Monday, May 9, 2016

Vacation Reading

Sunset in Cabo - (more about this vacation soon!)
Since I was on vacation in Cabo this past week, I had lots of time for reading. I'll keep it brief, but here's my mini-book reviews on the two books I read while lounging around.

As I mentioned in my last book review post, I read some reviews of this book before reading it that left me feeling a little unexcited.
The Good Neighbor by A.J. Banner
Several of the reviews on Goodreads were pretty negative, and several people complained about the ending in particular.  I couldn't remember why I had chosen to read it by the time I got it from the library- But it probably showed up on my Amazon "recommended" feed or something.  The book was pretty short (194 pages) so I figured, even if it wasn't great, it wouldn't take much time for me to be done with it, and just see what I thought for myself.

Although I agree with what was said in many of the reviews I read (that it was "formulaic", that the characters were all stereotypically beautiful, that the ending seemed a little abrupt, and that there might have been a few too many characters than were necessary), it kept my attention and I wanted to find out how it was going to end.

Oh wait... I should back up and say the story begins with a house fire.  The narrator of the story, Sarah, saves a little neighbor girl from the burning house, but the Mom and Dad die.  Sarah has a concussion and can't remember what happened. So the book is all about Sarah trying to piece it all together to find out- was it an accident?  Or did someone plan this fire?  And was it suppose to be her house, rather than her next door neighbor's?  And was/is her husband having an affair?

Short chapters tend to work well for suspense books. And like I mentioned, it was a short book.  So I got through it pretty quickly, and enjoyed it enough. Although it wasn't awesome, and I can barely remember that much about it- even a week later- it kept me entertained for a few hours.  I'd give it 3 out of 5 stars.

But there are definitely better books in this genre...
Like, the one that I read next.
Hush Little Baby by Suzanne Redfearn
Although Hush Little Baby was much longer than the other book, (352 pages) it was a quick read too.  Partly because it was hard to put down.  Again... short chapters!  And in this book SO much was happening in each one!

The narrator in this book, Jillian, is married and has two kids.  On the outside, her life looks awesome...but, of course, that's not the case.  She's in the thick of an abusive marriage.  She stays married out of fear, but eventually decides to leave... also because of fear.  Fear that her husband is going to kill her! But, in leaving, she also fears that he will get custody of the kids~ because he's a cop and everyone thinks he's a great dad and all around great guy. All the while, he's her making look like the crazy person.

One part of the book that seemed stupid to me was when Jillian got a DUI- while driving her kids around.  The husband had a cop pull her over, because he knew she had been drinking and wanted her to get busted.  Later, the charges were dropped once they realized her husband was an a-hole.  But really?  A DUI is kind of a big deal.  Especially with two little kids in the car.  So that kind of bugged me.  But it wasn't a big part of the story...

By the way, I read the reviews of Hush Little Baby after I finished it.  (Probably a better way to do it!) Other readers seemed to really like this one.  Probably giving it more credit actually than I would. I think it got an over all rating of 4 1/2 stars on Goodreads site.  I'd probably give it about 3 1/2 stars. It was good, but I wouldn't say it was great. And the writing wasn't so good that it moved me to tears as a few people said.  But see for yourself!

Stay tuned for my recap of our trip to Cabo...


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