Promise Me Spoiler Free Review

Promise Me

by Kelly Walker

Release Date: January 23rd, 2018

Synopsis:

Self-professed Harry Potter addict and math genius River Jacobsen can count on one hand the people who matter in her life. Really, it’s just Dean, the boy who loves her despite her odd habit of counting everything around her when she needs to quiet her mind. When Dean promises her forever she never imagines it will be a lie. 

After Marine hacker Ian Maclean is mistakenly declared dead by the US government, he’s happy to correct them the moment he escapes captivity. He wants nothing more than to get home to the wife he left behind. Discovering she’s been cheating on him since the moment he deployed wasn’t in the plan. Devastated, he walks away from everything, even his name. 

With the futures they were counting on destroyed, Ian and River find themselves starting over. Ian reminds River of things she’d much rather forget, but pushing him away is harder than she expected. Ian wants a second chance at happily ever after, but the more he gets to know River, the more he worries she isn’t trying to figure out how to live again, she’s figuring out how to die. 

My Thoughts:

I received a copy from Netgalley

I gave this book 4 stars. Holy crap this book had an amazing plot. I didn’t want to stop reading once I really got into it. 

I have to admit I felt a bit cheated near the end. There was a confrontation I was so looking forward to, but it ended up being very anticlimactic and we never really got to see it happen. I really wish the author had included it.

I also wish that I had been warned that this contained characters from the authors Chadwell Hearts series. I was a bit confused about some of the characters like I was supposed to know all about them already but didn’t. I would have appreciated at least a warning so I could have read those other books first. In a way, it sort of spoiled a lot of what happened in that series, so if you haven’t read that series yet and you plan to, then read them before this one.

I loved River. I could relate to River. River spends a lot of time crying and reading Harry Potter. The only thing unrelatable about her is that she likes Professor Snape and is good at math. 

As a love interest, Ian is a good guy, but I wasn’t particularly wowed by him. I really enjoyed his plotline, but again, his personality wasn’t enough for me to forget about every other book boyfriend. I also can’t get behind his nickname being Ghost. It just doesn’t fit with his appearance or personality. I just don’t see it.

I’m glad that the author didn’t stick with the trope of the dead husband/boyfriend secretly being horrible and the protagonist finds out about it after they die. I hate that trope and I’m glad this wasn’t the case in this book.

If you love NA romances then I would 100% recommend this one to you. It has every mark of a good NA novel.

Top 5 Romances

Now since I’ve read a lot of romance novels of every shape and size, I decided to make this easier on myself and just make the list books of contemporary settings. No fantasy and no historical. Also, no YA, just plain romance. So you won’t be seeing Wolfsong or Kresley Cole’s IAD series. This was also honestly the hardest list to write because I had it narrowed down to about 8 books and I just couldn’t figure it out.

5. Fear Me

I have a weakness for darker romances and man this book checks that box. I love Kieran and Lake and I’ve reread this book about 10 billion times. I love it.

4. Hideaway

This was an instant love. I loved everything about this book, I even read it about 3 times in the first month of its release and I’ve probably already read it about 15 times as a whole.

3. Scandal Never Sleeps

This book is full of scandal as the title suggests and the romance is very sexy. I’m addicted to not only this book but this series.

2. Hopeless

This is old school Colleen Hoover and still to this day remains my favorite of her works. I love her writing style and her characters, it’s impossible not to fall in love along with them.

1. The Secret of Ella and Micha

This has been a favorite of mine since the beginning of time. I love them and I love their love. I read this maybe 6  years ago and I still love it. 

What are some of your favorite romances?

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The Peer and the Puppet Cover Reveal

Time for the cover reveal of B. B. Reid's latest novel! This book will be coming out on February 13th, 2018

Genre: New Adult, Romance

Synopsis:

THE PUPPET

Borrow the bike. Win the race. Collect the cash. It should’ve been an easy job. Ran out of town with a broken leg and a lawsuit, my mother’s latest flame swoops in like a knight in gilded armor. Blackwood Keep is a place I don’t belong, and I’m not the only one who knows. To the boy across the hall, my savior’s only son, I’m a stray looking for a bone.

He’s lord of the manor.

King of the academy. 

And number one on my shit list.  

THE PEER

I have no intentions of becoming a happy family with the social climber and her wild daughter. A bottle of Jameson and a cracked skull gets my problem shipped to reform school, but I didn’t bank on her returning. 

Four’s out to get even, and she almost had the perfect plan: expose the privileged kid moonlighting as a gangbanger. She’s smart, but she’ll have to be smarter. Sending her away won’t be good enough this time. I’m going to have to tame the little troublemaker. To the girl across the hall, the one without a name, I’m nothing without my silver spoon. 

She’s lady of the trailer park.

Queen of the swamps. 

And my new favorite pastime.

Cover:

Teasers:

Sunday Favorites: The Sea of Tranquility

I'm actually horrible at doing these Sunday Favorites, however, I like doing them. This week we are going to go all the way back to 2014 when I initially read The Sea of Tranquility.

In case you're curious, here is the synopsis:

Former piano prodigy Nastya Kashnikov wants two things: to get through high school without anyone learning about her past and to make the boy who took everything from her—her identity, her spirit, her will to live—pay.
Josh Bennett’s story is no secret: every person he loves has been taken from his life until, at seventeen years old, there is no one left. Now all he wants is be left alone and people allow it because when your name is synonymous with death, everyone tends to give you your space.
Everyone except Nastya, the mysterious new girl at school who starts showing up and won’t go away until she’s insinuated herself into every aspect of his life. But the more he gets to know her, the more of an enigma she becomes. As their relationship intensifies and the unanswered questions begin to pile up, he starts to wonder if he will ever learn the secrets she’s been hiding—or if he even wants to.
The Sea of Tranquility is a rich, intense, and brilliantly imagined story about a lonely boy, an emotionally fragile girl, and the miracle of second chances.

The Sea of Tranquility is an NA novel, the only novel that Katja Millay has ever written and I would like to say before anything else that I would love to read more of her writing. This book was so completely full of soul that it was impossible not to get sucked in. It was heartbreaking at times, I may have actually cried because of how sad it was, but it was worth every tear I shed. The book was a reawakening of sorts. You have to get through all the heartache and hope that you will be better on the other side.

I first discovered this book, believe it or not, from another romance novel. The characters from More Than This by Jay McLean were talking about it and freaking out about the last two words in the book. Obviously, this got me incredibly curious. Stupidly, the first thing I did once I had a copy of this book was read the last two words. I had no idea what their significance was, obviously, since I hadn't read the book yet. It actually didn't even make sense to me until that last scene when it was completely transparent.

Nastya and Josh have a beautiful little relationship. They both have terrible backstories that have shaped who they are, but they find solace in each other. They see something in each other that resonates deep within. I feel like this is one of those books where the characters are very flawed and live pretty realistic lives and that's why the novel hits so close to home because nothing about it is impossible.

The writing itself is spellbinding. We get gems from the story like this:

I live in a world without magic or miracles. A place where there are no clairvoyants or shapeshifters, no angels or superhuman boys to save you. A place where people die and music disintegrates and things suck. I am pressed so hard against the earth by the weight of reality that some days I wonder how I am still able to lift my feet to walk.

If that one quote doesn't have you interested in the book than I don't know what will. Maybe the fantastic characters, maybe the premise of the story itself. And I have to say, the characters are jarringly vulnerable at times. We really get to the heart of who they are, and I hate to sound like a broken record because I say this all the time, but they are relatable!

This was one of the few books that I read an ebook of and decided that I had to have a physical copy of it. I don't usually do that unless I absolutely loved the book. I really do hope I've convinced you to give this beautiful piece of literature a read, I swear by this book.

Have you ever read The Sea of Tranquility? If so how did you feel about it?

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