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Page 82: “Too many people glorified small-town America, making it seem like a Norman Rockwell painting, but the reality was something else entirely. With the exception of doctors and lawyers or people who owned their own businesses, there were no high-paying jobs in Oriental, or in any other small town for that matter. And while it was in many ways an ideal place to raise young children, there was little for young adults to aspire to. There weren’t nor would there ever be, middle management positions in small towns, nor was there much to do on the weekends, or even new people to meet.”

In this passage, Sparks does put his finger on a challenge in Pamlico County when it comes to well-paid work. He does not elaborate further, but here on the ground, some “grass is greener” dynamic is at play. The pace of life in Oriental that might bore the tears out of a 16- or 24-year-old makes it alluring as a weekend or vacation get-away for executives with busy lives in Raleigh or beyond.

Page 93 “When Dawson returned from his run, several other guests were sipping coffee in the parlour, reading free copies of USA Today.”

We were met with laughter when we asked innkeepers Johnny and Margaret Reiswig if they provided Cartwright House B&B guests with copies of USA Today. Margaret asked if the daily were even available — in paper form — in town, while Johnny noted that Cartwright guests can read the paper on line from the wireless signal routed through the building.

While USA Today’s hard copy is not an option, you can feed quarters in to the newspaper machines around town to get either the News and Observer from Raleigh or the New Bern Sun Journal. The Bean sells the New York Times on Sunday.

And speaking of The Bean…. (cue the aromas of many, many coffees)

Page 95: “Amanda stood at the counter of the Bean, adding cream and sugar to a cup of Ethiopian coffee. The Bean, once a small home that overlooked the harbor, offered about twenty different kinds of coffee along with delicious pastries. Along with Irvin’s, it was a place where locals congregated to catch up on whatever was happening in town. Behind her, she could hear the murmurs of conversation. The twenty-something-year-old behind the counter hadn’t stopped moving since Amanda had walked in.”

The four coffees offered daily at The Bean. From left to right, Decaf, Unblended, Blended and Flavored. Outside the window is the Duck Pond.

Before the Bean was founded about a decade ago, the building was home to a real estate office, a video store, a headhunter’s office. It’s not a large structure — maybe 600 square feet or so. If this passage meant to suggest the Bean offered 20 kinds of coffee at one time, the counter would have to extend out the side window, over the handicapped ramp and stretch towards the Duck Pond.

As regulars to The Bean can tell you, there are in a given day, four types of coffee in the self-serve carafes – decaf on the left, flavored coffee on the right and unblended and blended in the middle. If Amanda were getting her caffeine fix on a weekday morning, the peripatetic barrista, June Durham would smile at being described as a twenty-year-old (as well as hearing no mention of singed bagels.) On weekend mornings, the staff’s average age hovers closer to 17.

Meanwhile, on page 97, we read that the other protaganist, “has set his sights on the coffee shop” and then waits “in the shade of a magnolia tree” until Amanda comes out of The Bean.

Perhaps the sights he is setting are in his telephoto lens. To be standing in shade, he may have been watching Amanda from quite a distance. There are no shade trees, much less magnolias, on any public sidewalks or rights of way near The Bean.

Shortly afterward, Dawson goes in to the coffeehouse with Amanda.

Page 98-99 “Amanda noted the way the pretty twenty-something cashier tried not to stare at him as he walked toward the refrigerator case. When Dawson neared the back of the store, the clerk checked her appearance in the mirror behind the counter, then greeted him with a friendly smile at the register.”

The Bean has not had a mirror behind the counter. It will occasionally have some customers capable of turning heads. (In the real world of Oriental, demographically speaking, a 42 year old man would stand out. As being young.)

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Posted Monday November 7, 2011 by Melinda Penkava