caso_queso's review against another edition
2.25
Not a fan. The beginning held my attention, but near the end it went downhill.
nursenell's review against another edition
4.0
A good escape on a dreary weekend. Not a lot of depth but interesting characters, a good mystery, and some romance. Not my usual genre but I liked it.
jtlars7's review against another edition
2.0
A low 3 stars. I had trouble getting into it and spent the first half trying to decide whether to keep reading, but I got into it in the second half. Along the lines of Kate Morton’s books. The story jumps back and forth in time, with lots of secrets, some dead bodies, and some romance. A little over the top and sometimes gimmicky.
encounterswiththemoon's review against another edition
2.0
Spoiler
It is important to note that the majority of the themes explored in this book deal with sensitive subject matters. My review, therefore, touches on these topics as well. Many people might find the subject matters of the book as well as those detailed in my review overwhelming. I would suggest you steer clear of both if this is the case. Please note that from this point forward I will be writing about matters which contain reflections on abuse, child endangerment, parental neglect, & others.There was so much about this story that seemed improbable & quite frankly, impossible. Lucy is a character I've come across more than once, often enough for me to say that I'm unsurprised by her lack of development throughout the story & her overall shallowness. Having moved nearly 15 hours from where she grew up, Lucy is faced with the decision as to whether or not she should remain in Virginia. She gets a free mansion-like-house, doesn't have to pay for any groceries, gets free services from nearly everyone in town as a 'welcome' & spends the entirety of the novel referring to friends she never hears from & nostalgia that seems misplaced as the only true recollections we get of her time in Nashville are of her struggling to make ends-meat.
I wish we had read less about her indecision throughout the story. I can't imagine having $100 to my name, driving 15 hours & spending 5 days in a town where I constantly involved myself in things that didn't concern me, only to imagine myself back in a city where I had nothing to go back to. As well, $100 is barely going to cover her gas on her trip back so I'm unsure why she thinks moving back to Nashville is an option.
I cannot in my right mind understand how Lucy was able to involve herself so heavily in Natasha's life. This is a 12-year-old person who has a severely abusive parent & this stranger comes into town & suddenly everyone is okay with this kid staying with this lady whom no one knows anything about. How does this even happen? I understand the convenience of Lucy becoming close with Natasha in such an indirect way given that they are revealed to be siblings but, come on, that makes no sense.
I feel like we could have done without the entire 'Natasha saga'. It was sad to see a kid have to go through so much turmoil & then really have nothing resolved for her except that she's privy to a whole bunch of bananas stuff that Lucy has had happen to her (i.e. bones on the property, 'love' affair with Hank, etc.)
While we're on the topic of things I could have lived without; the whole 'romance' (if we can even call it that) aspect of Hank & Lucy felt so forced & dry. I kept expecting Hank to be revealed as the antagonist because he was always so present & so nice & so involved & so helpful, it was improbable & made me feel like I was waiting for the next shoe to drop. If Lucy & Hank had stayed at the 'getting to know you' stage, I would have felt that this was more authentic than whatever started happening near the middle of the story.
Claire's part of the story was alright. I appreciated how everything tied together & we weren't left with any unresolved situations. However, I was left feeling the same way that other reviewers did; Jimmy & Claire were not the ultimate romantic couple & it felt like something out of the left field to see Claire be totally enamoured by someone she met one time. Then, upon seeing him as an adult, she expects him to remember her & be as randomly in love with her & she has been with him for all these years.
Victoria had Jimmy's baby & Claire goes about her life as if she & Jimmy have been in love (deep down) this whole time & they just had missed opportunities. No, that is not what happened, Jimmy chose to go engage in extracurriculars with Victoria & then left for WWI. The end. That's the story. Claire was never a choice, she was never wanted & again, her character forced her way into situations that didn't concern her. I get pinning for someone but this man had a baby with someone else & then when he was a burn victim & suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) from the War, he settled for the fact that you had nothing else going for you.
The entire story is explained in the family tree at the beginning of the book so I felt a little cheated when nothing else but what I knew was going to happen, happened. Having the legend at the front to explain which character fits in where was helpful but it might have been better to fit that in as we went along so that we as the reader had to piece things together more on our own, rather than having Victoria & Jimmy's baby's name right there for us to see.
The secondary characters added too much confusion to the story because I never became invested enough in their storylines to bother understanding what the point was. Meghan was trying to renovate the house, why? She told herself she wanted to open a bakery but it was going to be a lot of work. But renovating a 100-year-old house isn't? Also, what's the point of that part of the plot? Lucy just kept meeting random people who were all weirdly related & conveniently had their own motivations for being involved with the house by the end I was wondering why we had to read about a town in which everyone seems to be related.
I'm surprised I got through this book.
miapboyer's review
4.0
I really enjoyed this book a lot. I didn't think I would, but the story had me guessing the entire time. Who was Lucy's father? Who was Claire? Who was the baby for in Mrs. B's story? I was guessing the entire time and loved every second of it!
lenore_r6's review against another edition
4.0
Three timelines, family history, small town, what's not to love.
ash_hermatz's review against another edition
emotional
lighthearted
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.25
shelbscam's review against another edition
hopeful
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Loveable characters? Yes
4.0
mollyellen4's review against another edition
5.0
I loved everything about this book. It had mystery, romance, self discovery and loyalty.
When Lucy's mother, Beth, dies, she is thrust into a journey of self discovery and an opportunity to put down roots and grow her life. What follows is the unraveling of several mysteries that brings her closer to what she didn't even realise she wanted
When Lucy's mother, Beth, dies, she is thrust into a journey of self discovery and an opportunity to put down roots and grow her life. What follows is the unraveling of several mysteries that brings her closer to what she didn't even realise she wanted