Readers Guide for Beautiful Ugly

Quick Plot Summary for Beautiful Ugly

The Isle of Amberly, part of the Scottish Hebrides islands, was a weird place, right? Things that seemed stranger and stranger:

• a ferry to the island twice a week, but no return ferry
• no telephone or internet
• only twenty-five residents

And then things get weirder:

• Shortly after his arrival, Grady finds a human hand under a loose board in the cottage.
• He also finds a manuscript written by Charles Whittaker, the writer who owned the cottage before Kitty.
• Then we learn that, before Abby’s death, she was lying to Grady. About everything!
• AND Abby calls him from a broken telephone booth. Okay!
• Then one of the residents tells him a man’s body was found on shore a year ago

Other clues in the story:

• Grady keeps seeing women in red coats, just like the one Abby wore
• The residents also wear silver rings with a thistle on them
• At some point I noticed Grady was the only man on the island
• The residents (except Grady) comunicate by walkie-talkie

We get more backstory on Abby:

• She was sexually abused by her piano teacher. When her mother discovered this, she hit the teacher over the head and he was never seen again.
• Abby wrote a story about Cora, one of the island residents, who was sent to prison for killing the man who sexually assaulted her daughter
• She wanted a child but Grady didn’t

Grady makes a decision

• As in many suspense books about authors, Grady decides to steal the Charles Gallagher’s story and rewrite it for himself.
• He then learns that Charles Whittaker took his own life AND
• Sandy read all of Whittaker’s first drafts. Did she read the book he stole? (YES!)

Grady learns more of the island’s secrets

• Sandy tells Grady why there are no children on the island. Years ago, there were thirteen. Unsupervised by a drunken teacher, they hid in a sea cave and were trapped by the tide and drowned.
• Grady leaves Sandy in the cave. If she drowns, he won’t get exposed for stealing the manuscript

Abby reappears!

• Grady nearly runs her over in the road.
• She doesn’t recognize or remember him
• “Abby” is the proprietor of Beautiful Ugly, the town pottery shop

What is Beautiful Ugly?

The pottery shop on the island. (Also the title of Grady’s new book.)

Abby (Aubrey) says the name is because “life is beautiful and life is ugly and we have to learn to live with both sides of the same coin.”

What are the Buried Lovers?

When Abby and Grady were renovating their home, the builders found “buried lovers,” a two-hundred year ritual in which a couple would each put a set of clothes plus money and food under a blanket and then bury it under the floor. This would guarantee they could find it in the afterlife.

Grady told the builders to throw everything out.

Grady puts more pieces together

• He finds a photo of two residents of the island, plus Abby as a child
• He meets Travers, the woman Abby/Aubrey says she’s now married to
• BUT Abby isn’t really Aubrey
• Grady also confesses that he had a vasectomy and can’t father children
• And Grady reaches out to Kitty

Abby finally DOES show up

• She tells him what happened the night she disappeared. Their marriage was failing but she was driving home to celebrate his bestseller
• She saw a woman lying in the road
• Abby says SHE was to blame for the children drowning. (She seems to have survivors’ guilt because she was there and survived.)
• Arabella, the woman who killed her daughter’s attacker, runs the tavern.
• All the women on the island are there to start over … without men
• Abby gave birth to a daughter, Holly, who is not Grady’s child

What Was the Ending of Beautiful Ugly?

• Abby reveals that Grady was the one lying in the street the night Abby disappeared. He then drugged her and threw her over a cliff.
• Kitty shows up. She raised Abby after Abby’s mother took her own life.
• Kitty was the girl abused by her piano teacher and Kitty’s mom cut his hands off with an ax
• But thirty years later, her abuser came back to the island to be a substitute teacher.
• The abuser came to Kitty’s cottage and found Abby, who fought back and injured him.
• Abby went to hide in the cave with Sandy’s daughter
• After the children drowned, Sandy killed the teacher.
• Charles helped Sandy bury the body
• Kitty and Abby left the island, and Kitty married Charles Whittaker
• After Abby disappeared, Kitty came back to the island and found her.
• Kitty vowed to destroy Grady

What?? I know. But there’s more:

• Grady explains why he tried to kill Abby: he found a positive pregnancy test in the trash and knew the baby wasn’t his
• Abby did IVF with a donor and was going to tell Grady about the baby (she says…)
• Kitty says Grady can stay on the island and write books if all the money goes to the island. Since Charles died, the island needs money, as his book proceeds had been supporting the island
• A year later, Grady is writing books
• Then Grady thinks he wakes up in a coffin. He told Abby that his greatest fear was being buried alive. Is it a dream? Or is life just Beautiful Ugly?

What do you think of all this?

• Is the whole thing just Grady hallucinating on Bog Myrtle Tea?
• Is the whole thing Grady’s book, Beautiful Ugly?
• Or is it all a feminist vengeance story and did Grady really get buried alive? Is this punishment for his destruction of the Buried Lovers (and trying to kill Abby?)
• Were the “Abby” chapters written by Kitty, as someone suggests in comments?

Tell me what you think in the comments!!!

Your Questions about Beautiful Ugly

Ask and I will try to answer. If you disagree, let me know in comments!

Caroline wants to know what happened to Columbo, Grady’s dog

• I’m so sympathetic to this question, as I was SO stressed out in Rock Paper Scissors about Bob the elderly labrador.
• So Grady may have his flaws (cough) but he does seem like a good dog dad
• Columbo, the dog, is FINE, in my opinion. When Kitty shows up on the island, Columbo seems to love her and she says she’d be happy to take care of him if anything were to happy to Grady (wink)

I am of the opinion that Alice Feeney might harm her characters, she’d never harm a dog in her book. Here’s a photo of her with Boots, her black labrador! Follow them on Instagram at AliceWriterLand!