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dillybar20's review against another edition
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
2.0
(Copy-pasted from my Goodreads review) I own a copy of this book but not for much longer. I have only read one other book of Debbie Macomber, "The Man You'll Marry", and I rated it pretty high. This book doesn't hold up. One of my biggest "no's" is the fact that both women cry all the time and most of the men around them make fun of them. Romance is supposed to be an escape I don't want to be reminded that men ridicule women for expressing any emotion at all but particularly sadness and anger.
Now that that's out of the way we can talk about the other problems I had with this book. Bambi could have said anything to make us hate her and yet the author chose to trigger fat people and people with an eating disorder by having Bambi, a thin woman repeatedly call herself fat and talk about needing to be on a diet.
"How much longer until dinner? The natives are getting restless." (Pg. 291). Why not just say "kids"? Why have this Italian family make a stereotypical offensive Native American joke? There's a dozen other words they could have used.
Both Alex and Carol decided to wait until a couple months after marriage to try for children. Alex knows that Carol has trouble trusting and loving again after her first abusive relationship. So what does Alex do? Well, when they get married Carol is very happy with the sex considering her awful sex was with her ex-husband, Alex uses that as a distraction to not wear a condom. He gets her pregnant without her consent. How she views this huge boundary stomp as an okay thing I'll never know.
The author seems to frame their story as a happily ever after but I can see that she's just in another abusive marriage. Alex needs to have control over Carol at all times and he boundary stomps all over the place. He lets himself into her car, home, and workplace multiple times even though she's made it clear she doesn't want him there. The very first boundary that they both set up as a married couple he intentionally breaks 2 days in and has no apologies. This man cannot stand boundaries or Carol being out if his view/control. He is just as abusive as Bruce but in a different form. Disgusting.
Edit: After writing this review I went to add a quote I liked from the book and found it already existing but was credited to another book of Debbie's. So I went to google books and it confirmed that Debbie used the exact same quote at least twice. The quote is, "Years, ago someone had told her it took a hell of a man to replace no man." (Right Next Door, 1990). Listen to this, "Years, ago someone had told her it took a hell of a man to replace no man.". That's not from the same book. That's from "A Turn in the Road, 2017". A completely different book. She just copied and pasted the same quote not even rewriting it.
Now that that's out of the way we can talk about the other problems I had with this book. Bambi could have said anything to make us hate her and yet the author chose to trigger fat people and people with an eating disorder by having Bambi, a thin woman repeatedly call herself fat and talk about needing to be on a diet.
"How much longer until dinner? The natives are getting restless." (Pg. 291). Why not just say "kids"? Why have this Italian family make a stereotypical offensive Native American joke? There's a dozen other words they could have used.
Both Alex and Carol decided to wait until a couple months after marriage to try for children. Alex knows that Carol has trouble trusting and loving again after her first abusive relationship. So what does Alex do? Well, when they get married Carol is very happy with the sex considering her awful sex was with her ex-husband, Alex uses that as a distraction to not wear a condom. He gets her pregnant without her consent. How she views this huge boundary stomp as an okay thing I'll never know.
The author seems to frame their story as a happily ever after but I can see that she's just in another abusive marriage. Alex needs to have control over Carol at all times and he boundary stomps all over the place. He lets himself into her car, home, and workplace multiple times even though she's made it clear she doesn't want him there. The very first boundary that they both set up as a married couple he intentionally breaks 2 days in and has no apologies. This man cannot stand boundaries or Carol being out if his view/control. He is just as abusive as Bruce but in a different form. Disgusting.
Edit: After writing this review I went to add a quote I liked from the book and found it already existing but was credited to another book of Debbie's. So I went to google books and it confirmed that Debbie used the exact same quote at least twice. The quote is, "Years, ago someone had told her it took a hell of a man to replace no man." (Right Next Door, 1990). Listen to this, "Years, ago someone had told her it took a hell of a man to replace no man.". That's not from the same book. That's from "A Turn in the Road, 2017". A completely different book. She just copied and pasted the same quote not even rewriting it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, and Physical abuse
Moderate: Eating disorder and Fatphobia