Olga Tjukova Tjukova itibaren Pirwadi, Maharashtra, Indien
I thought this book was great. I loved the original concepts and couldn't put the book down, starting it yesterday and finishing it very late last night. The only thing I thought was a little strange was the first person, present tense style of writing. It felt awkward at times. Otherwise great original book! I even cried at one point in the book. I felt like the emotion of the moments were portrayed realistically. I thought the main characters were interesting and likable.
I'm currently reading this for research. It's very well written with fourteen stories of survival. I'm on story seven and enjoying it.
Maybe my two stars are harsh, but I was not a fan of this book and after reading it, I’m really surprised at all the positive reviews. Sparks is just becoming too cheesy for me to read and enjoy. It isn’t that I have anything against romance books, it’s that this book doesn’t have any substance in it and is very poorly written. The characters are bland and predictable, except for Kevin, who is so over dramatized, that I wanted to throw the book in the trash by the end. So Katie and Alex were suppose to be in love right? After seeing each other in the store a couple times, after Kristin takes to Katie for comfort, and then after a day at the beach together. Not such a great foundation to make me believe they can be in love. Did anybody else notice that every time Katie and Alex talked in the beginning, it mostly revolved around how great a dad Alex was? Or how busy his life must be? Geesh, mix it up a little bit Sparks. Josh, the boy, is suppose to be around the age of 7, but he didn’t act much like a 7 year old. More like a 10 year old. Jo’s character was something different, and I liked it. However, when she came into the restaurant and started in on her rant to Katie about how she doesn’t want her to “toy with his feelings”, I thought it went totally against her character. Not that she wouldn’t come out and be blunt about her feelings, but that she would accuse Katie instead of talking about it with her. Maybe asking a question like “do you plan on staying now? Have you thought about what would happen if you left? Do you love him and plan to marry him?” To me, that would have been more realistic then her coming in and pointing fingers right off the bat. Now on to Kevin. I guess Sparks was trying to vary off his normal book writing path and went for a suspense approach. It didn’t work for me and the last 100 pages were tough for me to get though. It is a fundamental move to write a story and demonize the bad guy, that way when he gets his, the reader feels happy about it instead of feeling sorry. In this story, I thought Sparks took that element way too far with Kevin. Why can’t Kevin just be a normal guy who is an asshole? Why add on top all these abnormal qualities that pushes his character to insanity in four month’s time? To me, Sparks was trying too hard and gave Kevin too many layers and it made his character very fake and the action super boring. The most stimulating part of this book was when the story of how Erin got away was told. I could have lived happy without reading the rest. I would not recommend this book, Sparks has done better.