Review: Emotional roller coasters
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 02 12, 2014
I was stripped bare by this debut novel by Rebecca Yarros. Within the first five minutes of reading Full Measures, I was sobbing and I knew that I was in for an emotional, roller-coaster read. My hope was that the story continued to be as powerful and the opening chapter. Well, I was brought to my knees. I cried, more than once, I laughed, I rejoiced but, most of all, I was amazed at how vividly Rebecca Yarros brought her characters to life, made you feel that you were a part of them – their actions, their feelings, their heartache and sorrow, and, their love.I really have no idea how to summarize this book. It’s a story, not only about young love but about everything that life can throw at you in such a short period of time. About surviving the hurt, the loss and about moving forward. It’s about how fate can throw you one hell of a curve ball then, at the last moment turn it into a fast ball and knock the wind right out of you. It’s a story about a family and how they make it through the grieving process after losing their father in Afghanistan – each in their own ways. How love has a way of finding you in the most inopportune times and what you have to go through to understand why.Full Measures centers around December (Ember) and Josh, their fight to find each other after tragedy strikes her family and Josh’s secret. Ember is holding her family together. Her mother has gone catatonic after the news of her husband’s death, her sister April is running wild and her brother Gus has lost his Dad. If that’s not enough, she find’s her boyfriend of three years in bed with her roommate. Josh reenters her life and becomes her savior, the one to be there to catch her when she starts stumbling, the most important person in her life. She knows he’s not telling her everything about what happened after he graduated, why he wasn’t playing Hockey for the big teams, why he disappeared one week-end out of every month. When everything finally comes out, Ember is devastated, feels betrayed again and fears that she is going to lose it all, again. She can’t and won’t stand by Josh and the decisions he’s making in his life. She won’t live the life of her mother.Josh can’t bear to tell Ember everything about himself. He knows that she’ll run, never see him again. He’s been in love with her since he was 18, never felt he was good enough for her but, he can’t lose her now that he has her. He’ll be there for her and Gus, her family … he’ll pick her up when she falls … he’ll love her until his dieing day … he’ll honor her father’s memory in the best way he knows how – serving his country and loving his daughter.Again, I was amazed at how Rebecca Yarros vividly brought us into the world of a military family. Her way with words has you right at the funeral – you can hear taps, you can hear the 21 gun salute. You feel their pain and anguish and feel the loss. She gave me new respect for military wives and children and made me truly understand what they live through while their husbands, wives or children are deployed and what they feel when they don’t return. She also brought to light the different ways people grieve and how they get themselves through the darkest parts of their lives. She made me understand that there is truly no one way to face the loss of a loved one – that everyone has to deal with the pain in their own way and then face the demons that possess them in the end. I was awed, I was inspired, I was truly and completely swept away by this over-powering book called Full Measures and I can only hope that this wonderful author graces us with more beautiful, heart-wrenching stories.Review copy provided for an honest review.