Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.73 AVERAGE
3.73 AVERAGE
Hilarious and sad all wrapped up in a quirky story of family, friendship and love.
I have some mixed feelings about this book. Many of my issues have been described by other reviewers. The way things end up working out for the main character and the others are so convenient and precious that this book could almost be considered magical realism. And the women's groups is both interesting and silly beyond words. But I enjoyed the book and the town it is set in. I will say that the scenes of violence sort of jump out of an otherwise lighter story. And the scenes are violent. I've read disturbing stuff and I am not sure what it was about the way the abuse scenes were written that made me so impacted but I almost felt like I needed a trigger warning.
But overall, this is an enjoyable book.
But overall, this is an enjoyable book.
So parts I wanted to laugh out loud it was so funny other parts make you almost want to cry. Loved the book. Would read again.
This book is in need of a good editor. The juvenile writing style and the rambling, disjointed story makes this nearly unreadable. It's a contrived, predictable and painful read from beginning to end. It's as if the author couldn't decide on a direction so she just made a lame attempt at developing everything she thought she wanted. The result is a story that lacks depth, character and focus. It's a shame because the recovery from abuse and building a new life angle could have gone somewhere other than the predictable route. Sadly, Julia did not discover herself, she only discovered the need for someone else to make her strong.
So I finished up a re-read of Cathy Lamb's books this week. I could not get into anything last week and re-reads was all I was up for at the time. What frustrates me though is that as I read Lamb back to back, I started to see a lot of flaws in her writing and some of her latest books were just hitting the spot at all. "Julia's Chocolates" is the first book of Lamb's I bought and read back in 2008. This book works for the most part and Lamb does play with "magical realism" a bit, but not in a way that most readers will notice or appreciate I think. I thought the book went up and down (flow wise) that messed with things, but all in all I liked this one and enjoyed the ending.
"Julia's Chocolates" follows our title character, Julia. Julia is supposed to be getting married, but she leaves her wedding dress in a tree and flees away from her abusive fiancé and to her Aunt Lydia. What happens is that Julia meets a group of women that all have something going on with them. Her three new friends are dealing with a lot of internal and external forces with them all coming together once a week to "enjoy their womenhood" with Aunt Lydia. I saw some other readers calling this a rip-off of "The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" but as someone who read that book, I have to say not really.
Julia is really frustrating and she becomes emblematic of the rest of Lamb's female heroines who are indecisive and who don't tell someone the whole truth which will drive you up the wall. Julia of course has "feelings" for a man in this one, but as I noticed in her latter books, her male characters are either evil incarnate or the best man that has ever walked the Earth. There's not a lot to really grab onto there. That said, the reason why I gave this 4 stars is that I liked the multiple plotlines (Lydia's, Julia's, the two kids that Julia befriends, the other women in this story, etc.) I have to say that when Lamb focuses on Julia's childhood the book starts to sing and really works. When the other storylines get tossed in, the book starts to drag a bit.
"Julia's Chocolates" follows our title character, Julia. Julia is supposed to be getting married, but she leaves her wedding dress in a tree and flees away from her abusive fiancé and to her Aunt Lydia. What happens is that Julia meets a group of women that all have something going on with them. Her three new friends are dealing with a lot of internal and external forces with them all coming together once a week to "enjoy their womenhood" with Aunt Lydia. I saw some other readers calling this a rip-off of "The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" but as someone who read that book, I have to say not really.
Julia is really frustrating and she becomes emblematic of the rest of Lamb's female heroines who are indecisive and who don't tell someone the whole truth which will drive you up the wall. Julia of course has "feelings" for a man in this one, but as I noticed in her latter books, her male characters are either evil incarnate or the best man that has ever walked the Earth. There's not a lot to really grab onto there. That said, the reason why I gave this 4 stars is that I liked the multiple plotlines (Lydia's, Julia's, the two kids that Julia befriends, the other women in this story, etc.) I have to say that when Lamb focuses on Julia's childhood the book starts to sing and really works. When the other storylines get tossed in, the book starts to drag a bit.
Loved, loved, loved this book! It was a roller coaster of emotions from page to page, from crying with laughter, to crying with sadness. The character development was great and even though I haven't really lived in a small community, I really felt that sense of neighborliness. My favorite character had to be Aunt Lydia, I loved her smart mouth and her honesty as well as her caring spirit! A few things that happened in the book were kind of a stretch but it worked!
Highly recommend this book!
Highly recommend this book!
I didn't like this book at all. To me, it seemed like a Lifetime original movie, which I also loathe.
The characters were either perfect or odious, with nothing in between. There was no depth to anyone. I also figured out the ending about 10 pages in so everything in between was a dreary race to the finish, at which point I could close this book and not look at it.
There were moments of humor and creativity, but overall I thought that it was awful, although it might certainly appeal to the same audience that enjoys Lifetime or Nicholas Sparks.
The characters were either perfect or odious, with nothing in between. There was no depth to anyone. I also figured out the ending about 10 pages in so everything in between was a dreary race to the finish, at which point I could close this book and not look at it.
There were moments of humor and creativity, but overall I thought that it was awful, although it might certainly appeal to the same audience that enjoys Lifetime or Nicholas Sparks.
An ok story of a woman who is in an abusive relationship. She runs out on her wedding and the wealthy abuser eventually catches up with her. Julia runs to her Aunt Lydia's house in rural Oregon. It is a quaint town with lots of characters. Julia finds herself and learns to love herself. She also recliams her sexual identity as she learns to love her body. A little bit hokey of a story where the women get everything they want and the bad guys get what they deserve.
inspiring
lighthearted
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
The inside of this book does not match the cover at all (in the best way possible). I was not expecting the amount of humor and colorful characters I got in this book.