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3.9 AVERAGE
3.9 AVERAGE
A heartwarming light read.
"Anna and T.J. are en route to join T.J.'s family in the Maldives when the pilot of their seaplane suffers a fatal heart attack and crash-lands in the Indian Ocean. Adrift in shark-infested waters, their life jackets keep them afloat until they make it to the shore of an uninhabited island."
I love the story, I love the plot, I love the two main characters. Eventhough I kinda feel weird about the dialogs between the characters (the story's told from dual point of view from both Anna & TJ. Most of them are short, and a story with short-simple dialogs plus minimum internal monologues sometimes is not just for me) but I love how real the characters seems.
Anna is 30, while TJ is still 16 by the time they landed on the unknown Island. Clearly they have completely different way of thinking about life and... love and everything else. Interesting to read how the two of them taking on their new adventure of living together, only two of them, with a very little hope on being saved. Lots of things I discovered and I found fun on this book are mostly the tips of survival :p They started by collecting waters from the raindrops, eating coconut's meat, making fire from sticks, and then continuing to make a real living as the time goes by... and as they got older.
I like how it's not instant between both of them. Eventhough it's been years from the beginning, Anna's still struggling with her uneasiness about dating TJ who's 13 years younger than her. Understandable and realistic. This woman feels as if their relationship is somewhat inapoppriate, moreover when it comes to society's eyes. And I also love how TJ, in such a young age, has become so mature. The journey of living in the island did it to him.
And also, since the story's setting is located in an island somewhere near Maldives, I keep picturing the secluded island to be somewhat familiar like this...
White sands, crystal-blue waters, wide-unending skies... Ugh, I'm a sucker for beaches.
4 of 5 stars.
"Anna and T.J. are en route to join T.J.'s family in the Maldives when the pilot of their seaplane suffers a fatal heart attack and crash-lands in the Indian Ocean. Adrift in shark-infested waters, their life jackets keep them afloat until they make it to the shore of an uninhabited island."
I love the story, I love the plot, I love the two main characters. Eventhough I kinda feel weird about the dialogs between the characters (the story's told from dual point of view from both Anna & TJ. Most of them are short, and a story with short-simple dialogs plus minimum internal monologues sometimes is not just for me) but I love how real the characters seems.
Anna is 30, while TJ is still 16 by the time they landed on the unknown Island. Clearly they have completely different way of thinking about life and... love and everything else. Interesting to read how the two of them taking on their new adventure of living together, only two of them, with a very little hope on being saved. Lots of things I discovered and I found fun on this book are mostly the tips of survival :p They started by collecting waters from the raindrops, eating coconut's meat, making fire from sticks, and then continuing to make a real living as the time goes by... and as they got older.
I like how it's not instant between both of them. Eventhough it's been years from the beginning, Anna's still struggling with her uneasiness about dating TJ who's 13 years younger than her. Understandable and realistic. This woman feels as if their relationship is somewhat inapoppriate, moreover when it comes to society's eyes. And I also love how TJ, in such a young age, has become so mature. The journey of living in the island did it to him.
And also, since the story's setting is located in an island somewhere near Maldives, I keep picturing the secluded island to be somewhat familiar like this...
White sands, crystal-blue waters, wide-unending skies... Ugh, I'm a sucker for beaches.
4 of 5 stars.
Noooooo! In the first half of this book, with all of its spirited shades of Blue Lagoon and slowly building taboo lust between an early 30's female tutor (Anna) and her teenaged student (TJ), marooned on a deserted island after surviving a plane crash, I really thought this was going to be the first modern romance I'd truly enjoy.
There are elements of silliness -- such as several of their personal items, including a suitcase loaded with toiletries, washing up right on their beach! With a premise like On the Island's, goofiness is to be expected, even welcomed, and I found myself enthusiastically willing to suspend disbelief in favor of entertainment.
But, in accordance with his probably intentionally juvenile name, TJ reads like a real teenage boy. Also, the chemistry between Anna and TJ on the island is actually pretty hot, which I was not expecting (especially since I'm usually the jerk that's rolling my eyes like the Dowager Countess or skipping over most "erotic" parts of romance books, as if that's not the point of the book I've knowingly elected to read or anything).
This book did a total 180 for me after Anna and TJ are no longer on the island fighting sharks and catching chickens with their bare hands, in between bouts of ravishing each other. I was excited to get to the second half of the book to see how the age gap would affect the relationship in non-extreme, possible "end-of-our-world" situations.
Hence the lower rating that doesn't quite do justice to my enjoyment of its first half. Sorry, lovers of love.
There are elements of silliness -- such as several of their personal items, including a suitcase loaded with toiletries, washing up right on their beach! With a premise like On the Island's, goofiness is to be expected, even welcomed, and I found myself enthusiastically willing to suspend disbelief in favor of entertainment.
But, in accordance with his probably intentionally juvenile name, TJ reads like a real teenage boy. Also, the chemistry between Anna and TJ on the island is actually pretty hot, which I was not expecting (especially since I'm usually the jerk that's rolling my eyes like the Dowager Countess or skipping over most "erotic" parts of romance books, as if that's not the point of the book I've knowingly elected to read or anything).
This book did a total 180 for me after Anna and TJ are no longer on the island fighting sharks and catching chickens with their bare hands, in between bouts of ravishing each other. I was excited to get to the second half of the book to see how the age gap would affect the relationship in non-extreme, possible "end-of-our-world" situations.
Spoiler
But their lives post-island become super domestic, to the logical conclusion of the two of them ending up married with kids (after some obvious red herring "conflicts" threaten to end their relationship for good). To me, that is boring and I steadily lost interest more and more over the final 100 pages, to the point where I was MAD at this book and Tracey Garvis-Graves for not fulfilling its notable weird/sexy potential. I was not invested in this book winding up in a fairy tale ending. I only wanted it to continue to be fun.Hence the lower rating that doesn't quite do justice to my enjoyment of its first half. Sorry, lovers of love.
Had this one on my tbr since 2012, so that's one more down from the personal challenge
Ok, so the first half of the book was a bummer (how one can make a castaway story boring, beats me) but when they get back to land, for some reason that gripped me. It's still felt like the writing wasn't able to covey the feeling (show dont tell) but I was invested in the couple and their journey back to each other and what they do in the meantime.
Ok, so the first half of the book was a bummer (how one can make a castaway story boring, beats me) but when they get back to land, for some reason that gripped me. It's still felt like the writing wasn't able to covey the feeling (show dont tell) but I was invested in the couple and their journey back to each other and what they do in the meantime.
I FINALLY, FINALLY READ AND FINISHED THIS.
After all of the poking and prodding that my friends in gr kept on doing, I have finally accomplished this task. Not that I treated it like a task... much. Kidding!
Reading about T.J. and Anna wasn't a hardship at all. In fact, it was very easy to fall in love with the two of them. Their adventures on the island was what made me like this book more. I never would've accepted their age gap if it weren't for what they've been through on that island which doesn't have a name by the way.
IT SHOULD HAVE A NAME SO I'M GONNA CALL IT THE D.C.C.B.S.R island. In memory of the animals that they were with. HAHAHAH DOLPHINS, CHICKENS, CRABS, BATS, SHARKS, RATS.
If you ask me, I think they both fared well in DCCBSR island. Anna, ever the girl scout was able to pack lots of toiletries (which surprisingly lasted for years.. IS THAT ONLY IN FICTION?) and her luggage was conveniently washed to shore at some point. T.J., ever the boy scout, was able to find ways to feed them and give them shelter. It's like they're members of SURVIVOR, only without cameras and without other people to mess with their minds.LOL. T.J. definitely grew up rapidly in DCCBSR. He became more mature (or is that because of the illness that he's been through?). It was fun reading about how attracted he is to Anna and how Anna fought for a while with her feelings as well. But when it all spilled over, they were so fast to catch up! hahaha.. I can't believe how I enjoyed reading about their "hot" moments though it's not really detailed. Do I wish that it's more detailed? HELL YEAH! Does that make me a perv? I surely hope not! What's sooooo wrong in wanting details? O.O hahahha
I already expected that they would face real big problems once they go back to civilization. It didn't shock me that T.J. was insecure about his stand on Anna's life because of his younger age. I'm just glad that he tried to fight it off.
He was so cool when he said to one guy "I'm sorry you can't touch my hot girlfriend." HAHAHAHAH BEAT THAT!!!
What I didn't expect is Anna's continuous battle with her body clock. tik tok tik tok I want babies. Well, I guess I wouldn't understand it fully since I'm not yet at that point in my life. Anyhoo, they were able to patch things up. It didn't have fireworks, but it was a sweet getting-back-together scene. The epilogue helped a lot as well since I was able to get a glimpse of their lives after how many years. It's nice to know that eventually, Anna got her wish. They have babies, family.. complete with a beautiful house. I guess they owe it all to sperm banks eh? ^_^
All in all, I loved it. I thank all of those people WHO PUSHED AND PUSHED AND PUSHED FOR MONTHS AND MONTHS that I read this. I know I was super stubborn since I hated their age gap. I'm happy to report that in the end, I was still aware of their age gap, but it didn't bother me as much as it did at first.
Great story, great characters. What more can I ask for? :)
After all of the poking and prodding that my friends in gr kept on doing, I have finally accomplished this task. Not that I treated it like a task... much. Kidding!
Reading about T.J. and Anna wasn't a hardship at all. In fact, it was very easy to fall in love with the two of them. Their adventures on the island was what made me like this book more. I never would've accepted their age gap if it weren't for what they've been through on that island which doesn't have a name by the way.
IT SHOULD HAVE A NAME SO I'M GONNA CALL IT THE D.C.C.B.S.R island. In memory of the animals that they were with. HAHAHAH DOLPHINS, CHICKENS, CRABS, BATS, SHARKS, RATS.
If you ask me, I think they both fared well in DCCBSR island. Anna, ever the girl scout was able to pack lots of toiletries (which surprisingly lasted for years.. IS THAT ONLY IN FICTION?) and her luggage was conveniently washed to shore at some point. T.J., ever the boy scout, was able to find ways to feed them and give them shelter. It's like they're members of SURVIVOR, only without cameras and without other people to mess with their minds.LOL. T.J. definitely grew up rapidly in DCCBSR. He became more mature (or is that because of the illness that he's been through?). It was fun reading about how attracted he is to Anna and how Anna fought for a while with her feelings as well. But when it all spilled over, they were so fast to catch up! hahaha.. I can't believe how I enjoyed reading about their "hot" moments though it's not really detailed. Do I wish that it's more detailed? HELL YEAH! Does that make me a perv? I surely hope not! What's sooooo wrong in wanting details? O.O hahahha
I already expected that they would face real big problems once they go back to civilization. It didn't shock me that T.J. was insecure about his stand on Anna's life because of his younger age. I'm just glad that he tried to fight it off.
He was so cool when he said to one guy "I'm sorry you can't touch my hot girlfriend." HAHAHAHAH BEAT THAT!!!
What I didn't expect is Anna's continuous battle with her body clock. tik tok tik tok I want babies. Well, I guess I wouldn't understand it fully since I'm not yet at that point in my life. Anyhoo, they were able to patch things up. It didn't have fireworks, but it was a sweet getting-back-together scene. The epilogue helped a lot as well since I was able to get a glimpse of their lives after how many years. It's nice to know that eventually, Anna got her wish. They have babies, family.. complete with a beautiful house. I guess they owe it all to sperm banks eh? ^_^
All in all, I loved it. I thank all of those people WHO PUSHED AND PUSHED AND PUSHED FOR MONTHS AND MONTHS that I read this. I know I was super stubborn since I hated their age gap. I'm happy to report that in the end, I was still aware of their age gap, but it didn't bother me as much as it did at first.
Great story, great characters. What more can I ask for? :)
adventurous
challenging
emotional
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cancer
Moderate: Death, Infertility, Sexual content, Vomit, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail
I am a bit torn between the love story in the book and the ages of the characters. However, overall it was a great read, full of romance, and the last 150 pages flew by fast.
Loved this story so much. Read it in less than 2 days and had to put it down last night so I could get some sleep. Loved the strength of Anna and TJ and how they each rose to the occasion when needed. Finished it on the beach in Tahoe this afternoon, trying not to cry unsuccessfully. Such a beautiful story. Looking forward to more from this author.
I really enjoyed this book, especially the last 2/3th. I found it a bit hard to get into, I couldn't really connect with the characters (maybe because I'm not used to the switching between different perspectives). I love the 'people getting stuck somewhere deserted'-vibe. Only the age difference was a bit awkward, and I don't like switching perspectives that much.