Truly Madly Amy by Kerry Wilkinson 🎧Audiobook Review @bookouture @kerrywk

Happy hump day friends!

This book my friend is PERFECT for summer! A delightful coming of age story set at summer camp.☀️

My Thoughts

4 Nostalgic Summer Stars! ☀️

Title: Truely Madly Amy

Author: Kerry Wilkinson

Narrator: Joe Jameson

Story Rating: 4/5

Audio Rating: 4/5

📖 why you need to read this book!

• The book is jammed packed with nostalgic summer vibes.

• The summer camp setting was great.

• there really is nothing sweeter than first love!

• Joe and Amy are likable relatable characters.

•

🎧 why you need to listen to this book!

• I just love when a book set in the UK is told to me in an English accent.

This was a fun feel good coming of age summer read. I would say it is more of a book about Joe finding himself than a romance, but The innocence of first love is definitely present. I’ve seen other reviews that mention that there was “excessive teenage drinking“ in the story. I have no idea what the drinking age is in the UK, but as an American I didn’t find it excessive, just realistic. This is a very sweet summer story that will make you smile and want to fall in love for the first time again!💜

*** Big thank you to Bookouture & Bookouture Audio for my gifted copy of this book. All opinions are my own. ***

About the Book

We all remember that one magical summer that changed our lives.

For Joe, it’s 1999. School is over, and with zero idea of what he’s meant to do for the rest of his life, he’s reluctantly accepted a job at the local summer camp. Anything to drown out the sharp grief of missing his dad and move on from what school calls his ‘anger problems’. But getting screamed at by hyperactive ten-year-olds is almost enough to make him quit on day one.

Almost.

Then he sees Amy Ashworth for the very first time, her black hair shining in the sun – and learns that nothing hits harder than first love.

She’s the only person he knows who reads for fun, or who’s seen Titanic fourteen times. But there’s another side to Amy. Soon, she’s the only person he’s ever been to a wild house party with, or kissed under the twinkling stars. It’s the happiest Joe has ever been… until the terrible day when what’s left of his family fractures into a million pieces.

Caught up in Amy’s whirlwind, Joe can’t bring himself to tell the truth about his life. Would his dad have wanted him to fight for the girl he loves, or protect his family, no matter what?

Only one thing is certain: this is the summer Joe will grow up. But when he looks back decades later, will he be ashamed of his choices? And will Amy still be by his side?

Heart-warming, hilarious, nostalgic, and bittersweet, Truly, Madly, Amy explores first loves, last chances, and the summers that shape us. Perfect for fans of David Nicholls, Mike Gayle, and anyone who remembers the carefree days of being just sixteen, when the world was full of possibility.

Have a fabulous day filled with fantastic books! XOBERIT

The Edge of Summer by Viola Shipman 🎧Audiobook Review @harlequinbooks @harperaudio

Happy Tuesday Readers!

Happy PubDay to this fabulous story!🪡

My Thoughts

5 BIG BEAUTIFUL BUTTON FILLED STARS!🪡

5 reasons you should read this book.

1️⃣ Viola Shipman is a brilliant storyteller.

2️⃣ this is a beautiful yet heartbreaking story about the love of a mother, and a daughter beginning to understand.

3️⃣ Sutton is a likable relatable character. Her growth throughout the story was wonderful to see.

4️⃣ buttons! You will never learn so much about buttons and you will never have realized that you wanted to know all there is to know. I will honestly never look at a button the same way again.

5️⃣ The setting of Lake Michigan scream summer and the romance is slow and sweet.

2 reasons you should listen to this book.

🎧 Nancy Peterson did an amazing job bringing Viola Shipman‘s storytelling to life.

🎧 Nancy also set the perfect tone and pacing for this beautiful story.

It never fails to amaze me that Viola Shipman is a pen name for a male author. He really has such a firm grasp on the female psyche. I also really appreciated how the subject of Covid and the pandemic was handled and addressed in this book. I completely empathize with Sutton as she tries to navigate her “new normal“. The role that buttons played in the story was so unique, well done and interesting. This book seriously made me want to start sewing, something that has never happened before. Tug The love interest in the story is fabulous, you’ve got to love a man that loves baseball and fabric. Another beautiful story from this exceptional author set against the backdrop of Lake Michigan. A definite can’t miss summer read.

*** Big thank you to Grayden House & Harper Audio for my gifted copy of this book. All opinions are my own. ***

About the Book

Bestselling author Viola Shipman delights with this captivating summertime escape set along the sparkling shores of Lake Michigan, where a woman searches for clues to her secretive mother’s past

Devastated by the sudden death of her mother—a quiet, loving and intensely private Southern seamstress called Miss Mabel, who overflowed with pearls of Ozarks wisdom but never spoke of her own family—Sutton Douglas makes the impulsive decision to pack up and head north to the Michigan resort town where she believes she’ll find answers to the lifelong questions she’s had about not only her mother’s past but also her own place in the world.

Recalling Miss Mabel’s sewing notions that were her childhood toys, Sutton buys a collection of buttons at an estate sale from Bonnie Lyons, the imposing matriarch of the lakeside community. Propelled by a handful of trinkets left behind by her mother and glimpses into the history of the magical lakeshore town, Sutton becomes tantalized by the possibility that Bonnie is the grandmother she never knew. But is she? As Sutton cautiously befriends Bonnie and is taken into her confidence, she begins to uncover the secrets about her family that Miss Mabel so carefully hid, and about the role that Sutton herself unwittingly played in it all.

Have a fantastic day filled with fabulous books! XO Berit

The Nature of Fragile Things by Susan Meisner **Book Review** @berkleypub

Happy happy Sunday!

Excited to share with you today my review for what might be my favorite book so far in 2021! And it’s historical fiction, who am I?💐

My Thoughts

ALL. THE. STARS. Susan Meissner completely swept me up with her exceptional storytelling, transporting me to San Francisco 1906 and into the lives of these characters. Sophie is an Irish immigrant who travels to San Francisco as a mail order bride. When Sophie meets Martin she is attracted to his luxe but not certain about his personality. His daughter Cat however completely captures Sophie‘s heart. As the bond between Sophie and Cat grows martin becomes more and more shady. Then one night a young pregnant woman shows up at Sophie‘s door and confirms Sophie‘s suspicions that she doesn’t know the man she married at all. The next day the earthquake strikes and the women find their lives even more deeply intwined. What follows is such a captivating tale of survival, family, Secrets, and love.

This is a historical fiction book that will appeal to absolutely everyone. It was the perfect blend of historical fiction, mystery, and family drama. I absolutely fell in love with all these characters and was sad to say goodbye to them at the end of the story. The earthquake was so vividly described I almost thought I felt the earth shake. As a Californian I was surprised at how little I really knew about this historical Quake. It also made me realize how much better our infrastructure is now than it was then. I truly cannot say enough good things about this book! I strongly encourage everyone to read it!

This book in emojis 🚂 💍 👩‍👧 ⛺️ 🍑

*** Big thank you to Berkley for my gifted copy of this book. All opinions are my own. ***

About the Book

April 18, 1906: A massive earthquake rocks San Francisco just before daybreak, igniting a devouring inferno. Lives are lost, lives are shattered, but some rise from the ashes forever changed. Sophie Whalen is a young Irish immigrant so desperate to get out of a New York tenement that she answers a mail-order bride ad and agrees to marry a man she knows nothing about. San Francisco widower Martin Hocking proves to be as aloof as he is mesmerizingly handsome. Sophie quickly develops deep affection for Kat, Martin’s silent five-year-old daughter, but Martin’s odd behavior leaves her with the uneasy feeling that something about her newfound situation isn’t right. Then one early-spring evening, a stranger at the door sets in motion a transforming chain of events. Sophie discovers hidden ties to two other women. The first, pretty and pregnant, is standing on her doorstep. The second is hundreds of miles away in the American Southwest, grieving the loss of everything she once loved. The fates of these three women intertwine on the eve of the devastating earthquake, thrusting them onto a perilous journey that will test their resiliency and resolve and, ultimately, their belief that love can overcome fear. From the acclaimed author of The Last Year of the War and As Bright as Heaven comes a gripping novel about the bonds of friendship and mother love, and the power of female solidarity.

Have a gorgeous day! XOXO Berit 💕

❤️The Love Proof by Madeleine Henry **Book Review** @atriabooks

happy Valentine’s Day!

Excited to share with you today my review for an extraordinary Romance unlike any you’ve read before!💕

My Thoughts

Love+Physics+Time=THE LOVE PROOF

What a book! Madeleine Henry started with a love story, mixed in a generous drop of science, and the result is a Romance like no other. Sophie Jones is brilliant. She spent her childhood voraciously reading and Digesting endless amounts of knowledge. Now she is starting her collegiate career at Yale and studying her prime passion time. When Sophie meets Jake her first week of Yale she is overwhelmed by the power of first love. For the first time in Sophie‘s life there is a distraction to her thirst for knowledge and she’s here for it. That is all you’re getting about the plot, because the true magic of the story is the unexpected direction it takes.

Sophie is such a sympathetic and lovable character. She is quirky, intelligent, insecure, and kind. Her motives were always so pure and true, she did not have a manipulative bone in her body. Jake I am conflicted about. On one hand I think he was a really good person that perhaps got a little caught up in his own ambition. But on the other hand…. there is a lot of science/time theory dropped into the story, but I think it was done in a very accessible way. Admittedly I’m not a big science person and I *think* I understood what was being said. At the heart of the book though this is truly an epic love story. I would have never thought a book with so much science in it would evoke so much emotion. If you are a fan of romance or good storytelling I cannot recommend this book enough.

This book in emojis 📔 ⏳ ⏰ 🕰 🪐 💫 💔

*** Big thank you to Atria for my gifted copy of this book. All opinions are my own. ***

About the Book

“Henry has done a masterful job…. This book is academic and heartfelt and tender and loving. It is worth every minute spent reading it.” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review) 

A brilliant physicist studying the nature of time embarks on a journey to prove that those we love are always connected to us, leading to surprising revelations in this fresh and unique love story.

Sophie Jones is a physics prodigy on track to unlock the secrets of the universe. But when she meets Jake Kristopher during their first week at Yale, they instantly feel a deep connection, as if they’ve known each other before. Quickly, they become a couple. Slowly, their love lures Sophie away from school.

When a shocking development forces Sophie into a new reality, she returns to physics to make sense of her world. She grapples with life’s big questions, including how to cope with unexpected change and loss. Inspired by her connection with Jake, Sophie throws herself into her studies, determined to prove that true loves belong together in all realities. 

Spanning decades, The Love Proof is an unusual love story about lasting connection, time, and intuition. It explores the course that perfect love can take between imperfect people, and urges us to listen to our hearts rather than our heads.

Have a day filled with love and books! XOXO Berit💛

The Perfect Guest by Emma Rous **Book Review** @berkleypub

happy Friday y’all!

This was such a great thriller that I strongly encourage you to pick up! So very sinister and atmospheric!

My Thoughts

Delectably deceiving. deeply disturbing. Deliciously dark. Emma Rous once again stretched my mind with her mesmerizing storytelling, an atmospheric story with a Gothic vibe. 1988 Beth arrives at Raven Hall hopeful that this will be her new home. The family has a daughter Nina about the same age as her and Beth is eagerly cautious to befriend the girl. not long after arriving at the manor Beth begins to get some strange vibes, like why is it that Nina is not allowed to leave the property? 2019 struggling actress Sadie gets a part as a Party Guest at a mystery dinner. she cannot believe her luck a stunning dress, a gorgeous manner, interesting company. But it isn’t too long before Sadie figures out there is more to all of this than meets the eye. oh what a sinister tale Miss Rous has spun. Two women,one creepy manor, 30 years apart. what ties these two storylines together and what secrets is Raven Hall keeping?

I could not put this book down! I stayed up late into the night and finish this in one sitting. I was completely engrossed in this twisted mind bending tale. The story bounced between Sadie and Beth as well as now and then. I was equally engaged in both narratives. The story was extremely compelling even though the pacing was not always perfect. there was such a chilling sinister feel to the story, I was constantly waiting for something bad to happen. The ending was cleverly revealed one piece at a time keeping the tension throughout.

This book in emojis 🏚 🗝 ⛸ ☕️ 🫖 🍷 🎻 🎭

*** Big thank you to Berkley for my gifted copy of this book. All opinions are my own. ***

About the Book

The USA Today bestselling author of The Au Pair returns with another delicious, twisty novel—about a grand estate with many secrets, an orphan caught in a web of lies, and a young woman playing a sinister game.

1988. Beth Soames is fourteen years old when her aunt takes her to stay at Raven Hall, a rambling manor in the isolated East Anglian fens. The Averells, the family who lives there, are warm and welcoming, and Beth becomes fast friends with their daughter, Nina. At times, Beth even feels like she’s truly part of the family…until they ask her to help them with a harmless game—and nothing is ever the same.

2019. Sadie Langton is an actress struggling to make ends meet when she lands a well-paying gig to pretend to be a guest at a weekend party. She is sent a suitcase of clothing, a dossier outlining the role she is to play, and instructions. It’s strange, but she needs the money, and when she sees the stunning manor she’ll be staying at, she figures she’s got nothing to lose. 

In person, Raven Hall is even grander than she’d imagined—even with damage from a fire decades before—but the walls seem to have eyes. As day turns to night, Sadie starts to feel that there’s something off about the glamorous guests who arrive, and as the party begins, it becomes chillingly apparent their unseen host is playing games with everyone…including her.

Purchase on Amazon

Have a lovely weekend! XOXO Berit

The Ruthless Lady’s Guide to Wizardry by C. M. Wagoner **Book Review** @berkleypub

Happy Tuesday all!

Happy birthday to this clever quirky story! This was such a fun read!🧙🏻‍♂️

My Thoughts

whimsical. Magical. Fantastical. C. M. Waggoner completely pulled me into this enchanting story with her quirky and unique writing style. before you start this book I think it is important that you are aware of the fact that the dialogue in the story is highly original. It is almost as if they are speaking a different language but they aren’t. At first this threw me off a little but by the end of the book I was completely acclimated to the style. I have to think The colorful language drew me into this world even more. The colorful language also was perfectly suited for our antiheroine Delly. Delly is a sharp, spunky, spirited fire witch who is in need of funds fast. When Delly sees an ad for a job as a bodyguard of a rich lady in need of being guarded before her wedding she is eager to apply. How hard can this be? Delly is certain the lady is exaggerating her peril. But Delly soon finds out the threat is real and it has put herself and her new friends in danger. because Delly never anticipated making new friends and meeting a possible romantic interest.

This was just so much fun! Definitely not my usual genre but it was such an enjoyable story. loved the relationship between Delly and Winn. Winn was half troll half female and one of the most kind caring characters I’ve ever read. The characters in the story were so accepting. Everything was so fluid your appearance, your gender, your sexuality. The mystery was interesting and made even more complex by everyone’s ability to change their appearance. A little magic… a little historical fiction… a little romance… a little mystery… and a whole lotta fun!

This book in emojis 🧙🏻‍♂️ 💰 🧪 🚰 🐭

*** Big thank you to Berkley for my gifted copy of this book. All opinions are my own. ***

About the Book

A charming historical fantasy with a tender love story at its core, from the author of Unnatural Magic. Hard-drinking petty thief Dellaria Wells is down on her luck in the city of Leiscourt—again. Then she sees a want ad for a female bodyguard, and she fast-talks her way into the high-paying job. Along with a team of other women, she’s meant to protect a rich young lady from mysterious assassins. At first Delly thinks the danger is exaggerated, but a series of attacks shows there’s much to fear. Then she begins to fall for Winn, one of the other bodyguards, and the women team up against a mysterious, magical foe who seems to have allies everywhere.

Have a magical day! XOXO Berit

The Starcrossed Sisters of Tuscany by Lori Nelson Spielman**Book Review** @berkleypub

Happy Tuesday all!

This book was such a treat! The perfect book at just the right time! I cannot recommend it enough!🍷

My Thoughts

Family… Romance… regret… heart… hope… Lori Nelson Speilman swept me away to Italy and stole my heart with her vivid storytelling. For generations the second daughters of the Fontana family have been cursed, never to fall in love and get married. Emilia is resign to her fate, spending her days working in the family bakery and her nights at home with her cat. Lucy’s approach is a bit different, she spends all her energy trying to find a man and is constantly getting her heart stomped on. When the cousin’s Aunt Poppy reaches out to take the girls on an all expenses paid vacation to Italy they are intrigued. But their grandmother has not spoken to her sister Poppy in decades and forbids the girls to go to Italy. Unfortunately for grandma the allure of an Italian trip and the possibility of the curse being broken is too much. So Emilia and Lucy pack their bags and head to Italy. The food… the sites… the sounds… the smells… the family secrets… As The ladies travel around Italy Poppy begins to share the story of her romantic yet heartbreaking past.

I absolutely LOVED everything about this book! It is hands-down the best travel romance I have ever read. Sometimes when you read a book where travel is involved it can get really bogged down with descriptions of the food, and the sites, and all that. This book brought Italy alive, but the vivid descriptive writing did not detract anything from the gorgeous storyline. Emilia, Lucy, and poppy were such well developed characters with so much charm and heart as well as many insecurities and flaws. Most of the story takes place in current times, but we also got a generous sprinkling of flashbacks about Poppy’s lovestory. This is a story that will make you feel. I laughed, I cried, I got frustrated, I found joy. This is a can’t miss for anyone who loves the love.

This book in emojis 🐱 ✈️ 🍷 🎻 🇮🇹

*** Big thank you to Berkley for my gifted copy of this book. All opinions are my own. ***

About the Book

An international best seller!

A Library Reads pick and Indie Next Pick! 

A trio of second-born daughters sets out on a whirlwind journey through the lush Italian countryside to break the family curse that says they’ll never find love, by New York Times best seller Lori Nelson Spielman, author of The Life List. 

Since the day Filomena Fontana cast a curse upon her sister more than 200 years ago, not one second-born Fontana daughter has found lasting love. Some, like second-born Emilia, the happily single baker at her grandfather’s Brooklyn deli, claim it’s an odd coincidence. Others, like her sexy, desperate-for-love cousin Lucy, insist it’s a true hex. But both are bewildered when their great-aunt calls with an astounding proposition: If they accompany her to her homeland of Italy, Aunt Poppy vows she’ll meet the love of her life on the steps of the Ravello Cathedral on her 80th birthday and break the Fontana Second-Daughter Curse once and for all. 

Against the backdrop of wandering Venetian canals, rolling Tuscan fields, and enchanting Amalfi Coast villages, romance blooms, destinies are found, and family secrets are unearthed – secrets that could threaten the family far more than a centuries-old curse.

The Storm by Amanda Jennings @MandaJJennings @HQstories #bookreview

Hello book friends,I hope that you are all doing well?

I was sent a copy of this book by another book friend, and once I had started , I couldn’t put it down!

My Review

Hannah and Nathan are married with a teenage son.

They have a beautiful house, Nathan is an established Lawyer and does a lot to help in the community, everyone loves Nathan.
Hannah is a Housewife.

From the outside, Hannah and Nathan have a perfect marriage, they are happy and loving life.

But behind closed doors, Nathan is a controlling Narcissistic Douchebag!

He controls everything that Hannah does, from what she wears, to what she spends her money on, or should I say *his* money, because Hannah has to produce receipts for every purchase that she makes, even counting the change, if it is wrong, then a swift punch will set her right!

He is manipulative and gaslights her at every opportunity to make her think that she is going crazy. Hannah knows what he is doing, but is helpless to do anything about it, as she is powerless in this relationship.

But this story isn’t just about Coercive Control, it also delves into the past, and you find out how a happy young Hannah, can eventually end up being a beaten down shell of what she used to be.

Because Hannah is living with the consequences of a night that she will never forget, and knows that she can never escape, and Nathan will make sure of this!

This book was a tough read, I have recently left a toxic marriage, and although it was nowhere as bad as what Hannah endured, I was still reminded of the manipulation, and gaslighting.
People need to realise that domestic abuse is not always a black eye, sometimes the bruises don’t show on the body, sometimes they are on your heart, and they take longer to heal.

A great read, but please take heed of the Trigger Warnings for Domestic Violence.

Enjoy
Vicci 📚💛✨

The Blurb

To the outside world Hannah married the perfect man. Behind the closed doors of their imposing home it’s a very different story. Nathan controls everything Hannah does. He chooses her clothes, checks her receipts, and keeps her passport locked away. But why does she let him?

Years before, in the midst of a relentless storm, the tragic events of one night changed everything. And Hannah has been living with the consequences ever since. Keeping Nathan happy. Doing as she’s told.

But the past is about to catch up with them.

Set against the unforgiving backdrop of a Cornish fishing port in the ‘90s, this is a devastating exploration of the power of coercive control in a marriage where nothing is quite as it seems…

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Precious You by Helen Monks Takhar @HelenMTakhar @HQstories @NetGalley #bookreview #blogtour

Hello book friends, I hope you are all doing well?

I am so happy to be a part of this Blog Tour for this fabulously twisty read!

My Review

Katherine Ross is a 41 year old Magazine Editor, she has been working at Leadership for just over 20 years, and she loves it.

She has recently returned back after a spell away after some mental health issues, but she is chomping-at-the-bit to get back to work again.

Unfortunately, new management have taken over the magazine, so she has lot of new people to impress, and she supposes that she’ll be working with the new intake of Interns, and they’ll all be GenX ‘Snowflakes’ as usual!

After a strange coincidence with actually getting to work on her first day back, Katherine meets Lily the new Intern, Lily is 23, gorgeous, and as it happens, really good at the job.

Lily also happens to be the niece of the new boss!

Told from the POV of Lily and Katherine, this books starts to twist and turn in directions that I didn’t see coming.

Katherine is well aware of Lily’s manipulation tactics, but cannot seem to stay away from her, and Lily finds this fascinating, in fact she will do anything she can to infiltrate Katherine’s life, and all Katherine can do, is watch while her life tumbles down around her!

I sat on my sofa and read this book in one day, I was so intrigued, I needed to see where it was going, and I was stunned so many times, it was a complete ‘Knicker-Twister’

**Thank you to the Author, HQStories & Netgalley for asking me to be on this blog tour, and for providing me with a copy of this book**

Enjoy
Vicci 📚💛✨

Synopsis

An obsessive power struggle between an editor and her millennial intern turns dangerous in this debut psychological thriller–for readers of Luckiest Girl Alive and You.

Trusting you was my first mistake.

To Katherine, twenty-four-year-old Lily Lunt is a typical “snowflake.” Soft, entitled, unflaggingly earnest, the privileged, politically correct millennial will do whatever she can to make it big as a writer, including leveraging her family’s connections. She’s got it easy. To Lily, Katherine Ross, a career woman in her early forties, is a holdover from another era: clueless, old-fashioned, and perfectly happy to build her success on the backs of her unpaid interns.

When Lily is hired as the new intern at Leadership magazine, where Katherine is editor in chief, her arrival threatens the very foundations of the self-serving little world that Katherine has built. But before long, she finds herself obsessively drawn to Lily, who seems to be a cruel reminder of the beauty and potential Katherine once had, things she senses Lily plans to use against her. Is Katherine simply paranoid, jealous of Lily’s youth as she struggles with encroaching middle age? Is Lily just trying to get ahead in the cutthroat world of publishing? Or is there a more sinister motivation at play, fueled by the dark secrets they’re both hiding? As their rivalry deepens, a disturbing picture emerges of two women pitted against each other across a toxic generational divide–and who are desperate enough to do anything to come out on top.

As unsettling as it is provocative, Precious You cuts to heart of questions surrounding modern female rivalry, obsession and deceit. Helen Monks Takhar delivers an explosive take on the contemporary workplace and the disparate generations that power it, turning the professional roles women play on their heads in a razor-sharp, revenge-driven thriller for our age

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A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara #bookreview

Hello Book Friends, I hope you are all doing well?

WOW!!! Well, I really didn’t know what I was getting myself into when I grabbed this audiobook!!

After 32hrs of listening to this, I was an exhausted, pool of emotions.

My Review

This story is HARD GOING, it has ALLL the trigger warnings, so please be careful if you decide to read this, it could be very triggering for some.

The story is about 4 friends from college who decide to all move to NYC One is an architect, one is a painter, one is an actor, and one is a lawyer.

This is their story, each of the characters has their own demons to fight, but none as much as Jude.

Jude has his own story to tell, and it is told in heartbreakingly graphic detail, he is not only brilliant, but he is also a broken child-like gay man, who doesn’t really know who he is, and has to rely on Willem to be his emotional crutch and partner.

This is not a fast paced book don’t go in expecting the smash-and-grab experience, you won’t get that here, but what you will get is connection, a connection with every character, but mostly with Willem and Jude and their story.

This is a highly emotional book, and I can tell you that I SOBBED reading this, I cannot warn you enough about the emotion in this book.

There was great representation in here, there are multiple POC, LGBTQ relationships, Disabled representation in an MC, and a really great friendship base between them all.

It also shows mental health issues and how they are perceived.

This book is LONG, 700+ pages, so don’t go into it lightly thinking that it is going to be all hearts and flowers, IT. MOST. DEFINITELY. IS. NOT.

But if you want to read a beautiful story, about friendships, love, loss and horror this is the book for you.

If you were a fly on the wall and lived in a house for years and years, and got to watch every single persons life unfold in front of your eyes, this is what would have been written about it.

TRIGGER WARNINGS FOR EVERYTHING, I’M NOT JOKING AROUND!!!!!

🎧🎧

Narrated by Oliver Wyman who was just amazing, it took me a while to get used to his voice, but he made every character come alive, and I was invested in them all.

Enjoy
Vicci 📚💛✨

Synopsis

When four classmates from a small Massachusetts college move to New York to make their way, they’re broke, adrift, and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition. There is kind, handsome Willem, an aspiring actor; JB, a quick-witted, sometimes cruel Brooklyn-born painter seeking entry to the art world; Malcolm, a frustrated architect at a prominent firm; and withdrawn, brilliant, enigmatic Jude, who serves as their center of gravity.

Over the decades, their relationships deepen and darken, tinged by addiction, success, and pride. Yet their greatest challenge, each comes to realize, is Jude himself, by midlife a terrifyingly talented litigator yet an increasingly broken man, his mind and body scarred by an unspeakable childhood, and haunted by what he fears is a degree of trauma that he’ll not only be unable to overcome—but that will define his life forever.

Purchase Links

Berts Books

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