Continental

 

Continental Mark.IV

When I mention elderly attorney Conrad Summerlin—grandfather of Jam and Jelly—driving an ‘ancient Continental,’ this 1959 Mark IV is pretty much the sort of car I had in mind. Conrad makes a brief in-person appearance in ‘One Christmas in the Sun’ but is mentioned here and there in both Sun novels. I remember just such a car in the early 60s in Naples, stopping to pick up a student at St Ann School (which both Joey and the Summerlin kids are supposed to have attended).

Generic Girl

Ronnie Deerfield was intended from the start to be Generic Girl, a young every-woman without any particularly notable personality traits, unlike her best friends, Joey and Kris. Inevitably, she has grown into something more over the pages of my two Women in the Sun novels; she may remain less colorful but there is plenty going on internally!

Of the trio, she has explored the most, grown the most. Yet her future remains the most open, the most undetermined. Ronnie still has no clear vision for her life. She has not found her passion. She is groping toward what will be, unwilling to commit. That is, perhaps, a good thing.

A good thing for her. Ms. Deerfield has more growth ahead of her—as do her friends, to be sure. I hope to look in on them in the summer of 1969 and see how that goes.