I didn’t know what to expect from this book other than a reflective, heartwarming read. It wasn’t until I was almost done with reading it that I learnt that Debbie Howells is actually better known as a thriller writer and I honestly never would have known that by just reading this book!

Since their romance as teenagers, Anna and Will have spent most of their lives bumping into each other. 20 years after they dated, Anna is unhappily married with a grown up stepdaughter while Will is about to be divorced from his daughter’s mother. While sorting out his recently deceased father’s house, Will meets Anna in the local park and both of them discover that they still have feelings for each other. The spark reminds Anna of who she used to be and she starts to wonder how she can get that girl back. Can they both rediscover joy and is it finally the right time for them?

Every time that Anna felt she was too old to restart her life, I wanted to yell at her that she wasn’t. I am a firm believer that anyone can make a fresh start, whenever their life simply isn’t bringing them genuine happiness and I was really proud of Anna, when she finally took that leap. I didn’t enjoy how long it took her to do that though!

One thing that really frustrated me is the amount of time the protagonists spent doing absolutely nothing to help their own romance along, especially as they were both very open and honest about their feelings from the very beginning. The fact that they were both very quick to declare their love for each other is another issue I had (especially as Anna was still very much with her husband at this point). I understand that the author was trying to build the ‘will-they-won’t-they’ thing but it was always very obvious that they would, so that didn’t really work as well as it could have done, had there been some more ambiguity about one or both of their feelings or some bigger obstacles in their way.

While I know that some step-parents can become better parents than biological parents to their stepchildren, I didn’t see the connection between Anna and Millie until about two thirds of the way into the book. In fact, I think Anna and Millie talked on the phone once before this point. Therefore, I just couldn’t get on board with the fact that Anna saw Millie as her daughter, when she insisted several times that she was. I needed more interactions between them throughout the book rather than just at the crisis points in order to fully believe their relationship.

Anna kept getting ‘messages from the universe’ via her Facebook feed and this all felt a bit strange and unbelievable to me. I know that she is a middle-aged woman on Facebook and perhaps this is the kind of meme or post that typically floods her news feed but she was getting them daily and it just felt forced.

There were parts of the book I enjoyed. I loved the theme of living your best life and trusting your heart to tell you what’s right. However, I didn’t like that I was still being introduced to characters halfway through the book (Charley -no mention of her before 50% in despite her apparently being Anna’s oldest friend) or being re-introduced to a character who appeared briefly in a paragraph of a very early chapter before they faded into the background again (Liza). I was still learning about Anna’s passions (apparently she likes gardening) in the second half of the book too, despite having spent a good few hours of reading time inside her head by this point. I’m not sure what the author was trying to do, but none of the characters -and I include the protagonists in that- were very well-developed at all. While it’s not all that important, I had no idea what either Anna or Will looked like apart from the fact that Anna had brown hair. I couldn’t picture either of them as real, living and breathing people in my head, so that sadly diminished my connection to them. I also needed James to be a much more obvious villain for me to be OK with Anna cheating on him. I know that he had an affair before and so you could consider them to be ‘even’ now but Anna did choose to stay with him, signifying that she forgave him somewhat. To me, James seemed like a typical husband of his age -selfish, thoughtless and perhaps a bit misogynistic but he’s definitely not uncaring or the worst husband in the world. I think Millie even says at one point that she ‘doesn’t think he knows any different’, suggesting that’s just how he is -almost certainly a product of toxic masculinity, neurodivergence or both. 

Considering Debbie Howells is a psychological thriller writer, I really expected the plot to be more fast-paced. While I recognise that this isn’t a thriller at all, I’d expect to see markings of that within the writing, if that’s what the author usually writes. While it was a readable story, I just wish I’d been able to believe the characters more. If I had, I’m sure the high emotion at the end would have affected me far deeper and I’d have been fully invested in the central themes of true love, fate and discovering your true self.

25 Febbraio - "Una morte silenziosa" di Debbie Howells Link Amazon https://amzn.to/2XuO3p8

Titolo: Una morte silenziosa Autore: Debbie Howells Genere: Thriller Casa Editrice: Newton Compton Editore Lunghezza: 336 pagine Prezzo: Ebook €2,99 – Cartaceo €10,20 Data di pubblicazione: 25 Febbraio 2019

ACQUISTA

Sinossi

Ci sono bugie che non possono essere perdonate Autrice del bestseller La donna silenziosa Noah non ha mai dimenticato April, il suo primo amore. Quando, molti anni dopo, scopre che…

Book: The Bones of You

Author: Debbie Howells

Genre: Fiction/Thriller/Mystery

Summary: I have a gardener's inherent belief in the natural order of things. Soft petalled flowers that go to seed. The resolute passage of the seasons. Swallows that fly thousands of miles to follow the eternal summer. Children who don't die before their parents. When Kate receives a phone call with news that Rosie Anderson is missing, she's stunned and disturbed. Rosie is eighteen, the same age as Kate's daughter, and a beautiful, quiet, and kind young woman. Though the locals are optimistic - girls like Rosie don't get into real trouble - Kate's sense of foreboding is confirmed when Rosie is found fatally beaten and stabbed. Who would kill the perfect daughter, from the perfect family? Yet the more Kate entwines herself with the Andersons - graceful mother jo, renowned journalist father Neal, watchful younger sister, Delphine - the more she is convinced that not everything is as it seems. Anonymous notes arrive, urging Kate to unravel the tangled threads of Rosie's life and death, though she has no idea where they will lead. Weaving flashbacks from Rosie's perspective into a tautly plotted narrative, The Bones of You is a gripping, haunting novel of sacrifices and lies, desperation and love. - Kensington Books, 2015.

Author August: Debbie Howells – On Writing

To view all guest author posts so far and for a chance to win a £40 Foyles Giftcard visit the Author August Page.

By the time I started writing the Bones of You, I’d self-published three commercial women’s fiction novels.  With each of them, the words had flowed freely, unstoppably, leaving me with a first draft I’d then work through more slowly.

(more…)

WWW Wednesday (27 July)

WWW Wednesday is a meme hosted by Sam at Taking on a World of Words. It’s open for anyone to join in and is a great way to share what you’ve been reading! All you have to do is answer three questions and share a link to your blog in the comments section of Sam’s blog.

The three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?

What did you recently finish reading?

What do you think you’ll read next?

A…

ARC Book Review: The Beauty of the End by Debbie Howells

Before I start my review, I want to thank NetGalley and Kensington Books for allowing me to review The Beauty of the End.

**All opinions stated in this review are mine and mine alone.  I received The Beauty of the End from NetGalley via Kensington Books as an ARC for my honest and unbiased review**

Now, onto my review:

Format read in: Kindle

Author: Debbie Howells

Publisher: Kensington Books

Dat…