Review: 5 "OMG I LOVED THIS BOOK!" Stars
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 12 16, 2013
It's no secret that I am a huge Andrea Randall fan. Like, when we became Facebook friends, I seriously fan-girl screamed. I had fallen in love with her reading In The Stillness and devoured 10 Days of Perfect and Reckless Abandon. So...when she asked me to beta read Sweet Forty-Two I was beside myself and so very honored. And let me just say this: As much as I loved 10 Days and RA, this book is by far the best of the series thus far. It is brilliant. There is just no other word for it. So on with the review...Let me start by saying that when I first started reading, I didn't like Georgia. At all. She was mean to Regan and NOBODY gets to be mean to Regan. He's been through SO much, lost so much, and he's still this sweet, gentle soul and I love him. So...being mean to him wasn't the way to my good side.But having said that, within the first three chapters I was eating my words and a healthy helping of humble pie. I loved her...I mean in a way that I wanted to hug her, loved her. Her defense mechanisms are so REAL. Like, I can see myself throwing some of them up kind of real.As Georgia and Regan get to know one another, they form a bond. The kind of bond that doesn't have to be labeled or talked about, it's just there. She begins to open up, even though she doesn't really want to, and he begins reaching out to her, even though HE doesn't really want to."I just mean, Georgia," he teased, "people generally take the few basic and bare things afforded to us in this world and make them as complicated as possible. Us, though? We complicate it in beautiful ways. We have fun with it. Basically, we're awesome."There is something about them. I honestly cannot put it into words. Georgia is so *different* than most book heroines. It's almost the classic one step forward, two steps back with her and Regan but I didn't get frustrated with it like I normally would. They're both just so REAL that I wanted to firmly plant my hands on their backs and push them together. There were moments when Regan ripped my guts out and when Georgia broke my heart, but I LOVED them."Just because two people don't trust on the same timeline doesn't mean one is more or less trustworthy than the other."Eventually, as she opens up and he reaches out, they do learn to lean on each other, to trust one another, and to believe in each other."It wasn't about that day, Regan. It was about the forty-two before that. You didn't just help me in the bakery and break down my stubborn walls." She took a deep breath and reached for my other hand. "You broke down the walls and lead search party for the pieces of me you knew could love, and you dragged those out of the *f-----g* rubble I'd let pile up around my soul." - Georgia"And I didn't want there to be a bottom, because what greater feeling in the world is there to be actually falling into love?" - ReganAre you kidding me with this? How do you NOT swoon at lines like these?And my review would absolutely NOT be complete without mentioning how beautifully Andrea weaves bits of Alice in Wonderland into this book. She places the references perfectly and they give so much insight into Georgia's world. As her mother says to her:""There was no real ending to Alice in Wonderland, Georgia. Go ahead. Read the books, watch the movie again if you don't believe me." She gave a challenging smile."EXACTLY what Georgia needs to hear...and so true about life...we all write our own endings!This book is beautiful. It's love and pain and fear and trust. It's stunningly written and just plain brilliant. I love that Georgia and Regan get there in a way that is totally their own and yet feels like the universal love story."And there, under the soft glow of perfectly normal twinkle lights, two perfectly imperfect people did the most normal thing in the universe.Loved."Perfection <3