Showing posts with label Colleen Hoover. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Colleen Hoover. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 17, 2018

All Your Perfects by Colleen Hoover

* * * * 1/2

Colleen Hoover delivers a tour de force novel about a troubled marriage and the one old forgotten promise that might be able to save it.

Quinn and Graham’s perfect love is threatened by their imperfect marriage. The memories, mistakes, and secrets that they have built up over the years are now tearing them apart. The one thing that could save them might also be the very thing that pushes their marriage beyond the point of repair.

All Your Perfects is a profound novel about a damaged couple whose potential future hinges on promises made in the past. This is a heartbreaking page-turner that asks: Can a resounding love with a perfect beginning survive a lifetime between two imperfect people?


Source: advance e-galley provided in exchange for an honest review

If you've read any of Hoover's previous books then you're no stranger to her emotionally-charged stories. All Your Perfects is no exception as we watch a couple at the blissful start of their relationship and at their worst when their marriage is failing. Welcome to Hoover's World, folks! She'll reel you in and then rip your heart out, shred it and even run over it for good measure. I LOVE HER!

Quinn and Graham meet on the worst day of their lives - finding out their significant others are cheating on them with each other. They walk away from that disastrous day but run into each other again a few months down the road. They begin this bizarre courtship that works for them and honestly, it's freaking cute. Those are the happy parts. Hoover alternates their before and after stories, and it's dysfunction and devastation in the after. Disconnected, unaffectionate and distant - this part was not pleasant to read and frankly made me frightened for where things were headed. 

All marriages have their ups and downs and sometimes it's hard to love in our worst possible moments. The story is told entirely from Quinn's point of view which for me was a challenge because you're stuck in her head where she's a depressed, closed off from her husband. I desperately wanted to feel things from Graham's point of view as well but much like Quinn, I was isolated from him. The big question in All Your Perfects is can you love someone when they're different from the person you fell in love with in the first place? A lot of their marital troubles stem from Quinn's insecurities and she is exceptionally hard on herself. There are possible triggers and to avoid giving away the plot I've added them to the labels of this post. I will say that this story did feel more personal to me as I have experienced a little of what Quinn was experiencing though not to that extent. But I understood where she was coming from and it is a hard place and once you go down that rabbit hole, you're kind of stuck there. 

I like Colleen Hoover because she challenges me. She doesn't always assure me that everyone will get their HEA, heck sometimes she even leaves me hanging, but I love that I don't know what to expect from her. Sure, my heart might get wrung out but I want those feels and I'm always guaranteed that with her. The only thing holding me back from giving it 5 stars is that I would've liked a small glimpse of Graham's POV throughout their unhappy period, and I realize that's just my personal preference. Otherwise, All Your Perfects is real and honest, and once again Hoover captures perfectly the commitments we take on and the complexities of love.

~ Bel


ABOUT THE AUTHOR:


COLLEEN HOOVER is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Slammed, Point of Retreat, This Girl, Hopeless, Losing Hope, Finding Cinderella, Maybe Someday, Maybe Not, Ugly Love, Confess, November 9, It Ends with Us, and Without Merit. Colleen has won the Goodreads Choice Award for Best Romance three times—for Confess in 2015, It Ends with Us in 2016, andWithout Merit in 2017. Confess was adapted into a seven-episode online series. In 2015, Colleen and her family founded The Bookworm Box, a bookstore and monthly subscription service offering signed novels donated by authors. All profits are given to various charities each month to help those in need. Colleen lives in Texas with her husband and their three boys. Visit ColleenHoover.com. 


FIND COLLEEN ONLINE:

Website   I   Facebook   I   Twitter   I   Instagram 



Buy Links:

Amazon   I   Barnes & Noble   I   Books-a-Million   I   IndieBound





THE ALL YOUR PERFECTS tour

07/17: Denver, CO
07:00 PM
TATTERED COVER BOOKSTORE

07/23: Portland, OR
07:00 PM
POWELL'S BOOKS
Call Store for details: 503-228-4651 or pre-order

07/24: Seattle, WA
07:00 PM
THIRD PLACE BOOKS

07/25: San Francisco, CA
07:00 PM
BOOK PASSAGE

07/26: San Diego, CA
07:30 PM
WARWICK'S

07/27: Phoenix, AZ
07:00 PM
CHANGING HANDS BOOKSTORE


07/28: Los Angeles, CA
04:00 PM
THE RIPPED BODICE

07/29: Dallas, TX
06:00 PM
HALF PRICE BOOKS

08/02: Atlanta, GA
07:00 PM
EAGLE EYE BOOKS

08/03: Asheville, NC
06:00 PM
MALAPROP'S BOOKSTORE/CAFE

08/04: Cincinnati, OH
05:00 PM
JOSEPH-BETH BOOKSELLERS

08/05: Chicago, IL
03:00 PM
ANDERSON'S BOOKSHOP

08/06: Detroit, MI
06:30 PM
SCHULER BOOKS & MUSIC, Okemos

08/07: Minneapolis, MN
07:00 PM
BARNES AND NOBLE/Edina
Call for more details: 952-920-2124


08/08: Kansas City, KS
07:00 PM
RAINY DAY BOOKS

08/09: Austin, TX
07:00 PM
BOOK PEOPLE

09/17: New York, NY (just added!)
07:00 PM
THE STRAND BOOKSTORE

Monday, October 2, 2017

Without Merit by Colleen Hoover Blog Tour & Giveaway



Not every mistake deserves a consequence. Sometimes the only thing a mistake deserves is forgiveness.



The Voss family is anything but normal. They live in a repurposed church, newly baptized Dollar Voss. The once cancer-stricken mother lives in the basement, the father is married to the mother’s former nurse, the little half-brother isn’t allowed to do or eat anything fun, and the eldest siblings are irritatingly perfect. Then, there’s Merit.

Merit Voss collects trophies she hasn’t earned and secrets her family forces her to keep. While browsing the local antiques shop for her next trophy, she finds Sagan. His wit and unapologetic idealism disarm and spark renewed life into her—until she discovers that he’s completely unavailable. Merit retreats deeper into herself, watching her family from the sidelines, when she learns a secret that no trophy in the world can fix.

Fed up with the lies, Merit decides to shatter the happy family illusion that she’s never been a part of before leaving them behind for good. When her escape plan fails, Merit is forced to deal with the staggering consequences of telling the truth and losing the one boy she loves.

Poignant and powerful, WITHOUT MERIT explores the layers of lies that tie a family together and the power of love.


Visit www.WithoutMeritbook.com for teasers, tour dates and more.

:: Pre-order here ::

Amazon     I     Barnes & Noble     I     Books-a-Million     I     iBooks

Indiebound     I     Kobo     I     Google     I     Nook     




:: Review ::

* * * * *

Without Merit features a strikingly unconventional family dynamic that'll make your head spin. I mean a family that lives in a rehabed church? Peculiar? Yes. Entertaining, too. Everything takes place from Merit's viewpoint - her strained relationship with her twin sister, her distancing from her parents and brother, the animosity directed at her stepmother, and then the new guy she wants. She tends toward a cynical outlook with extra bitterness on the side for good measure. All the while she's withdrawing from her surroundings, allowing her feelings to overwhelm her and close in on her. The only emotional tether keeping her connected is Sagan, the mysterious boy who's with her sister.

The beauty of Without Merit is how it starts off with Merit's version of her immediate world and gradually moves beyond that to where she receives a shocking awakening, realizing that she isn't as insightful as she thought she was. Every character has a vital role to play and they become a mirror for Merit to see herself. It's how Hoover gives each one of them their truth that's the stunner and by the end, Merit has no other option than to face hers.

I don't typically slam books shut in excitement when I'm done with them, and I especially won't do anything to hurt my beloved Kindle, but oh my gosh, THIS book!! I thought I knew Colleen Hoover because I've read quite a few of her novels but it wasn't until after this that it occurred to me how she approaches each new book so differently.  I've become a firm believer that she'll always surprise me, make me think and most importantly make me feel something so deeply with every new story she shares with us.

~ Bel

*Source: advance e-galley provided by publisher in exchange for an honest review



:: About the Author ::



Colleen Hoover is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Slammed, This Girl, Point of Retreat, Hopeless, Losing Hope, Finding Cinderella, Maybe Someday, Ugly Love, Maybe Not, Confess, November 9, and It Ends with Us. She has won the Goodreads Choice Award for Best Romance twice – for Confess in 2015 and It Ends with Us in 2016. Confess was adapted into a seven-episode online series. In 2015, Colleen and her family founded The Bookworm Box, a bookstore and monthly subscription service offering signed novels donated by authors. All profits are given to various charities each month to help those in need. Colleen lives in Texas with her husband and their three boys. Please visit ColleenHoover.com.

:: Connect with Colleen ::


Website     I     Facebook     I     Twitter     I     Instagram




:: Book Tour ::

Guess what? You can catch up with Colleen Hoover in person and tell her yourself how much you love the book and how brilliant she is!


SEATTLE, WA
Monday, October 2nd
THIRD PLACE BOOKS
7:00 PM    

LOS ANGELES, CA
Tuesday, October 3rd
CHEVALIER'S BOOKS
7:00 PM    

KANSAS CITY, KS
Wednesday, October 4th
WOODNEATH LIBRARY CENTER
7:00 PM    

CHICAGO, IL
Thursday, October 5th
ANDERSON'S BOOKSHOP – LA GRANGE
7:00 PM    

CINCINNATI, OH
Friday, October 6th
JOSEPH-BETH BOOKSELLERS
7:00 PM    

POTTSTOWN, PA
Saturday, October 7th
BOOKS-A-MILLION
6:00 PM    
Coventry Mall

NEW YORK, NY
Sunday, October 8th
NEW YORK COMIC CON
3:00 PM to 5:00 PM   
Hudson Mercantile
New York, NY  10018

DALLAS, TX
Tuesday, October 10
SMU BOOKSTORE
7:00 PM    
B&N College
Southern Methodist University Bookstore



:: Giveaway ::

Win 1 of 5 signed hardcover copies of WITHOUT MERIT