Reviews with content warning for Child abuse - Beach Read

I liked it. Forced proximity, enemies to lovers who’ve secretly been fawning over each other not as enemies since the beginning. I thought it interesting to consider a romance novelist losing her faith in romance at the same time a more cynical writer may want to explore the nuance in a more optimistic way. Honestly only reason it’s not a 5 is I thought the spicey scenes were a little short after all the build up

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katlanmechele's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

I tend to be one of those people who reads a book and months later, can't remember what the hell happened in the book. But, I always remember how I felt reading it. I remember when a book makes me feel like my life existed between the pages or helped me dream that it could. So, rather than another book review. I want to capture how it made me feel.

I truly think anyone living on this planet for more than 20 years could understand the depths this book reaches, but as a writer myself, this book touched me in ways deeper than I expected.

I write songs. I love it, in many ways it comes very naturally to me. But in most ways, it does not. It's an art form that I love, but I tend to lean towards the model of thinking that believes most people are not born Stevie Nicks, rather they become her. To love something is to toil over it. To insist, there's a way it can be better and to recognize when it should be left alone. Whether it be a relationship between two friends, two lovers, or a song you're writing that doesn't have it's best hook yet. There are days when lyrics pour out of me, because life pulls it out of me. And then there are days, where the desire to create is bigger than the art that exists inside of me.

"Sometimes we lose the ability to create simply because we're tired. We need rest and recover. But other times, we can't move forward because there are hard questions we have to ask first." Henry writes this in her reader's guide at the end of the book. I think without trying, in that line she captured what it was that pulled at my heart strings about this book.

Here lies two characters, incredibly broken and misunderstood, like most of us. Clinging onto the hope that the artist they once were still lives in them somewhere. That the suffering of life had not stolen the last bit of artistry left of them. You watch two characters, one clinging onto hope like her life depends on it, and another who was robbed of the luxury of hope at an early age, grapple with their careers and if they can really continue to be writers in the face of all they've endured.

The book journeys through so many different tropes of life. Grief, loss, love, betrayal, resilience, and contentment. Through the journey of these characters, you cannot help but reflect on your own life and evaluate the ways in which you have let the rugged edges of life take more than it deserved.

One of the characters struggles with her identity in the face of such a huge loss. And with the help of the people who see through her walls, she realizes that no matter how cold life could be, she isn't a natural-born cynic. She wasn't naive, she wasn't inexperienced to the pains of life, but she also was not about to let life take pieces of herself that she was not willing to give up.

"Even if part of my worldview was taking a brief sabbatical, it had to be true, that sometimes heartbroken women found their happy endings, their rain-falling, music-swelling moments of pure happiness." - January Andrews

Though my writing and other reviews, may lead you to believe this book will only have you crying in a corner somewhere, it's not entirely true. You may indeed shed a tear....or a many. But, you will also laugh. You'll audibly laugh, gasp, and the corners of your mouth may be unable to resist turning upwards as you read. The characters feel human. Human like a friend. Human like a sister. Human like you.

Life will rob you of all of your artistry, if you let it. But if you dare to veraciously stare at the heart of life, you may learn that it's intent isn't to make you jaded, but content with what you have while you have it. We can not hold on to people for longer than they're intended to be here. We squeeze every ounce of love we can get out of those we care for. And we choose to be okay with happy for now.

"Bad things don't dig down through your life until the pit's so deep that nothing good will ever be big enough to make you happy again. No matter how much shit, there will always be wildflowers."

There will indeed always be wildflowers.

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