Random Chit Chat

I just wanted to write this post really quick because I've been slacking a bit lately on some things and wanted to do a little update. First things first, I decided to give up the ghost on trying to finish that Instagram Photo Challenge. I only joined Instagram to try out the challenge, and I realized after awhile that I just don't mesh well with it. As much as I love taking photos, I was able to see that I'm not interested enough to take them on a daily basis. I feel sort of like a failure for admitting that but the truth is, I didn't care about Instagram before the Challenge (which is why I didn't have an account), I had to make myself care about (and remember) it while I was attempting the challenge, and now that I've abandoned it I still don't care about it. lol Beyond Facebook and Twitter for promoting ATV and watching TNTs, I don't care for social media. I think as websites and media in general became more intrusive, I pulled back. I forget about checking my Instagram the majority of the time, I only use Twitter for my other blog, and I only post occasionally on Facebook, but it's never anything personal. With that being said, me being me Instagram and daily photo challenges aren't my style. There are still gaps in my life in which there are no photos, but what I have noticed about myself throughout this process is that 1-I don't think I'm cut out to photograph every day of my life, 2-My life simply isn't interesting enough for me to want to photograph something every day, and 3-Things like daily photo challenges make you bare a little of yourself everyday and I realize that I'm not necessarily comfortable with that. It is what it is. Maybe if there was more going on in my life or I was a more open person in my private life this would be easier to do, but right now it's not my can of soda.


Secondly, I haven't forgotten about the Pinterest Project. I've fallen on hard times financially, and since I'm still living at home, the number of projects that I can take on is pretty narrow (limited to bedroom equipment) and many of them require me to buy a number of the supplies. January's wasn't that expensive and I already owned a lot of the supplies, but many of them require supplies that are out of my budget right now. Once my bills have been regulated again and I've got more cash to spare (or I can find cheaper projects to pin), I'll pick the project back up and make sure to do all of the months that I may have missed in between. The SBS is still up and running, as you've seen, so no worries there.


I'm still working on rolling out the changes and new reviews for the site, but as I mentioned earlier, hard financial times have caused me to pull in a little bit and this limits a lot of the new things that I can buy to review. I have a firm idea of exactly what will be reviewed on the site now and I'm just waiting for when I can fully redo the design. By the end of the year, all changes will be implemented and it'll be straight.


Well, I guess that's all for this little chit chat for now. I've got some computer game, PS3 game, makeup and app reviews waiting in the wings now, and everything's moving along. I know there's been a few more book reviews lately, but I'm part of two review programs on LibraryThing so I thought it'd be a good opportunity to simultaneously build up that portion of RRNT and fulfill my reviewing obligations for LT. I've also been pursuing a few sponsored opportunities from a few companies to see what I can scrounge up to review. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that I haven't fallen off....completely. lol I'm still here. If you have any ideas for things I can review, shoot me a comment and let me know!

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Book Review: Ros Clarke Romances

I received a copy of Ros Clarke Romances as part of LibraryThing's Members Giveaway. This book featured three short stories--Reckless Runaway at the Racecourse, The Tycoon's Convenient Wife, and Flirting with the Camera. Reckless Runaway at the Racecourse is about a restrained horse trainer who finds himself coming to the rescue of a more free-spirited young woman early in the story, then he finds himself stuck with her and over time, feelings change. The Tycoon's Convenient Wife brings a pair of old friends back together again for a marriage of convenience, although one friend has been harboring her love for the other for the past 15 years. And finally, Flirting with the Camera brings two people together in an industry obsessed with what's on the surface, but they force the other to look deeper at each other...and themselves...in order to break through to another level of personal growth.  

Image from Amazon

Reckless Runaway at the Racecourse--Instead of the male being the one in need of a grown-up wake up call, it was actually the female. I wasn’t completely fond of Fliss to be honest; she was flighty, rather immature, and too indecisive which led to her flip flopping on her feelings throughout the book. She ran quicker than the horse that nearly ran her over at the beginning of the story. I thought she was a bit too persistent for someone who was intent on not having any lasting connections, yet was still hurt by the fact that Luke didn’t want any either. Luke, despite being rigid, brought a steadier energy to what otherwise probably would have been an annoying read had they both been so quick to run. His presence in the novel ended up being just what Fliss needed to grow up and finally commit herself to something, which I liked as it is usually the female in that role. Her more light-hearted approach helped Luke to loosen his self-induced chains on himself and let someone into his life, and her more family-oriented ways helped him to begin letting his father in as well. I liked the stability Luke brought to the book, and the sense of freedom that she brought to it. They were exactly what the other needed, even if it took one more time than the other to realize and make peace with it. I read so many stories where it is the man who needs the reality check, the man who puts his foot in his mouth, and even though it was still annoying, it was nice to see that for once it was the female doing those things. It was the man in this story who was sure of what he wanted earlier on and battled his fears to have it. Opposites do attract and this story showed it well. I think the story was well-written and despite it being a bit of a short story, there was still adequate time for both characters to grow sufficiently.

Image from Amazon

The Tycoon’s Convenient Wife—I really liked Emma. She had a few moments where I wanted to shake her a little bit, but otherwise she was a really likeable heroine for this book. She was innocent in terms of not knowing just how good of a person she was, but was still womanly enough to stand on her own, she just didn’t realize it. I liked the growth she went through as the book progressed in terms of wanting something more for herself than her current level of existence, which had grown stagnant. I also like that despite her love for Guy, she didn’t become completely reliant upon him or expect him to bail her out of everything in her life. Guy was a bit lackluster for me; he had a very one-track mind even though I can understand how he got to that place. I really didn’t like that Emma used Ben’s accident and Guy being there all week as something to throw in his face; that was a low blow. It seemed like it went against her character and was just a shoo-in for some convenient conflict. The main thing that stuck out for me as being a little unrealistic is the concept of having to fake a marriage simply for the sake of one business account, regardless of how large a coup it would be. I also don’t know that a businessman as important as Tripp Bailey would concern himself enough with the personal life of others to call him in the middle of the day about the latter’s feelings (or lack thereof) for his fake fiancée. Family oriented or not, I just can’t see the fate of a business deal that large hinging upon a person’s ability to read his fake spouse. All in all though, I liked the story. You got a good feel for the characters, their motivation and the reasons why they are the people they are, and it makes sense. The story was allowed to build gradually instead of rushing to a finish and I liked that.

Image from Amazon

Flirting with the Camera—At first, Hattie’s inability to be serious grated on my nerves, until I was able to see why she became that way, why she put on such an act for others. Her flippant, unaffected attitude disguised a perceptive and sensitive nature, and I like that she was layered that way. She wasn’t a typical empty-headed brat or an uptight control freak, and that was a breath of fresh air. I also really loved that she was plus-size. Many heroines are either tiny in stature/frame or average-sized, and “just right” for the hero. Hattie was a different shape entirely, was completely confident in it, and that too was “just right,” which I thought was great. Neither of them needed to come to terms with her size and it wasn’t a focal point of the plot like it ends up being in many stories. It was an enjoyable change of pace that instead of simply avoiding commitment because he’d been cheated on or because it just wasn’t his style like many other men in these kinds of novels, Tom was carrying a massive amount of guilt that held him back. He was rather bland, which I think could have been explored more so that we could see a little more of the man behind the camera. What I did like was that he wasn’t a CEO of some anonymous big-wig business; he was an in-demand photographer for the modeling industry and instead of glamorizing Tom’s work conditions; some of the real was explored and I enjoyed it. I just wish I could have gotten to know Tom a bit more beyond his past guilt. 

Overall:

I liked this trio of stories. I think they were all well-written, with fleshed-out characters who all had motivations and behaviors that made sense considering their past situations. Ros Clarke managed to cover a lot of ground in all of these short stories and made the small amount of time seem much longer, which allowed for a more thorough story to me. Each story brought something different to the table and I was glad I wasn’t reading the same story or plot repeatedly. The only complaint I guess I’d have is that we didn’t get to see what happened after these couples got their wishes; they all ended just as proposals were being made. I would have liked to see how Emma and Guy got on with the kids after moving and how Emma and Marilyn made their partnership work. It would have been nice to see how Hattie and Tom came together during her pregnancy and seeing Hattie really let her guard down, knowing Tom wasn’t going to humiliate or leave her. I think each of the stories had something left in them that I would have liked to read. I enjoyed each story and was sad when I got to the end. If you're a fan of romance stories that don't ramble on forever and have a more realistic, everyday approach and characters, then I recommend giving this book a read. Intimate situations do occur, but they're more racy than erotic and not the focal point of any of these stories. 

Rating:

If you'd like to download this collection yourself, here's where you can pick it up:

Amazon ($4.99) | Smashbooks ($4.99)

You can click the book links if you'd like to buy just one of them, but it's cheaper just to get all three. 

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Subscription Box Series Month 3: Love with Food

For the third month of this series, I wanted to go with a different kind of box. I've only tried beauty boxes for as long as I've been ordering them, and it was only a few months ago that I found out just how little I'd scratched the surface on the world of subscription boxes. I've been checking out some other boxes for awhile, and I decided to go with Love with Food for March. 

I've gotten a few culinary goodies in previous boxes, all from Birchbox I believe, so I wanted to try something that was completely food-related. I also chose this box because each box purchase equals a donation of meals to various food banks like Share Our Strength and Feeding America Network. So not only do you get a box for a great price, you also donate to help put an end to child hunger. I think this resonated with me a little more because although I was definitely not a starved child growing up, I did grow up a little faster than I should have due to certain circumstances and had more than a few nights where I wondered where our next meal would come from. So it's cool to be in a position now where even though I don't have a lot to give, I'm still giving something to help at least one child from wondering the same thing. But anywhoodle, let's get to the box.

I ordered this box back on the 27th but wasn't billed for it until the 1st, and when my order was complete the website informed me of both the billing and shipment date, which was the 10th. I received the box three days later, when my postwoman unceremoniously dumped the box at my porch and dipped. Not in my mailbox, but on the porch. Wtf. LOL Despite that though, everything arrived in good shape. Nothing was broken, bent or torn. I'd never tried half of these things before so I was pretty excited to get to them. Here's what I got:

1. Wai Lana Cassava Chips in Sea Salt and Vinegar, $19.99 for 12 1oz. bags 

I'm not a fan of salt and vinegar potato chips so I wasn't really looking forward to trying these, but they reminded me of Lay's Air Pops so I gave them a go. I first tried these when I was sick and my tastebuds were incredibly sensitive so the intensity of the vinegar nearly made me jump out of my window lol, but after I got a little better I tried them again and they weren't so bad. The flavor strength seems to increase with the more chips you eat; the flavor's pretty mute if you only have a couple. The cassava was a nice texture too; I think I actually prefer it to potato chips. The bag is sturdier than regular chip bags and even though there was a decent amount of air in the bag, you still get a decent amount of chips. 

2. Walkers Shortbread Fingers Twin Pack, $24.99 for 24 twin packs

These are some great cookies. They taste like shortbread but they're not heavy on butter or sugar; they're light but solid and still pretty tasty. This package has two fingers in it and I really liked them. I love shortbread cookies; they're filling and I don't feel the need to have 17 of them in one sitting. They're also not as sweet as chocolate chip or one of my latest cookie obsessions, brownie-filled chocolate chip. These cookies were light on the palate, were a suitable snack, and tasted great. No complaints. 

3. Taylors of Harrogate Earl Grey Tea, $14.99 for 30 sachets

I was down for the count last week with another case of the sicks but I kid you not, I'd had some tea earlier in the same day that I'd received my box and it ended up knocking out the rest of the sore throat I'd been dealing with all week. I didn't get to drink it while it would have actually done me some good. lol I'll update this when I've tried it. 

4. Chimes Ginger Chews, $10.99 for 50 chews

I don't care for ginger. So much like the chips, I wasn't looking to try these either. Maybe it's because I don't like ginger, but I honestly hated these things. There was a powdery coating on the outside and it's very chewy and soft. I just didn't like the taste. If you like gingerbread though, these chews would be great for you. They have a little heat, a little spiciness, and there's an undertone of sweet. I think if I liked ginger, I'd have been fine with these chews. But I don't, so I wasn't. 

5. Pierrot Gourmand Lollipop in Milky Apricot, $12.99 for 20 pops in assorted flavors

I'm not a super huge fan of apricot, but I kind of liked this lollipop. The sweetness of the apricot combined with the smoothness of the milk put me in the mind of a sherbet, like the orange Push Pops that were around when I was a kid. It had to grow on me, but I liked it. It wasn't overwhelmingly sweet and thankfully didn't taste like milk. I shudder to think of a milk-flavored lollipop. LOL 

6. Desert Gardens Taco & Burrito Seasoning, $14.99 for 10 packages

This has to win the award for 'most random' item in any of the subscription boxes I have ever received. I've never received or heard of someone else receiving taco and burrito seasoning before, so when I saw this it tickled me to no end. So I'm easily amused. Sue me. Anyway, I tried this out with hamburger meat and I'm glad I read the directions because these aren't your regular 'sprinkle all over meat' seasonings; you have to combine the seasoning packet with 3oz. of water and let it sit for 3 minutes, then pour the mixture over your meat. The amount of liquid you end up with goes a long way; I'd suggest using this for larger amounts of meat. I was making quesadillas the night I used this and it gave the meat some good coloring and some good spice action, but it wasn't anything special. It had a subtle heat but wasn't too spicy or overwhelming so if you don't like your food too hot, this would be just fine for you and you won't have to add anything extra except maybe some salt. I prefer my stuff hot though and have had more flavoring with the spices I normally use, so would I buy this again? Nah. But it was good to try out. 

7. Vintage Italia Pasta Chips in Marinara, $4.49 for one bag, $36.79 for a case of 12

I really wasn't looking forward to trying these. My taste preferences aren't all that adventurous and that extends to potato chips. I thought these would be some overwhelming mess of tomato-flavored crackers so I was trying my hardest to delay trying these at all. I wanted a snack earlier though, so I bit the bullet and tried 'em out. And you know what, I like 'em. I wouldn't get one of the larger bags as they can be a little intense if you have a lot, the smaller bag for me was just fine. There was a good amount of air in the bag, but there was also a good amount of chips, so I didn't feel like I got robbed. The seasonings weren't overdone and the flavor was subtle yet still hit the mark. They were pretty good alongside a burger, too. lol They kind of remind me of the pizza flavored Pringles, minus all of the seasoning dust and greasiness. The style of chip they made these with was perfect for the seasonings; it puts me in the mind of the thin crust pizzas. I dug 'em. 

8. Emmy's Organics Chai Spice Macaroons, $19.99 for 10 packages of 3 macaroons apiece

I liked these a lot. These are made from raw ingredients and they're both vegan and gluten-free. If you're not familiar with those kinds of foods you'd assume that these would be tasteless but oh my goodness. Even though there are only 3 in the bag, I can't eat them all at once. They're still very sweet despite that and damn if they don't taste just like chai. Calling these chai bites would have been pretty accurate as I didn't get a macaroon flavor from them at all. The coconut is more of a filler ingredient as the cinnamon and chai flavors are more dominant. They're a bit greasy, but I loved them. I think they'll make for a better treat mid-day than say chips or my usual, chocolate. I believe I'm getting old; I'm actually looking for healthier snacks. Damn this maturity. 

Fave: Emmy's Organics Chai Spice Macaroons / Walkers Shortbread Fingers
These were tied for me because I thought the macaroons were friggin' amazing and I have every intention of buying more at a later date, and the same goes for the shortbread cookies. Both of these make for a very tasty snack that's healthy, portable and well-priced for the amount you receive.

Dud: Chimes Ginger Chews / Wai Lana Cassava Chips in Sea Salt & Vinegar

It has nothing to do with the candy itself. I just don't like ginger. It has nothing to do with the chips as well because I actually liked the cassava chips and how they tasted; but I don't like salt and vinegar seasonings. These are only duds due to personal preference, not because they weren't made well. 

Overall:

My experience with Love with Food was a good one. It takes about two weeks from the time of ordering to receive your box, everything comes in good shape, and you get your $10 worth in terms of the number of items you get per box. Signing up for, finding out about, and cancelling the subscription are all fairly easy, as is shopping for any of the items you received in your box. You get a product card with your box which is good for future reference or just keeping track, and there's also a few coupons at the bottom. I got a whole box of items and products I'd never heard of and enjoyed the majority, so the goal was met. It's an added bonus to know that this company and your contributions also help put an end to childhood hunger. No complaints with this box or service at all. 

Rating: 

My money was well spent on products of great quality and I wasn't robbed in quantity, either. Love with Food is Mandy approved!

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TV Review: Resurrection

Tonight was the series premiere of Resurrection on ABC, and I've been looking forward to watching this since I first heard about it being added to the mid-season lineup.

The plot for the show mainly asks the question, "What if you got a second chance with someone you've lost?" as the deceased find their way back to their relatives in Arcadia, Missouri. The first episode centered on a little boy named Jacob, who'd died 32 years prior in a drowning accident. He wakes up in a rice paddy in Japan and with the help of Det. Bellamy (Omar Epps), he finds his way back to Arcadia and his bewildered parents. Jacob died in what everyone thought was a simple accident in which he'd fallen in the river and dragged downstream with the current, but the newly rediscovered child explains that he did fall in the river and ended up drowning, but he fell in trying to rescue his aunt. Everyone assumed that the aunt died saving Jacob, but the reappearance of the boy combined with his explanation of that day throws everything that Arcadia believed into question. Throughout the episode, we see just how intertwined the town is. Jacob's cousin Maggie, a baby at the time of Jacob's death, ends up being the doctor to conduct Jacob's check-up after he returns. She was there the day of the accident but of course being too young doesn't remember anything. Her mother Barbara was married to Jacob's uncle, who is the town sheriff, and his best friend now the town pastor. As the truth about what happened to Jacob begins to emerge, so do other long-hidden secrets and skeletons. At the end of the episode, Maggie's friend Elaine has a visitor of her own to contend with--her deceased father. We'd been seeing bits and pieces of him throughout the episode, but we were never told exactly what he was doing there. Now we know, and that's where next week's episode will begin.

My thoughts: 

Insanity's balls this first episode was intense. I'm blaming it on PMS, but within the first 20 minutes of the show, I was on the brink of tears. This happened twice within the hour. This show covered such a gamut of emotions, all of them so realistic to the situation. At first thought, you would think that if a departed relative came back, all you would feel is happiness. But then you really think about it. This is someone you saw after they'd died, someone that you'd buried and grieved for. Living without them has become a reality for you. Then bam, they suddenly turn back up? It's a lot to take in, and Kurtwood Smith did a wonderful job of showing that with Jacob's reappearance. He had a hard time reconciling the image of the child he'd buried with the child who showed up at his doorstep and contrary to first thought, he wasn't exactly happy. Frankly, he had mixed feelings, and with good reason. He had become accustomed to living with the knowledge that his son was dead for the past 32 years, and now he's being asked to take all of it back on the spot. Which brings me to another point; on this show the way the person was when they died is the way they come back. Jacob died an 8-year-old boy, and that's who he was when he returned to Arcadia 3 decades later. Unfortunately, his once young parents are now older, a parallel I thought they did an amazing job of showing when Jacob took off running and his dad attempted to keep up with him. It was a painful reminder that even though the boy is the same, his parents and the world around him are not. Jacob's mother took him to church, where his childhood best friend is now the preacher. To watch him explaining the phenomenon of miracles while he was staring at one, I swear I thought I saw the boy in his eyes again, longing for his friend and what had been lost. How terrifying must this entire situation be for someone, to suddenly return to a family they weren't aware they'd left, with no sense of time or how much of it had passed. I really had never thought that far into it; I just knew that I'd love to reunite with my grandma. This show made me consider all of the things I'd left out of my thought process before and while I still love the idea of it, it's about so much more than just seeing them again. Maggie, Jacob's cousin, thought there might be something, no matter how far-fetched, to Jacob's story and as it turns out, there was, but I won't spoil it. She'd been talking to her friend Elaine (Samaire Armstrong) throughout the episode, and at the end she and her friend got irrefutable proof that strange things were definitely going on, as Elaine's father returned. 

Overall:

This show is crazy intense. To me, anyway. I think it's a really solid show, with an equally formidable cast and I like that it's not a smorgasbord of huge name actors. The concept holds weight and it's done in a way that's different from a  "Once Upon a Time"/"Charmed" type of show. Right now, nobody understands what's going on or how these things are happening, but the biggest question for the citizens of Arcadia at this point is probably who's going to be next. Somehow the plot still manages to have a bit of realism, which sounds rather impossible to do when talking about bringing deceased people back to life, but it does. Instead of the la-di-da, ride off into the sunset sort of happiness, there are honest and raw feelings. Disbelief, anger, lack of understanding, denial, and questions. Lots of them. I do have a couple of complaints; in one scene after Jacob returns his mother is making him a grilled cheese sandwich, but the camera angle was wide enough to show that there was clearly nothing on the griddle at the time that food was being 'made.' I'm fully aware that many times there's no real cooking being done during scenes; my complaint has everything to do with the camera angle and nothing to do with the food. My second complaint is that at the end of the episode when Elaine's father comes back, it's supposed to be pouring rain, yet nobody standing outside is wet. I live in a city where the rain is weird; you can be on one side of the street and stuck in a downpour, but cross the street and be bone-dry. I'm familiar with dry pockets during a storm. There were 5 people outside during this storm, though, and not a single one of them had so much as a drop in their hair. I am guessing that the rain was digitally added into the scene, but it just wasn't realistic. It added some drama in a  "It was a dark and stormy night..." kind of way, but everyone in the scene was dry. These are rather small complaints, but I notice these things. As far as the cast, the plot and the actual episodes go though, this series is going to be awesome. I can't wait for next week. I remember describing this as a "Ghost Whisperer" in reverse kind of show, but I can see that it's going to be so much more than that. 

Will I be watching next week? Hell yes and I recommend you give it a go, too. 

Rating:

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Book Review: The Good Enough Husband

I received this book in exchange for a review as part of the Early Reviewers program on LibraryThing. This romantic novel by Sylvie Fox features an almost 40 year old woman named Hannah on the cusp of making a big life decision. While en route from Orange County to her intended destination of Oregon, a case of puppy motion sickness forces her to stop in a small town along the California coast, where she meets town vet Ben. Ben is everything Hannah feels her life should be about, everything her current life is missing, except there's one little complication: Hannah has not yet told her husband that she wants a divorce and Ben is unaware that she is technically still married. Her decisions during this time end up affecting everyone and teaching them a thing or two about their families and making peace with those who have hurt them.

To be honest, I found Hannah to be selfish and quite cowardly for much of the book and I just couldn't find much sympathy for her. She created her own problems, way before meeting Ben, and she continued to create more problems and involve more people in them instead of making things right before moving on. So many of her problems could have been avoided by just putting everything out there, yet she chose not to. While I understood some of her decisions, like her reasons for getting married, I still thought she could have made smarter decisions. Instead of trying to save her marriage, she selfishly decided that because she was done, it was done too but neglected to tell Michael any of that. Michael was no saint and wasn't all that likable himself, but both he and Ben got the short end of the stick where Hannah was concerned. Despite knowing how badly Ben had been burned, both by his father and his ex-wife, Hannah continued to let her lies sit between them and chose to keep allowing him to believe that she was the only bit of honesty in his life. Instead of dealing with any of her problems head-on, Hannah ran from them. It took her hurting both Michael and Ben and getting pregnant before I saw substantial growth from her. Unfortunately, the book ended before we could see this growth really being put to use in her relationship with Ben. 

Despite the fact that I didn't really find any of the characters very likable, there were a number of things I enjoyed about the book. Firstly, I sort of enjoyed that I couldn't fully get behind any one character. Usually I don't like that, I want to find my sort of ally in the story, someone that I can get behind and root for. I couldn't do that with this book, but it worked for the content. It was real. Everyone was flawed, in a big way, and the reality of it is that that's how the world works. Most of us are flawed, in a big way. Nobody's perfect and many of us make insanely shitty decisions. Many of us shut down, preferring our judgments about others based on past experiences to keep us company instead of actual people, like Ben did. Many of us love the idea of something but aren't ready to really love it because we're too self-involved, like Michael. And many of us still end up making situations we're in worse before they get any better, like Hannah did. You could even push that to the extended family. Many of our grandmas (and grandpas) or hell maybe even parents stayed with their spouse after they cheated. Many of those who cheated ended up creating an illegitimate child. And many still will stay afterward, out of obligation like Ben's parents or because they realized they loved their spouse. Too many of us know people like Michael's parents, judgmental folks from 'the old days' who don't venture outside a circle of people who look, think and behave as they do. Hannah's problem, marrying out of loneliness/comfort rather than love, is a common one for women who seem to keep missing out on real love, so I couldn't fault her there. Hell, I've contemplated doing the same thing a time or two myself. I understand needing time to get away from the problem, my problem with that is that Hannah's mind was made up when she left and I think she should have explained that instead of running from it. Even though I didn't like many of her decisions and spent a lot of the time facepalming myself over them, sadly they too were pretty realistic. They were stupid as hell no doubt, but none of them were things I’d never heard before.  

I also liked that Hannah was half Black but it wasn't stereotypically weaved into the larger plot of the story. I appreciated that Ben and his family saw her, not her color. Most of the time when there's an interracial romance in novels, someone always mentions that "I prefer black women" or "I don't usually date black women" and I can't remember how many times I've been reading a book and one of the parents innocently comments, "Oh, so-and-so's never brought home a black man/woman before," as if it was some new toy and not a person. I also enjoyed that after awhile, Hannah finally came around and allowed herself to grow a little bit. I say ‘a little bit’ loosely because she continued to make ridiculously stupid decisions for almost the entire book. Unfortunately, that bit of growth came after she'd already hurt both Ben and Michael and ended up pregnant, but this proves that it's never too late to grow. Ben grew some as well; as much as Hannah's betrayal hurt him, I think it set the wheels in motion for him to look at his family situation in a new light and stop being so closed off. I won't say Michael grew per se because just as I was about to say that he had, he'd do something completely ridiculous and change my mind, but he did have moments in which he showed that he truly grasped what was going on.

There were a couple of spots in the book that could have used some continuity. In one scene towards the beginning, Hannah and Ben are in the car, but about a paragraph or two after setting the scene, Hannah's dipping her toe into some water. Now unless there's a leak in the footrest, I don't think there should be any water in the car. Throughout the book, Michael's stance on Hannah's singing changes a few times. He starts out in the book as being the one to have killed her dreams, saying they weren't practical. Later, he was the only one of his family who didn't think her dreams were dumb and made a grand gesture that made Hannah remember who she'd married, then he was back to not supporting her dreams. His stance changed depending on how he was supposed to be seen at that time, whether it was in a good or bad light. It wasn't consistent and I think this affected how I saw him overall, because at the end of it I wasn't quite sure what to make of him. I didn't like that we weren't able to see what came of Hannah and Ben; he came to her in Copenhagen but the events after their reunion are where the real work for their relationship would have kicked in. I would have liked to see that. Some of the scene changes as well as the ending felt rather rushed and this was a little jarring for me, but otherwise I'm glad I read this book. I like that it wasn't a perfect romance and didn't have this perfect neat little ending. I wish it wasn’t so rushed, but with such an imperfect situation there really was no way to end it neatly with the way everything unfolded without flipping the script entirely.

Rating:

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Quick Update: March Photo Challenge

We're already in the 3rd month of the Instagram Photo Challenge! I'm still missing some photos from February, but it's not entirely my fault. lol Some of it, I've been slacking. But the other half, my phone memory finally conked out on me and I couldn't take any more photos because they weren't saving to the phone, so I had to buy another memory card. That alone took almost two weeks, so I'm missing a lot of photos. I'll be playing catch-up tomorrow and posting all the photos I missed. In case you're not following me and my misadventures with a camera yet, you can follow me here. This month's challenge is from Fat Mum Slim, as the other two were, and here is the daily list:

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