Review: Really liked this one
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 06 1, 2014
Hard Time by Cara McKennaGrade: B“We don’t have to....We don’t have to be those people we were, in those letters. We can just be who we were today.”Annie Goodhouse left the south and her family for college and later a job as a librarian in Michigan after her last relationship turned violent. Now five years later Annie is still not able to date and mostly keeps to herself. As part of her job Annie takes over an outreach program at Cousins Correctional Facility working with inmates on reading and job skills. On her first day Annie is drawn to inmate Eric Collier and the feeling in mutual. When Eric asks Annie to help him write a letter she can’t help but feel jealousy towards the woman receiving it but can’t contain her relief and joy when it turns out the letter is for her. Annie soon finds herself exchanging love letters with Eric and falling for a man who might not be free for years.Eric Collier did what he had to do to protect his family and has no regrets about it. Meeting Annie is the best thing to happen to him and loves writing her letters and getting hers. Both Eric and Annie are shocked when Eric is released early and neither knows what to do now that he is a free man. Eric leaves their fate up to Annie and soon finds himself back into the family drama that got him locked up in the first place.I was intrigued by the concept of a woman working in a prison falling for one of the inmates and had no idea what to expect from this story. From page one I was captivated by the connection between Annie and Eric both physically and emotionally. It has been a while since a book grabbed my attention like Hard Time did and once Eric started courting Annie through letters I was unable to stop reading. Through these letters Annie is able to let herself feel for the first time since her abusive relationship five years earlier and it was very fun to watch her break out of the protective shell she had been living in for so long.I really enjoyed both Eric and Annie and I liked how the book progressed from inside the correctional facility to the outside world and showing the difficulties that both Eric and Annie faced once he was released. I wish that we could have seen the interaction of Eric meeting Annie’s family and seen the differences between his family and hers due to Eric being an ex-con. I also wish we could have seen what Cousins was like for Annie without Eric there and if anyone there caught on to their relationship or knew of it once he was released.All in all I really enjoyed Hard Time and I am so happy that I read it. I tried to see if there will be a follow up to this book but was unable to find anything. i would love to read more about Annie and Eric because I think there is a lot more to tell. This is a great book for any romance reader who loves deep characters, lots of emotion and romantic men.