REVIEW: Deeper by Megan Hart

Published July 1, 2009 by Spice Books 
TBR Challenge Review: August

The theme for August's TBR Challenge hosted by Wendy The Super Librarian was "steamy reads." Without any hesitation, I knew I would chose a book from my TBR pile by author Megan Hart. I've read several of Hart's novels in the past, have a few on my TBR bookshelf and yet more on my wish list. Obviously I'm a fan of her work.

Megan Hart writes erotic fiction--but really unlike anything you'd imagine a book of this genre would be like. Although there are romantic elements to her books, and they are love stories at their core, the books are not what most readers would classify as a romance novel. The endings are not always happily ever after type endings, but they do end with a satisfactory level of closure. The stories simultaneously revolve around the lives and love stories of two or more characters. Hart's stories are a unique form of women's fiction. Women's fiction with honest, natural eroticism that shows the multitude of ways people are bound together by sex and love.

Deeper is not my first book by Megan Hart and it certainly won't be my last. Despite the fact that her stories often tend to leave me a little broken hearted, I still go back for more. Her stories are not easy on your heart and will likely challenge your personal moral compass. They're emotionally complicated and the conflict resolution is never easy or obvious. The stories sometimes make you uncomfortable, but they make you think, empathize and learn about human nature. And because of that, the characters and their stories are unforgettable. I end up thinking about them for a very long time after I've read the book. Weeks, months and even years.

Deeper is the story of Bess Walsh and Nick Hamilton through alternating glimpses into their lives at different time periods--Then and Now. Then is the summer Bess and Nick met when she was 20 and he was 21 at Bethany Beach. Bess was the college girl, working a summer job in the beach town while living at her grandparents beach house. Nick was the local bad boy. Bess' relationship with her long time boyfriend at home was falling apart and what she thought was love was nothing compared to the depth of passion and longing that she felt with Nick. They were undeniably drawn to each other in ways neither one of them had ever felt before. An attraction so deep that they'd be forever etched on each other's souls. Sadly, their love for each other was limited by how far they could break through their insecurities and vulnerabilities and they never saw each other again after that summer.

Until twenty years later, that is. Bess' marriage has failed and she finds herself back at her grandparent's beach house once again, still grieving for the lover she never got over--Nick. Standing at the ocean's edge with nothing but love and longing on her mind and in her heart, she cries for him and his name falls from her lips. Suddenly his mouth is on hers and his hands are on her body. A gift or a curse, neither one is sure, but a second chance is what they've been given and a second chance is what they're going to take.

One of the most compelling aspects of Hart's characters is that they are so very real and flawed. They have real problems, make life altering decisions, make real mistakes and have to deal with the consequences. The mistakes they make aren't easy to fix and sometimes they continue to make the same mistakes over and over again. There are several crucial secondary characters who contribute to Bess and Nick's story, such as Bess' husband, her two teenage sons, and her friend Eddie from that summer long ago who is now a business owner in Bethany Beach, but what goes on between Bess and Nick--and their personal issues-- is what's at the heart of Deeper.

Nick is the charming, sexy, aloof bad boy. He has the reputation of being a player and not sticking around. He admits he's an asshole and absolutely doesn't talk about he feels. He has issues trusting others--even those who promise to be there for him. Deep down, he's pretty insecure when it comes to emotional relationships. Not when it comes to sex, though. He's definitely uninhibited there. But when it comes to expressing how he feels, what he wants or any emotional intimacy--that's a tremendous obstacle for him and he just closes up. Eventually he drops hints of how he feels about Bess here and there, but because of HER issues with self doubt, it never really sinks in with her and what little does sink in, she doesn't believe him.

Then there's Bess. Every man she's ever loved has never been fully open and honest with her. He's either been a cheater or has the reputation of being a cheater or a player. Naturally this makes her even more susceptible to self doubt than she already is by her very nature. The men she is drawn to only fuel her self doubt and it's no wonder she feels unworthy of a faithful, long time lover. All of this inhibits her from being honest with herself and from speaking up for herself, her needs and wants in her relationships. As the story progresses, though, she starts to learn to be honest and upfront with how she feels in her relationships and to make healthy decisions in her life.

Deeper is one of those books that's just so darned hard to review. There's so many facets to this story to discuss, but near impossible to tell about in a review because it's the readers journey that's just as important as the character's journey. The reader gets jumbled up and tossed about as easily as the characters. It's so much better to experience it yourself than through another reader's eyes. So go read it.

I give Deeper 4 out of 5 stars on goodreads, but if I could give half stars, I would give it 4.5 out of 5 stars. Why not 5 stars? Something about the supernatural aspects of this story just pull me out of the story. It's not quite paranormal and definitely not realistic, but somewhere in between, a place I have trouble with. While I feel this book is mostly Bess' story, it is also Nick's, yet it was difficult to find his personal growth in the Now. I'm not sure what he learned from his second chance. [I think you should read the book so we can discuss this]. Overall, though, this was a wonderful, unforgettable read that will stay in my thoughts for a long time.

GRADE: A-


Other books I've read and loved by Megan Hart:

Tempted
This Is What I Want
Taking Care of Business [co-written with Lauren Dane]
Stranger
Everything Changes
Naked 

I also have Broken and Dirty by Megan Hart on my shelf, but haven't them read yet.

Have you read any of Megan Hart's books yet? Which ones? 

And if not, what are you waiting for?!

REVIEW: Still Life With Husband by Lauren Fox

F This book is April book for the Author's by the Alphabet Book Club as members read our way through the alphabet by authors' last names. Still Life With Husband by Lauren Fox was chosen by BookBelle, this month's host of the book club who blogs at BookBelle. :) For links to other reviews of this book, as well as to check out our discussion of the novel, visit BookBelle's blog HERE. If you'd like to join the Authors by the Alphabet Book Club, we'd love to have you. Visit the sign up post HERE.

Thirty year old Emily Ross is a freelance writer with a part time editor position with a medical journal and has a bad case of marriage blahs. Emily and Kevin have been together for the last nine years since their senior year in college, married for the last five. Kevin, who is employed as a technical writer, is firmly resolved to start a family and buy a house in the suburbs, despite Emily's reservations. Not only that, but Emily is overall discontent with her dispassionate, stale marriage.

While having lunch with her best friend in their favorite coffee shop, Emily--who is not wearing her wedding ring at the time-- meets David Keller, a journalist for an alternative local newspaper with whom she shares an instant, electric connection. Emily and David meet again under the guise of discussing a potential job opportunity for Emily at the newspaper for whom David works, and the two spend hours talking and practically falling for each other as if they were on a spectacular first date. Emily is fully aware that she is crossing the lines of fidelity to her husband and at the same time also dishonest with David as she is slow to reveal her marital status to him. Inevitably, Emily has committed the first of many betrayals that ultimately lead to more poor decisions with irrevocable consequences.

Still Life with Husband is told from the first person point of view of Emily as she wends her way through the mess she makes of her life over several weeks. That's not to say that Emily was not already dissatisfied with her life, however the choices she makes specifically during this time frame actually force her to own up to what really wants out of life. The novel primarily centers on Emily's struggles with her marriage to Kevin, her conflicted feelings of her infidelity, the consequences of her decisions and how she handles it all. It's also about Emily learning to essentially take charge of her own happiness. There are also well crafted story threads involving Emily's relationships with her best friend Meg, her sister Heather and her parents, all of which added richness to Emily's story.

Still Life With Husband is adeptly written in an extremely compelling, articulate and very expressive voice. There's both fantastic humor and depth of emotion at every page and while the plot is not complicated, not once did it feel the least bit predictable and was, in fact, quite the page turner. I didn't want to put the book down, and when I did, I kept wondering what Emily was going to think, feel or do next. What were the consequences of those actions going to be, who was going to get hurt, and how was Emily going to straighten out her life? Would she even straighten out her life? What good could possibly come of this? All I could do was to keep reading.

Truthfully, when I read the book blurb after it was announced as the April book club selection, I was hesitant to read a novel about infidelity. I didn't want to empathize with a protagonist who was cheating on her husband and even worse, I was afraid that the author would glorify infidelity as a whole in some way. Thankfully, neither of those things happened, which I think is a testament to the author's skill at sharing Emily's journey in a way the she could be your sister or your friend. You like her, you know her, you even came to completely understand her even though you don't agree with her actions and yet through it all ... you were there for her.

GRADE: B+


Still Life With Husband is Lauren Fox's first novel. Her second novel, Friends Like Us, is due to hit shelves in February 2012.

REVIEW: The Persian Pickle Club by Sandra Dallas

D This book was the March selection for the Authors by the Alphabet Book Club, representing letter D. For links to other reviews and a book discussion, visit Julie at Reading Without Restraint.

Published in 1996

The Persian Pickle Club by Sandra Dallas is a story of friendship in times of adversity in the small farming community of Harveyville, Kansas during the Great Depression era and has a bit of a murder mystery to it as well. The story is told from the point of view of a young farm wife named Queenie Bean who treasures time spent with her closest friends in their quilting club. The women name their quilting club The Persian Pickle Club after a treasured bolt of quilting fabric with a Persian pickle design on it, also known as paisley. The members of the club affectionately refer to themselves as "Pickles."

Queenie is the youngest Pickle and yearns for a close friend her own age in the Pickle Club. When newcomer and newlywed Rita Ritter joins the Pickles, Queenie is anxious to become best friends with her. Rita is friendly and nice, but very different from the farm wives of Kansas. Rita is a city girl and aspires to be a successful news reporter. In fact, Rita is determined to write her best news story ever that will land her a job at a major city newspaper and essentially be her ticket out of farm country. When the bones of one of the Pickle's missing husband is found in a shallow roadside grave, Rita believes solving the mystery of his murder will be her lucky break. She enlists help from Queenie who is all too eager to spend time with her new best friend, even when their investigating leads them to trouble and possibly heartache as secrets between Pickle members are unearthed.

The Persian Pickle Club is a charming Depression-era story that encompasses a wide range of important women's topics such as friendship, marriage, financial hardships, charity, death, widowhood and even infertility. The author adeptly draws the reader in to the hardships of this time and the lives of the families trying to survive with their dignity intact. A few scenes packed more emotional punch than I expected, and despite the fact that there is a murder mystery, the story is warm and uplifting.

For all it's strengths, however, I did feel the book could have been more for a few reasons. For one, the story started out rather slow. Considering the book is barely two hundred pages, I expected the story to be strong and engaging from start, not start to pick up speed and interest at the halfway mark. Perhaps contributing to the feeling of a slow start is the fact that there are so many characters in the story, most of them Pickles who are introduced at the same time, making it difficult to keep track of who was who. I tried to just read on, thinking I'd figure everyone out as I went along, but I still found myself flipping back to the early chapters to remind myself who was who. I think this was especially important for me to keep straight because the women were of different ages and stages of their lives--for example, I found it important to keep straight who was older, younger, related to whom, had children or not, were married, widowed, etc.--because these attributes strongly established their "place" within the community, their hardships and their relationships with each other. Eventually I got it, but I wish I didn't have to work as hard getting it straight. Also, although I enjoyed the murder mystery aspect of the story while I was reading the book and how it inevitably intertwined the lives of the Pickles together, when I closed the book I questioned its plausibility.

This is one of those cases for which I wish readers could give half stars for their ratings on goodreads. I rated The Persian Pickle Club three stars on goodreads, but would have given it three and a half if I could have.

GRADE:  B-

REVIEW: Saving CeeCee Honeycutt by Beth Hoffman

I read this book as part of a book club tour hosted by the lovely Alaine of Queen of Happy Endings. Inspired by the book club tour that Amy organized with her copy of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows last year, Alaine proposed a similar Read Around the World book tour with her copy of Saving CeeCee Honeycutt by Beth Hoffman. The novel is traveling around the world to different readers and by the time the book reaches Alaine again, it will have been to eight different countries and read by sixteen different people--including me! It's a really fun idea and I'm looking forward to reading everyone's review of the book.

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Saving CeeCee Honeycutt is an emotional and yet uplifting coming of age story about a young girl who has been living pretty much lost and lonely and the lovely women who essentially save her over the course of one hot summer in the late 1960s. At the tender age of twelve, CeeCee Honeycutt has already lived a difficult life. Her mother Camille suffers from a psychosis that has been worsening over the years, leaving a trail of embarrassing moments behind her wherever she goes, dressed up in her former glory as the 1951 Vidalia Onion Queen wearing old prom gowns and tiaras. CeeCee's father's way of handling things has always been to leave town on business for weeks at a time, which has left CeeCee to take care of herself and her mother. Her only friend in her small Ohio town is her elderly neighbor and her only comfort is her collection of books. CeeCee's world takes a dramatic turn one fateful day when a tragedy befalls her mother and CeeCee is sent off to live with her great Aunt Tootie she never even knew she had in Savannah, Georgia. What at first feels like the end of CeeCee's world slowly transforms into a beautiful beginning for this brave young girl as she learns some of life's most valuable lessons about life, friendship, family and love.

Saving CeeCee Honeycutt is a beautiful novel filled with so many empowering lessons on life, friendship and family told through the story of one brave young woman who longs for friendship, family and acceptance. CeeCee Honeycutt's story is in so many ways a heartbreaking one. She is a smart young girl who reads all the time and submerges herself in her school work to escape the reality of her lonely world. In so many ways she is wise beyond her years, yet in so many other ways she is vulnerable, naive and lost without someone to hold her and tell her she is loved and wanted. The women who come into CeeCee's life provide her with some of her first solid relationships outside her dysfunctional family of her psychotic mother and absent father, each in their own way showing CeeCee the ups and downs and joys of family and friendship within a stable home. She learns more in one summer about loss and grief, friendship and family, love and acceptance than most people learn in a lifetime. The story broke my heart and brought me to tears several times, but it also made me laugh and brought me joy as CeeCee found happiness.

While the various conflicts woven throughout the story do get resolved rather neatly and smoothly, contributing to the novel's feel good story book style, I say what's not to love about that? The romantic in me cherished the happily ever after endings to all of the story lines and I simply adored the delivery of the story with all it's southern charm. I definitely closed Saving CeeCee Honeycutt with a happy sigh.