Review: Sizzles in many ways
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 05 23, 2013
Read in one sitting which to me means Wife in Name Only was a fast paced, catchy and riveting read.My hero Zoe, owner of honeymoon resort in Tonga calls her ex husband in sheer desperation to keep up appearances to the outside world she's the other half of a successful and happy marriage with a world wide well known businessman Rory. Zoe is quite convinced her marriage is over, after all she did walk out of it with by her own choice and took off to the other side of the world. Rory however has different ideas, his marriage is not over and when Zoe calls out of the blue he takes the opportunity in both hands to go and bring her home, thus beginning a rollicking read full of humor, adventure, mystery and second chances.Why is Zoe my hero? She left her marriage because she was brave enough to leave what seemed to be a loveless marriage and face life on her own. She didn't stay just for the sake of not being along. Zoe was almost in what we refer to as the First Wives Club. The ones that stand by their man when they grow from nothing to something then the husbands move on. Rory did grow from nothing to something and Zoe's reflection of those times is heart-melting.As a lover of second chance stories I was fully invested in Rory wanting to go back and save his marriage. Poor guy had a hard time with this because he is a bit of an ass to Zoe in both attitude and his outlook on life. He cant understand why Zoe would want to stay on a godforsaken island in the middle of nowhere and so far removed from his central NY hub it couldn't be more different. The rest of us would think Zoe's actually in paradise.I loved how Hayson Manning's descriptive writing placed me on that island, in the middle of the drama Zoe and Rory faced together. There were moments of total Laugh out Loudness and moments of heart-thumping terror and moments of shock, all rounded up into a fun read.I googled Hayson Manning because she was a new author to me and I like to find out a bit of background. I was delighted to see she originally hails from my neck of the woods NZ! Congratulations on your first release Hayson.