Andrea Nourse's Blog, page 13

Big Summer, Jennifer Weiner

I know I say this with every Jennifer Weiner book I read, but this was by far my favorite. I was worried she wouldn’t be able to top Mrs. Everything. She did. Big Summer blew me away.

Daphne was loveable, relatable, and real. Her relationship with Drue, though frustrating, is something that I think we can all sympathize/empathize with. I was rooting for both of them.

I will say, the second half of the book blew by. Once I hit part two, I couldn’t put it down. I was enthralled and had to finish it. I won’t give away the mid-point twist, but DAMN.

Little Weirds, Jenny Slate

I came into Little Weirds with zero expectations and left with a massive girl crush on Jenny Slate. Before reading Little Weirds, Jenny Slate was a comedian, a voice that appears in movies my kids love, and a myriad of other things that we assign to actresses and celebrities. Now I know the truth. Jenny Slate is a vivid writer with endless imagination.

The prose within Little Weirds was rich and lively. I listened to the audiobook and am fairly certain I need to get the print version as well.

The Sweeney Sisters, Lian Dolan

You know those books that just make you want to smile? That was The Sweeney Sisters.

Each sister had a complex, relatable story and journey that brought them to life. Even the characters not present much on page, Bill, Maeve, and Birdie felt real and alive.

This was the exact book I needed to pull me away from the insanity of 2020.

Valentine, Elizabeth Wetmore

I had such high hopes for Valentine when I picked it for my April BOTM. I’d seen amazing reviews on Bookstagram and Jenna Bush Hager picked it for her April book club. But, it fell short for me.

I loved the writing and voice of the book but the story felt disconnected. Each character could have her own book, and I wanted more of them. But especially more of Glory. Her story was lost in the story of so many other women.

Falling in Love with my Characters

Have you ever fallen so in love with a project that we’re we’re scared to set it free?

I am 2 chapters and an epilogue away from finishing the first draft of my latest WIP. and I cannot wait to go back and read it from the beginning.

I realized yesterday that I was telling the story of an old friend who had big dreams and never chased them. I don’t think I sat down with the intention of writing that story. When the realization hit me, I fell a bit more in love with my characters and story.

It also made me want to go back and make it perfect, and then hold it close and protect it from the world.

This new project also brought me back to my first writing love—lyrics. As I started writing this book, I dug up my old songs and listened to them on SoundCloud. 

I Would Never … But if I Did, Maria Ann Green

You know those deeply tortured, complicated, flawed characters that are so endearing you can’t help but love them?

That’s Taryn Sams. At times, I wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake some sense into her … like, girl, listen to your friend and family!

As always, Maria Ann Green’s writing is flawless, even if her characters aren’t. She knows how to tug your heart and suck you into a story.

You and Me and Us, Alison Hammer

You and Me and Us, Alison Hammer. Thank you to the publisher & NetGalley for the gifted copy.

This book is beautiful and heartbreaking and all the things. Amazing. Pretty sure this book gutted me—in a good, cathartic way.
See, when I was ten I lost my dad to cancer. Like the father in You and Me and Us, my dad’s name was Thomas. So, this one was a hard one for me. I legit started crying writing that sentence.

All the stars. All the tears. All the feels. Thank you @thishammer for this beautiful book.

The Bookshop of Yesterday, Amy Meyerson

This book has been on my radar for a while. Then @thebooksocialite read it and insisted that I needed to read it to. As usual, she was right.

This book was quite a ride. I loved Miranda and the bookshop, and even Malcolm. Even though I was able to predict much of the plot, I still enjoyed it immensely.

Beach Read, Emily Henry

I just finished Beach Read by Emily Henry, and it was the kind of book that just grabbed me and pulled me into the comfort of its pages. January and Gus were both deep, flawed, relatable, and absolutely perfect for each other.

The quick-witted banter between the two was perfect.

Henry’s writing and voice sucked me in and didn’t let me down. Not once. I seriously couldn’t stop reading but also never wanted it to end.

As a woman who writes women’s fiction, I really related to January and loved how the author made the art of storytelling a heavy part of the story.

Truths I Never Told You, Kelly Rimmer

After finding disturbing journal pages that suggest her late mother didn’t die in a car accident as her father had always maintained, Beth Walsh begins a search for answers to the question — what really happened to their mother? With the power and relevance of Jodi Picoult and Lisa Jewell, Rimmer pens a provocative novel told by two women a generation apart, the struggles they unwittingly shared, and a family mystery that may unravel everything they believed to be true.

With her father recently moved to a care facility because of worsening signs of dementia, Beth Walsh volunteers to clear out the family home to prepare it for sale. Why shouldn’t she be the one, after all? Her three siblings are all busy with their families and successful careers, and Beth is on maternity leave after giving birth to Noah, their miracle baby. It took her and her husband Hunter years to get pregnant, but now that they have Noah, Beth can only feel panic. And leaving Noah with her in-laws while she pokes about in their father’s house gives her a perfect excuse not to have to deal with motherhood.

Beth is surprised to discover the door to their old attic playroom padlocked, and even more shocked to see what’s behind it – a hoarder’s mess of her father’s paintings, mounds of discarded papers, and miscellaneous junk. Her father was the most fastidious, everything-in-its-place man, and this chaos makes no sense. As she picks through the clutter, she finds a handwritten note attached to one of the paintings, in what appears to be in her late mother’s handwriting. Beth and her siblings grew up believing Grace Walsh died in a car accident when they were little more than toddlers, but this note suggests something much darker may be true. A frantic search uncovers more notes, seemingly a series of loose journal entries that paint a very disturbing portrait of a woman in profound distress, and of a husband that bears very little resemblance to the father Beth and her siblings know.

A fast-paced, harrowing look at the fault in memories and the lies that can bond families together – or tear them apart.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:Kelly Rimmer is the worldwide and USA TODAY bestselling author of Before I Let You Go, Me Without You, and The Secret Daughter. She lives in rural Australia with her husband, two children and fantastically naughty dogs, Sully and Basil. Her novels have been translated into more than twenty languages. Please visit her at www.Kelly.Rimmer.com

Exclusive Excerpt
PROLOGUE

Grace

September 14, 1957

I am alone in a crowded family these days, and that’s
the worst feeling I’ve ever experienced. Until these past few years, I had no
idea that lone­liness is worse than sadness. I’ve come to realize that’s because
loneliness, by its very definition, cannot be shared.

Tonight there are four other
souls in this house, but I am unreachably far from any of them, even as I’m far
too close to guarantee their safety. Patrick said he’d be home by nine tonight,
and I clung on to that prom­ise all day.

He’ll be home at nine, I tell
myself. You won’t do anything crazy if Patrick is here, so just hold on until
nine.

I should have known better
than to rely on that man by now. It’s 11:55 p.m., and I have no idea where he
is.

Beth will be wanting a feed
soon and I’m just so tired, I’m already bracing myself—as if the sound of her
cry will be the thing that undoes me, instead of something I should be used to
after four children. I feel the fear of that cry in my very bones—a kind of
whole-body tension I can’t quite make sense of. When was the last time I had
more than a few hours’ sleep? Twenty-four hours a day I am fixated on the
terror that I will snap and hurt someone: Tim, Ruth, Jeremy, Beth…or myself. I
am a threat to my children’s safety, but at the same time, their only
protection from that very same threat.

I have learned a hard lesson
these past few years; the more difficult life is, the louder your feelings
become. On an ordinary day, I trust facts more than feelings, but when the
world feels like it’s ending, it’s hard to dis­tinguish where my thoughts are
even coming from. Is this fear grounded in reality, or is my mind playing
tricks on me again? There’s no way for me to be sure. Even the line between
imagination and reality has worn down and it’s now too thin to delineate.

Sometimes I think I will walk
away before something bad happens, as if removing myself from the equation
would keep them all safe. But then Tim will skin his knee and come running to
me, as if a simple hug could take all the world’s pain away. Or Jeremy will
plant one of those sloppy kisses on my cheek, and I am reminded that for better
or worse, I am his world. Ruth will slip my handbag over her shoulder as she
follows me around the house, trying to walk in my footsteps, because to her, I
seem like someone worth imitating. Or Beth will look up at me with that gummy
grin when I try to feed her, and my heart contracts with a love that really
does know no bounds.

Those moments remind me that
everything changes, and that this cloud has come and gone twice now, so if I
just hang on, it will pass again. I don’t feel hope yet, but I should know
hope, because I’ve walked this path before and even when the mountains and
valleys seemed insur­mountable, I survived them.

I’m constantly trying to talk
myself around to calm, and sometimes, for brief and beautiful moments, I do.
But the hard, cold truth is that every time the night comes, it seems blacker
than it did before.

Tonight I’m teetering on the
edge of something horrific.

Tonight the sound of my
baby’s cry might just be the thing that breaks me altogether.

I’m scared of so many things
these days, but most of all now, I fear myself.

Excerpted from Truths I Never Told You by Kelly Rimmer, Copyright © 2020 by Lantana Management Pty Ltd. Published by Graydon House Books.