This proves it: Abby Jimenez cannot write a bad book.
I loved reading Part of Your World way more than I had anticipated. The writing was absolutely phenomenal. Abby Jimenez is a very talented writer, but I honestly feel like she outdid her self here. I was hooked on the story from page one and remained glued to this book going forward. The different character dynamics and relationships are what really made Part of Your World shine, however. Daniel and Alexis’ connection was special from the beginning and I loved how it blossomed and grew as the story went on. The nature of their relationship and their reservations felt very authentic and relatable. Alexis’ familial dynamics with her parents were another important aspect that I thought added a lot of strength and adversity to her character.
Part of Your World was truly a magical reading experience and I have nothing but great things to say about it! Definitely add this to your summer reading TBR! as much as the previous two.
As I’ve begun to grow out of reading YA novels, I was super excited to see Wibbroka writing an adult romance. It’s no secret these two can seriously write and The Roughest Draft was no exception. The concept of the story was great and the chemistry between Katrina and Nathan was definitely palpable in the later half. However, the book is not without its issues.
Unfortunately, the book dragged for a majority of the story. It felt like it took forever to get to the actual meat of the story. The second problem I had while reading was the way in which ‘past’ scenes were written. I always appreciated flashbacks chapters in stories like this, but the way they were placed in the story felt really disjointed. The tone/setting of them also felt so similar to what was happening in the present that I would occasionally get confused.
The Roughest Draft is a great concept. Even with the small issues I had, I still really enjoyed reading this and would definitely recommend to fans of Wibbroka or contemporary romances in general. I hope this duo sticks to adult books and I look forward to reading what they write next!
Somehow I was led to believe that The Simple Wild was a cute hate-to-love romcom about a city girl moving to the middle of nowhere and falling for the grumpy small town love interest similar to It Happened One Summer. While that pretty much sums up the romantic subplot, this book is so much more than that. The Simple Wild was an emotional, poignant, heart-wrenching story that took me completely by surprise.I honestly could not tell you the last time I cried this hard reading a book.
It’s refreshing to read a hate-to-love story that actually encompasses that hate aspect. And I say that because I really, really hated the love interest, Jonah, for the good beginning of the book. It took a really long time for me to warm up to him (and to be honest there are still some aspects about him I’m not a fan of; mainly how he speaks about women who enjoy dressing up and wearing makeup), so I can easily imagine how Calla must have been feeling. The romance is slow-burn in the best sense, because it wasn’t until halfway through the book that Calla (and myself) began to change her mind about him.
I know this may be hard to believe, but the romance wasn’t even my favorite part about the book. The Simple Wild really touches on families, especially forming ties with estranged parents and the theme of regrets and forgiveness. Following Calla and Wren’s journey in learning about one another and recreating their father/daughter bond after so many years of not speaking was the best part of this story. The way their relationship was written was absolutely beautiful.
The story also places an importance on found families and community. Like Calla, I’m a city girl through and through. The thought of living someplace as remote as Bangor, Alaska makes me break out in hives. But I’ll be damned if K.A. Tucker didn’t do a phenomenal job showing a different side to small, rural towns and how tight-knit such communities are. Before reading this I was unfamiliar with Alaskan bush pilots and their roles but the author did a great job showing their importance to the remote communities and villages of Alaska.
This book simply had no reason to be this good and cause me this much emotional pain. My heart was physically aching at some parts. I was expecting a light-hearted romcom with some good angst between the protagonist and love interest, and instead I was given a book that was so much more than that. The Simple Wild was one of the best books I’ve read this year and I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a beautiful story about love, families, community, and forgiveness.
I’ve been looking forward to reading Quan’s story for a long time, and while I really enjoyed reading it, there was just something missing that kept it from being a winner. The Heart Principle was more of an emotional read than the previous two, but it still contained the light-hearted, romantic charm of the rest of the series.
Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. This week’s theme is books with numbers in the title. As I was putting together this list, I decided to have a bit of fun and see if I could count to ten with book titles, which I was able to!
Paws & Paperbacks 