Hi there and welcome to my stop on the HOLDING ON FOREVER blog tour sponsored by YA Bound Book Tours. For other stops on the tour click here. Today’s book is a New Adult romance by Cecilia Robert.

Book Summary:
Liese is finally moving on with Frey by her side. But sometimes letting go is the hardest part, and trusting is a risk one has to take. In between her practicum and spending time with Frey whenever he is town, she fights her insecurities, and wins. Then something happens and Frey’s priorities momentarily shift, making her second guess their relationship. Suddenly, going back to their former best friends status has never looked so appealing.

Frey’s life has never shined so bright now that Liese is his. But there is a part of him that is shrouded by memories he’d rather have them buried where no one can touch them.  Not even him. But even buried memories and people can’t stay hidden for forever. What Liese doesn’t know is that Frey isn’t about to let go so easily, and he will throw in everything he’s got to stop her from leaving him. He has waited an eternity for her. Giving her up is not an option.

My Review:

This short novel is the sequel to TRULY MADLY DEEPLY YOU, which I have not read. Still, it can be read alone. It picks up with Liese and Frey already in serious with each other. This may not sound odd, but Liese and Frey are childhood friends. They are young (about 24 each I’d say) yet have suffered deep personal losses. Liese had a miscarriage and lost her husband after a terrible car wreck two years prior. She has tremendous abandonment issues, as a result.

Frey’s parents died in a Christmas Day fire ten years ago and his only brother died in duty five years ago–so they’ve suffered. Unfortunately, I didn’t really sense this in the book.

Here’s Why:  At first I thought the pacing was off. That everything happened too slowly for me to really agonize about the characters, but as I read on I realized that the tension was the problem.

As soon as anything remotely dangerous or upsetting occurred, it got dealt with. When Frey went MIA for a few weeks Liese barely got anxious. She didn’t go alcoholic, or turn her house into a Monument of OCD behavior; she spent some nights at her parent’s house and talked to her therapist about her feelings. Then, when he called she tried to break up with him. The rapid transition was very superficial–it never gave me a chance to really get into Liese’s head and feel her pain, so I couldn’t connect with her abandonment, or her worry, or her…anything.

Likewise with Frey–he thinks his brother’s dead for FIVE YEARS. Then one night he gets a call from his brother’s cell number. First, I’m sure people update their cell phones more often than that. If he’d gotten a new phone, I’d imagine he’d have deleted his bro’s contact info…amiright? But, that aside, his brother shows up–alive–and after a brief confrontation they go to Frey’s house. End of chapter.

So, my biggest complaint of the story was a complete lack of emotional resonance. There was no pitch and roll, no “Will they, or Won’t they?” heartstring tug that made me stay up too, too late and show up to work the next day groggy with a book hangover.

My second biggest issue was with setting. I didn’t learn where this story happened until page 50. The book is clearly written by a “Queens English” speaker–meaning the grammar and diction is that of a subject of the Crown, not a gal from Queens, NY–and I’ve read an unGodly amount of British authors who apply their familiar speech and colloquialisms to characters in, say, Texas. Or, New York. Or, some other distinctive US locale wherein persons would never, for example, “have a row” or discuss how “smartly” a woman dresses. Those Brit-isms are rampant throughout the manuscript, so I kept waiting for the London references and crossing my fingers were weren’t going to take a ride up the Empire State Building. Turns out the setting was Vienna, Austria. I’d not known anything about Vienna–and have learned little more than areas within the city are called “Districts”. I’d have loved a bit more immersion into this destination.

Interested in HOLDING ON FOREVER? You can find it at Barnes and Noble and Amazon.

About the Author

Cecilia Robert  writes YA, NA and Adult. Her motto: Passion rules. She enjoys writing stories about people finding love in the most unexpected of places, and also about people finding their true purpose in life coupled with adventurous journeys, whether it’s urban, fantasy, sci-fi, contemporary or paranormal romance. There’s always a happy ever after, no matter how long it takes for the characters to get there. When she’s not working in her full time job, she dons her supermom cape, or in most cases find herself trapped between the pages of a book in search for a hero who’ll make her swoon with just a look or a word. Her favourite form of therapy is knitting. Best. Therapy. Ever.

You can find Cecilia on her blog, Goodreads, twitter, Facebook or Pinterest.

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