more or less on their own due to the treatment of their father. What was so very important about this read is that from the opening of the story till the very end that there wasn't any love lost between the father and the children. Why was this? Edgar was a guitarist, Gunther an entrepreneur software designer and Shirley was a PR specialist for a cruise line. The two younger Farrell children had worked their way through college and into successful careers while Edgar, well you will see from the read how he managed. Now, to really understand what all is going on with the Ferrell's you area going to have to pick up this amazing read to see what happens after their father dies and no one can find the will.Who will be really concerned with this... the inheritance? Will they find this well hidden will? Be ready for some mystery, with deep secrets and lies with will be revealed in this drama of many twist and turns. Will the oldest sibling, Edgar finally grow up and stop depending on his brother and sister to help him out of his messed up life? One thing I will note about this novel is that their was love showed toward the brother, Edgar by his siblings. They truly had tried to help him out many, many times. "When The Sun Goes Down" will be a long novel but I feel the author did a good job at presenting it all to her readers the way she did and it was a easy smooth read.The characters well developed and interesting maybe some I didn't like but that did not take away from the awesome story that was presented. I thought that the 'family dynamics' were very true to life in what could happen when someone loses a 'influential' family member especially when money is involved. If you are looking for a good family story with a little bit of it all you have come to the right place for "When The Sun Goes Down" will give you some of it all. From death, secrets, lies, love, rape, deceit to romance....it's well covered between the book cover. Would I recommend? YES!

[saltypepper_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I got this as part of the Early Reviewer's program. I tried to get into it several times but I couldn't make myself finish it. I felt the writing was a little choppy and the dialog didn't sound quite like real people to me. I couldn't lose myself in it the way I often do. The story was interesting, but there was nothing here I couldn't see coming from a mile off. Maybe as a beach/pool read, where you're not asking for a deep story, just to be entertained.

[melselz · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I have to admit that I did not even finish this book. I really did not like the way the author seemed to have to spell everything out for the reader and the self descriptions of the characters. I thought that it lacked any real depth and did not have a gripping story line.

[ezinwanyi_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book was a decent read, but it was not very good. In this book, we are introduced to 3 siblings at their father's funeral. It becomes very apparent that there was no love lost between them and the deceased father. I don't remember any dialogue detailing any happy memories of time with their father.We are introduced to Gunther, an entrepeneur software designer. His older brother Edgar, who is a guitarist/gambler/rebel, and a younger sister Shirley, who is a PR specialist for a cruise line.What I liked about the book is that there seemed to be unwavering love for Edgar, who would make a nun want to strangle him. He is lazy, selfish and direction-less.Shirley found love in the book (I don't want to give up the details), but that was encouraging.They were blessed with another sibling, which was revealed through the father's will.What I didn't like about the book;1) The dialogue was unnatural and didn't flow. For that reason, I just never connected with the characters. They just seemed too robotic, especially Gunther's dealings with Lissa. I don't know any man who would answer or approach that situation with such clarity of thought and language. Also, this whole thing about "harrassment" was too contrived by the author. 2) I didn't feel that the siblings "enjoyed" life. I heard a lot of acceptance for their life as they were the captains of their own ship--they made their own way--but I didn't feel their enjoyment of their choices.3) The author could have added more depth to the characters. I mean, it got kind of predictable.4) This book was just not captivating or intriguing. I put the book down several times to tend to other things. I can read a book like this in 1-2 days. The writing was choppy and didn't flow. But the actual plot and storyline had a lot of potential.This book was just okay for me.

[echoesofstars · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book wasn't what I had expected. It read more like a romance novel, with the main plotline of finding the will more or less stalled right up until the very end. I found the plot twists to be pretty transparent - I could see them coming from a mile away, but somehow they were still satisfying.The relationships between the siblings seemed to be pretty stagnant. I was hoping for more dynamic character development with either Edgar or Gunther, but both held true to their original personas apparent at the beginning of the book. Because of this, I find the synopsis on the back cover of the book to be misleading. This book really isn't about the tensions between the sibilings, because neither the characters nor their inter-familial relationships ever really evolve or change. At its heart, it's a romance novel, and it does a very good job of steaming up the relationship between Carson and Shirley. The search for the will and the events that surround that search are really just the backdrop in which the romance blooms. The development of the romance is where the real action is.Final verdict? Read it as a light romance novel, and you won't be disappointed.

[shemsu_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Leon Farrell was a very mean spirited, emotionally distant man. He spent most of his time holed up in his room, building robots and hoarding his valuables. This made for a very cold and unyielding childhood for Edgar, Gunther and Shirley Farrell. But they have since grown up and moved on. Well, except for Edgar. He will never grow up or move on. But Gunther and Shirley have found happiness and success in their adult lives and are living without the emotional or financial support of their father. When Leon Farrell dies each sibling has to deal with their own issues of loss and anger. Fortunately, Gunther and Shirley have led fulfilling lives that help them to deal with their loss. Edgar Farrell, however, is desperate for money. Edgar is a talented musician that gambles most of his money away and refuses to hold a regular job. He knows that their miserly and devious father has left them each a generous inheritance but he can’t find the will to claim it. Mr. Farrell has hidden the will, probably in the hopes that they will never find it. Too lazy to search himself, Edgar hires a private detective to find the will so that he may live “high off the hog”. Hiring the detective leads to a whole other series of issues and the reader finds the story being pulled in several different directions.When the Sun Goes Down by Gwynne Forster is a decent weekend read. Not to be confused with great literary fiction, it at least offers a distraction from everyday life. The story is interesting enough but the dialogue is unrealistic and the book is littered with grammatical errors. Some seem like they are used to liven up the dialogue, others are just oversights by the editors. At times the plot is entertaining although predictable and some of the scenes are hard to imagine. Forster often tells the reader what is going on instead of painting a picture for us. The characters are also quite unbelievable and never really become living figures. Overall, the book is a good vacation read. It’s a good book to relax with after dinner or take it with you to the beach. But don’t expect to be wowed.

[reads4pleasure · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

"When the sun goes down on my life, you'll all come apart like ripped balloons." The wealthy Leon Farrell spoke those words to his three children before he passed, but, as always, he underestimated them. While his oldest, Edgar, does seem to be falling apart at the seams, Shirley and Gunther are doing just fine.Shunned by their father after the death of their mother while they were still children, the younger Farrell siblings worked their way through college and into successful careers. Shirley handles PR on board cruise ships and Gunther has built a computer software company that's growing by leaps and bounds. Their oldest brother, Edgar, is the only one that seems to be struggling in the wake of his father's death. It's not that he misses their father, he misses the inheritance that he's sure is coming to him.In his final thumbing of the nose at his kids, Leon died without telling anyone where his will was, including his attorney of over 20 years. Pressed for money to pay off gambling debts, Edgar hires private investigator, Carson Montgomery, to locate the missing document.What did you like about this book?It was a quick and easy read.What didn't you like about this book?Some of the conversations seemed so unnatural. For example, at the beginning of the book instead of giving a narration about the siblings, the author has them speaking to each other and describing their jobs to the other as if they're strangers meeting for the first time and not brother and sister.I was also troubled by the dialect in which the author had the maid and nurse speak. It was almost as if because they were the hired help, they weren't capable of speaking in grammatically correct sentences. Every time I read their words, I cringed just a little.What could the author do to improve this book?There were whole chapters that served no purpose and, because of that, the book dragged at some points. I also question the nice, neat ending of the book. It's okay to not have a fairytale ending all the time.

[momweaver · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

This book wasn't as good as I had hoped that it would be. The characters were two dimensional and the dialog was stilted. The character problem might have been solved with 200 or so extra pages, but I've still never heard anyone speak the way that these people do.

[l3wilso_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The book was not the best, but was not the worse. I think the author could have done more with the character development of the children, and not surprise us with the deceit of the Father. The relationship between the Father and the chidren needed to be available to the reader to understand why the relationship was not a good one. To parallel it with a rape in his youth did nothing to explain the father's dislike of his own children. The detective was good and the relationship with Shirley was great, but did drag out a bit. I think the author should have put a little more research into the children, instead of bits and pieces from the characters when they were remembering their childhood.

[susanheim · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I went into this book really wanting to like it, the cover alone is just lovely, but in the end, it was not a favorite. I was at a disadvantage because this book is a sequel and I hadn't read the first one so it felt somewhat hurried as Forster summarized the history of a few key characters in paragraphs that did not do them justice. That would be my major issue with the book - it's a Ken Follett sized story in a Mitch Albom sized book. The story was so good and intriguing - a great premise for the mystery and good pairings for the romance - but the characters deserved more time in the pages for the relationships to develop naturally. To make the pieces fit within the time frame of the story (number of pages/words), Forster had to use too many fantastic coincidences for my taste. The other turn off for me was the way the male characters spoke. When the romantic lead, Carson, is asking the heroine on a date, he says, "A dressy street dress shoud be suitable for the evening...." and when Gunther is describing a work project, he describes it as "a dilly of a game". I work for the Navy surrounded by hundreds of men, none of them talk like this. I wondered if perhaps Gwynne is not from America, the more formal style of speech made me think of someone for whom English is a second language. Then I visited her website including her blog and her voice in that setting sounded much more relaxed and natural. I felt like Forster wanted to tell young Black women that there were spohisticated men out there for them but it ended up feeling like the men were preaching rather than being real. This book was full of promise but did not pan out for me.

[traceythomson_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Forster's book "When the Sun Goes Down" follows a family's journey after the death of a parent and the "missing" will. The book was an easy read with the most interesting character being the detective. The character development could have been better, but the biggest disappointment to me was the lacking history of the children. Frieda's past was explained at the end, but what made Edgar the way he was. Also, being as the father was a millionaire, reality (no matter how shallow) dictates that Gunther and Shirley would care more about finding the missing will than they let on. It was entertaining, but with a little more history and development, it could have been much better.

[geekyblackgirl · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

This book was awful. The writing was not smooth and grammatical errors were everywhere. Maybe the errors were not the author's fault but whomever edited the book. The storyline was predictable. The author paid too much attention to what clothing the characters were wearing rather than her story which led me to rolling my eyes multiple times while reading. There seemed to be little continuity to the plot. It was not an enjoyable read. Would not recommend.