allingoodtime 's review for:

Christa Comes Out of Her Shell by Abbi Waxman
3.5
emotional hopeful reflective medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated
To start with, I had a hard time figuring out how to classify this book. It’s on me that I thought this was a Romance going in because I don’t think I was ever specifically told that. This is more general fiction with romantic elements. But I will say, for my Romance peeps, it does have a HEA for Christa. And the last half of the story is a lot heavier on the romance than the first half.

There are some terrible people in this story. Underhanded, narcissistic, greedy people who only pretend to care about what their actions do to their supposed loved ones. Fortunately, Christa’s mom and sisters are not those terrible people. This book is, at its core, about Christa and her sisters and mom healing their relationships. They love each other hard and deeply, but many mistakes have been made through the years. Especially in Christa’s childhood. Christa has her faults, but it’s much easier for her to admit to those faults once her family members address their past mistakes with her. I loved seeing them come together and display a united front over and over, even before they had stitched up the tears in their family.

Nathan and Leo are wonderful additions to that family team. I would have loved to see more of Leo, but he was always there holding them up when they needed him. Nathan is the love interest and he’s also a comforting present for the women in the family. He was witness to Christa’s greatest shame (in her eyes, anyway) and that was one of my issues with the story. It was kind of kept as a secret from the reader and I didn’t really see the reason behind the secrecy. Everyone who mattered in the story knew what happened so it was strange to keep it from the reader. Regardless, Nathan is amazing and it seems he always has been.

This is a new-to-me author so I’m not sure if this book is a good example of her usual writing style. I found the flow to work well and, for the most part, the story was engaging. It threw me off that she switched from first-person POV (Christa) to third-person POV a few times. Those third-person bits weren’t very long, but it was strange to have them thrown into a first-person story. I still enjoyed the story and, even though this isn’t my usual genre, I would read more from this author if the opportunity arose.

**I received an ARC of this book courtesy of NetGalley and the publisher. All opinions expressed in this review are my own and given freely** 
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