The Life She Wants by Robyn Carr Release Date: September 27, 2016 Publisher: MIRA Stand Alone Number of pages: 352 Kindle Source: MCL Contemporary Fiction/Chick Lit Rating: R Read 3/23/17 to 3/25/17
I am a huge fan of Robyn Carr’s Virgin River and Thunder Point series. I have found with her stand-alone books I find her storytelling more hit and miss. This wasn’t a favorite of mine. It is an interesting story but I just didn’t connect with the characters.
There is so much bitterness between Emma and Riley. Where I understand that their “feud” has more to do with hurt feelings than anything else, I find it hard to believe all of their loved ones don’t realize that fact. Why would Emma still be hung up on Jock 16 years later? Of course she was more hurt by Riley’s actions than anything else. It got to the point of being annoying.
Riley was not a pleasant woman. She went through some stuff when she was just becoming an adult but it was far past time for her to get over her issues. She is so self-centered she doesn’t realize how her attitude is affecting all those she loves. She’s not a bad person. Riley does many great things for a lot of people. But when it comes to her more personal issues she is not flexible at all. Thankfully she is called out on this late in the book and does start to change a bit. Unfortunately it was a bit late for me. I just couldn’t root for her.
There is a totally throw away character that seems like he’ll be an interesting addition to the story but his story line just seems to fizzle out. He has some important things to contribute, but we didn’t really need to get to know this character in order for him to do his job in regards to the story. It was confusing to me in the sense that I kept waiting for something more to happen with him.
I highly recommend most of this author’s books. Like I said, I adore her Virgin River and Thunder Point series so it pains me to rate this one so low. This one just didn’t do it for me.
All In Good Time 