By Eden Baylee
I loved Eden Baylee’s stories since I read her Fall into Winter collection. So when I saw that she had written a Lei Crime Kindle World novella, I had to read A Snake in Paradise.
Essentially, the story is one of a woman discovering her inner strength and learning to trust herself. My favorite aspect is how the author uses the snake as a symbol of strength and power, as opposed to the usual sneaky, evil associations.
The story
Madelaine Lee is a recently divorced woman who decides to turn her life around. She starts to call herself “Lainey,” rather than Madelaine. After decades of her overbearing husband preventing her from getting a tattoo, after her divorce, Lainey has a friend give her a colorful tattoo of a snake the length of her back. Then she treats herself to a solo vacation on the Big Island, Hawaii.
At the opening of the story, she’s clearly still in recovery mode: nervous, anxious to please. But she is making the effort to transform herself. She dresses so as to show off her tattoo. She books adventurous excursions.
At her hotel, she is victimized by a handsome man, who seduces her, then robs her and leaves her naked and bound hand and foot.
Drawing on her new-found inner strength, symbolized by the snake tattoo, she is determined not to let her experience ruin her vacation, and to help the police find the man who robbed and humiliated her.
Her self-confidence grows daily. She makes new friends and begins to like herself more and more. By the end of the story, she’s no longer the same Madelaine Lee, ex-wife. She’s self-actualized Lainey Lee. Like a snake, she has gone through a painful struggle and is now renewed.
This is an excellent book that follows a credible, sympathetic character’s development, who finds in trauma her own inner strength. From that, she changes her situation, her life and herself.
5*.
Kindle World
A Snake in Paradise is one of the titles in the Lei Crimes Series Kindle World. Bestselling author Toby Neal created the Lei Crime series, which now has nine books featuring Hawaiian Detective (and sometimes FBI Agent) Leilani Texeira, as well as a companion novel about a secondary character.
Kindle Worlds is an initiative of Amazon, where the company takes a successful series and invites other people to write shorter works that fit within the original author’s world. Toby invited a number of proven, professional writers to contribute to her Lei Crime world, and Eden Baylee joined with A Snake in Paradise.
In total, 11 authors have published Lei Crime Kindle World books of varying length, and I’m looking forward to reviewing more, including Christine Nolfi’s The Shell Keeper and Emily Kimelman’s Warrior Dog.
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Thanks so much for posting a review of A SANKE in PARADISE on your site. I really appreciate the publicity to your readers!
eden
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I am having trouble wrapping my mind around the Kindle World concept. I came across a book written with this series and felt the story was incomplete. Fortunately for the authors there are plenty of readers who do “get it.”
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Hi Onisha, Nice to meet you! I understand your concern. Even as an author, I had to learn about the Kindle World concept so I could evaluate how to write a story for it. As all the Lei Crime Kindle Worlds’ books are novellas, they will be shorter books, but should still be complete stories within themselves. A few of them may continue the story with the same character, as I have in mine with my second book — SEAL of a Monk, but a book should not leave you ‘hanging.’ The Lei Crime Kindle Worlds takes characters, plot lines, and settings used by Toby Neal (author of the Lei Crime series) and expands on them. As Toby has been writing the series for some years now, it’s an opportunity for her to explore new stories while allowing avid fans of her Lei Crime series to read how other authors interpret the world she has built. You can also find out more on Toby’s site http://tobyneal.net/kindleworlds/. Appreciate your comment, and hope this clears it up a little for you, eden
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Interesting short story idea. I love reading about characters who discover their strength within the story. I’m not sure how a tattoo that you can’t see might do that, but the symbolism is clear. She shed her old self and emerged shiny and new.
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Hi Diane, thanks for commenting.
The snake is definitely symbolic and a metaphor, interpreted two ways. Snakes are not usually associated with anything good, so it’s a twist on established beliefs. Within the Asian culture, a snake has many positive traits, just like pigs and sheep—two other animals that normally do not have positive associations.
In my story, the ability to physically see a tattoo is less important than knowing of its presence. It is viewed as a talisman because it is carried on the body at all times. Hope this explains it a little, appreciate your comment! eden
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Interesting idea of turning the snake metaphor on its head. Thanks for sharing the review, Scott and best wishes, Eden.
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Hi Rebekah,
Great way of putting it and thanks very much for reading the review,
eden
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It’s always good to read about strong women.