The Year I Left
Christine Brae
Published by: Vesuvian Books
Publication date: August 20th 2019
Genres: Adult, Contemporary, Romance, Women’s Fiction
“A thousand half loves must be forsaken to take one whole heart home.”
Carin Frost doesn’t understand what’s happening to her. A confident businesswoman, wife, and mother, she begins to resent everything about her life. Nothing makes sense. Nothing makes her feel. Maybe it’s the recent loss of her mother in a tragic accident. Or maybe she’s just losing her mind.
Enter Matias Torres. As their new business partnership thrives, so does their friendship—and his interest in her. Carin is determined to keep her distance, until a work assignment sends them to Southeast Asia where a storm is brewing on the island. In the midst of the chaos, Matias asks her to do something unimaginable, exhilarating, BOLD. Carin knows the consequences could be dire, but it may be the only way to save herself.
An honest look at love and marriage and the frailties of the human heart, this is a story of a woman’s loss of self and purpose and the journey she takes to find her way back.
Author Bio:
Christine Brae is a senior executive with a full time career, who thought she could write a book about her life and then run away as far as possible from it. She never imagined that her words would touch the hearts of so many women with the same story to tell. Christine has written six books since her first release in 2013. She is the author of The Light in the Wound and His Wounded Light (2013), Insipid (2014), In This Life (2016) and Eight Goodbyes (2018).
Her latest book, The Year I Left is scheduled for release in August, 2019.
When not listening to the voices in her head or spending late nights at the office, Christine can be seen shopping for shoes and purses, running a half marathon or spending time with her husband and three children in Chicago.
Christine is represented by Italia Gandolfo of Gandolfo Helin & Fountain Literary Management.
My Review
Sometimes when I'm reviewing books I struggle to know where to start. I have to admit that The Year I Left is one of those times. The book tells the story of Carin and her dissatisfaction with life. She meets a younger man through work, who she is drawn to irresistibly and her life begins to unravel around her as she tries to find her way again.
I think part of my struggle with the review is not that I didn't enjoy the book, I did, but rather I didn't really like the main character. While I understood that she wasn't happy and felt for her feeling so trapped, there was also a lot that I didn't like and didn't really understand. I don't want to give away the things that happened in the course of the story, but on more than one occasion it was hard to understand why she acted the way that she did, or why she didn't just follow her heart without making a huge and drastic change.
The story is beautifully written and it was next to impossible to put down, particularly in the second part of the book. I couldn't see where it was going to go and how things were going to be resolved, which of course kept me turning the pages. The storyline as a whole is thought-provoking and I can certainly see what the author was doing, it was just a shame for me at least, that I couldn't relate to the main character and didn't really have a lot of sympathy for her. Having said that, I was left satisfied with the end of the story and did warm to her a little eventually.
This was a great read, it dragged you along, pushing your emotions all the way and I think was ultimately attempting to get you to question what was really important. I'd definitely recommend it.
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Great review, Kelly! This sounds like a beautifully written story, and despite not being able to relate to the MC it sounds like the story/plot itself was compelling.
ReplyDeleteThe cover looks beautiful!
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