Review: A Sweet Love story about 2 people healing from their pasts...but was lacking in reality with some of the plot
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 08 3, 2013
I received this book by the author on Goodreads in exchange for an honest review. I will try not to get into spoilers, but I do want to voice my opinions on some serious issues I had with this book.First off, I Really did enjoy this book for the most part. Some of the content hit too close to home, so some of it was hard to read. But some just didn't seem based in reality. It's too bad that they didn't treat some of the characters' past pain & problems with more truth.It did mess up some of the story for me, as you will see below.But this is meant to be a story about troubled people finally finding solace in their soul mate's arms. I really liked and enjoyed the 4 main characters, Bree, Josh, Eric & then Lena. They really made a good support system and family for each other. The characters & the other parts of the plot were at times so touching, it really lifted up my spirits. Truly. The love, trust & loyalty between the two main characters was inspiring as well as deeply touching. Bree is a beautiful young woman with a heart of gold and she certainly found her match with Josh. Both were working on very painful pasts that left very fresh wounds. They were drawn together at first sight and fell in love fast. And even tho Josh was drowning his sorrows before Bree, with random women & drink, he didn't push Bree for sex. In fact she was pushing for it, but he knew she was special and wanted to wait. Now when they finally got to that point, there was no discussion about birth control and he didn't use a condom! This was not cool with me. He just spent the last two years drunkenly doin whoever & obviously wasn't in the habit of being safe. Who knows when he stopped this behaviour before Bree. It could have been the day before! And who knows if he saw the Dr. regularly. So, eww. If he cared so much & waited, there's just no excuse. He's 25. Get it together!Then we have Bree. She's on NO birth control! She had time to take care of that. She's 22 & most of the time seems to have her head on straight, but not this time. They continue to be very amorous, but never a thought to make sure they were safe.As their relationship progresses, they tell each other their past hurts and Josh explains what happened with him that wounded both himself and his best friend Eric so gravely. Josh & Eric both continue to struggle over it daily. Incidents happen. Some quite shocking. But Bree REALLY loves Josh and has a Very forgiving heart. I like that's she stands up for herself and let's her feelings be known without being antagonizing. She let's Josh know when he's hurt her. What he did to do so and what she expects him to do about it, so that they'll be ok again. She doesn't let it sit inside and eat away at her. And I like how Josh doesn't hide his feelings for her and owns his emotions (most of the time). He adores her. Puts her first, rather than be selfish and has a Beautiful, Open, Loving heart.The characters in this book are just very likable. Eric also gets close with Bree, like a protective older brother. He's struggling thru his own pain and the two are there for each other. Lena is a friend from work who gets to know the others thru work & Bree. She also has her own issues. She's a Great friend for Bree and she and Eric have something brewing as well. Because the characters were so enjoyable, it made reading this enjoyable, as long as you focused on them.Now some of what I have to say next, were my basic problems when it came to how this book handled the Domestic violence issues, both in Bree's reactions to it and how it affected the plot.I want to now go back to the beginning...Now when Bree left Nick,her previous man,it was after two years of SEVERE Physical & Psychological abuse. She'd Finally had Enough! She'd found a new job and a new place to live, but for some crazy reason, she wanted to tell her ex in person. THEN she turns her back on him! Not a good idea to do to a psycho who thinks he owns you and will OF COURSE be LIVID and ready to do some damage. And that he did. Only by luck, or Divine Intervention, is Bree saved from being killed by Nick. They arrested him, but then all they did was have a restraining order placed & forced him to go to Anger management classes. REALLY??? Bree was messed up pretty bad and had said this wasn't the first time he'd tried to kill her. Why wasn't he locked up without bail? And although there were appropriate times thruout the book where she was scared,she didn't suffer from PTSD,Panic attacks, Nightmares etc. She'd been getting some therapy, but so little time had passed. But she seemed to act as if she'd had years of help dealing with this and to find her own identity again. Instead she took it all in stride and seemed to become her old self really fast. I understand that she wanted to put this all behind her and live in the Now. Not so easy, speaking from experience and to just be realistic. It also bothered me that she wasn't keeping some eye out for herself when it came to Nick. As I either Josh or Eric said, Guys like that aren't done with you. I wish Bree had met Josh some years after it happened, to give her time to really deal with the aftermath. And even then, she would probably be guarded and careful to some point when she did meet him. I wish Josh was farther along in his recovery as well. It just would have worked for me and seemed set in reality.Now I REALLY DON'T want to discourage people from reading this book. But I felt it was really important to discuss these issues in the book. Being a survivor myself, I know how traumatizing and toxic severely abusive relationships can be and her story was worse than mine. You can't just skip away from those experiences and not be carrying scars and wounds.Overall: 3.5 stars (rounded up to 4)Would I recommend: I do, just keep these things in mind before delving in. The book is quite enjoyable, it's just unrealistic concerning some of the issues stated above.