Review: Emotionally touching!
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 10 27, 2013
* Book provided by author in exchange for an honest reviewRarely do I read romance novels with heavy, realistic or even controversial themes, they're not my style. However Christi Williams' Perilous Promises was a book I made an exception for. Perilous Promises is the story of a woman named Perris's journey after breast cancer, who she wants to be, and the painful, but necessary decision to divorce her loving but suffocating husband (and love of her life), Noah. It shows that though people may have the best intentions, their actions might in fact, have the opposite result.Perris Dalton is refreshingly flawed. At times it seemed like even she didn't know what she wanted out of life. Did I wish I could slap Perri at times? Absolutely. At one point she acts as if the men in her life are mind readers and should know when she wants to be saved and when she wants them to back off. She lets fear influence her decisions as well, which was annoying but again, realistic. Most of us, for good or bad, would react like Perri in those situations. I truly did admire Perri for having the strength to put herself before her relationship with Noah. As painful as it was for her to do it, Perri had to get away from him unless she wanted to spend her whole life being treated like an invalid. That's what kept her from becoming a TSTL (Too Stupid To Live) character in my eyes. Her commitment to her well being above any relationship, even if she does do more harm than good by closing herself off to her loved onesNoah's love for Perri was admirable, he took care of her while she was fighting cancer and that made me love him. What didn't make me love him was how smothering he was after Perri was better. I understand the need to protect what he perceives as a "weaker" person, but sometimes he was over the top and the modern woman in me just cringed and felt suffocated (which is why I totally sympathized with Perri). Never fear though, he is an amazing man, just an imperfect one. Every male character in Perilous Promises has one huge thing in common, they don't know how to adjust to Perri being healthy again and the fear that she might find herself fighting for her life again makes them panic and do the stupidest things.Author Christi Williams doesn't gloss over Perri's battle with breast cancer. She brings to light the range of emotions that a cancer patient and their loved ones go through: anger, fear, resentment, acceptance and hope. Perri's battle didn't end with the cancer, she struggled with a big question: What now? She spent so much time and energy fighting the cancer that once she beat it it was like she didn't know what to do with the time and energy she now had to herself. What she was sure of, was that she didn't want or need to be smothered by her well meaning but at times clueless husband Noah.Perilous Promises takes readers on a long, sometimes frustrating journey but if you like less than perfect, well meaning characters then you'll enjoy this book. I do recommend it to breast cancer survivors and their family members because it's great that an author like Christi Williams made Perri's battle and recovery from breast cancer as realistic as possible without making the book all about the dark side of cancer.