Play Book Tag discussion

I’ve read and really enjoyed some of other books by this author, so I was very disappointed with this one. I didn’t know anything about the plot before I picked it up, but having read it, I just wasn’t a fan of the premise of the book. Emma marries her high-school sweetheart Jesse when they are in their early 20s, but Jesse is killed in a helicopter crash on their first wedding anniversary. Emma then moves back to the area she grew up, and some years later runs into Sam, an old friend, who she then falls in love with. A couple of years after this, Emma and Sam are engaged, when it turns out Jesse isn’t dead. He survived the helicopter crash and somehow managed to swim an incredible distance to safety. Jesse then comes back into Emma’s life, and she is forced to choose between him and Sam. The writing was very simplistic and the plot felt very lazy, suing so many different tropes that it was not at all original. The love triangle led me to feel not sorry for Emma as I think I was supposed to, but to think that she was incredibly selfish. I wish I had not bothered to read this book, but it is at least now off my TBR.

Wow - Great review. I've been on the fence with this one, and will probably delete from my TBR. Life is too short to read lazy writing.

I thought it was OK, but It’s definitely not her best work. I think I read it for the authors challenge a couple years ago. The main thing I liked about it is that it reminded me of 2 classic comedy films about a wife lost at sea who returns just as her husband is getting married, Doris Day and Cary Grant were two of the stars. This book isn’t funny though.

I’ve enjoyed a couple of her novels too but will avoid this one. It sounds pretty reminiscent of her debut novel (Forever Interrrupted) where a newly wed dies … except he really does die. Much hand wringing and melodrama and navel gazing.