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REVIEW: The Best Goodbye by Abbi Glines
Four Stars
I don’t know how Glines does it, but somehow she manages to keep all the various characters and love triangles and parenting relationships straight in the seaside town of Rosemary Beach! I’d have to have a map and a secret decoder ring handy just to keep everyone straight, and to make sure I wasn’t suddenly pairing off a biological brother and sister (although there are certain fetish genres for that…ewwwwww).
In The Best Goodbye, Glines is at it again when it comes to spinning a fun, sexy, yet completely implausible escape read. I know readers–even romance readers–who would turn up their noses at the highly unlikely stories coming out of this quaint yet dark little town, but that’s the whole point, isn’t it? If I wanted to read a book about a normal guy and a normal girl who do normal things and happen to fall in love in a normal way, those books are a dime a dozen.
Glines’ specialty is the “out there” style of romance, and this one doesn’t fail to deliver in that regard. In this instance, River Kipling meets Rose Henderson, and (no spoilers!) you’ll just have to see it for yourself to find out what makes this one so unrealistic but so entertaining at the same time!
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REVIEW: Two Titles by VC Andrews
I absolutely DEVOURED VC Andrews’ books when I was in high school, and it’s interesting to see them being re-released for a whole new generation of readers to enjoy. Two of them in particular–My Sweet Audrina and Sage’s Eyes–have just come out from Simon & Schuster, and best of all, Audrina is being formatted for television film by Lifetime Studios!
At the time that I first read a VC Andrews book, it got the “Twilight” treatment for me. No, it didn’t include bizarrely sparkly paranormal creatures. The Twilight treatment is the phenomenon that occurs when there is absolutely nothing like this book anywhere, ever. I hesitate to credit The Twilight Saga with the current fascination with YA lit, but you have to admit that it opened doors in a way that no books have done in ages. When I was a young teenager, the most “out there” things we had to read were books about Margaret getting her period and Deenie having to wear a back brace for scoliosis. Judy Blume was considered fascinating, even off-limits. When Twilight (and the books that followed in that same time frame) came along, adults ate them up because they weren’t like anything we’d had when we were kids.
Except we had VC Andrews. She wrote such intensely different stuff that far too many readers–young and old alike–didn’t get the chance to meet her strangely twisted plots. Her heroes and villains were so incredible that it’s no wonder a whole new audience has opened up for them.
Audrina – Where do I even begin? Crazy parents, a girl who’s been brainwashed into believing she’s practically a baby, a horrible crime that happened so long ago but still hurts like it was yesterday… Andrews’ unbelievable tales hit a lot more close to home than many readers may want to think.
Sage’s Eyes – Is she a witch? If not, why does she have the strange dreams, and why do her parents watch her so closely for any of the telltale signs? Why does the boy at school seem to understand everything she’s going through in a bizarre, connected way? In true Andrews’ fashion, you will NOT see this ending coming.
Be sure to check out both of these titles, available now where books are sold.
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