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Bibles Verse - Daily Bible Verses and Devotions

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All-in-One Inspirational Bible Verses & Quotes Photos! Get 1000's of the best hand picked verses! ...

ClareR (5681 KP) rated One Ordinary Day at a Time in Books

Aug 21, 2023

One Ordinary Day at a Time

Sarah J Harris | 2021 | Contemporary, Fiction & Poetry

8.0

(1 Ratings)

Book Rating

One Ordinary Day at a time is an ultimately uplifting story and I loved it. It’s not all plain sailing though.

Jodie has been in numerous foster placements as a child and a disastrous adult relationship. The only good things to have come out of it are her son Zak, and her drive to succeed and get into Cambridge University. But Jodie is living in one room with Zak and working at Prince Burger whilst she finishes her college course - and life is hard.

She meets Simon Sparks at Prince Burger and once she finds out that he has been to Cambridge, she’s determined to convince him to tutor her for her entrance interview. But Simon has a lot of secrets and has endured hardships and abuse of his own.

The narrators on the audiobook really brought this to life for me. Jodie’s narrator (Ayesha Kala) was spot on, but I did struggle a little with Simon’s narrator (Victor Oshin), and found that I had to speed the narration up more on his chapters. I do realise that he was probably trying to show how disconnected from real life Simon was, but it did annoy me 🤷🏼‍♀️. I liked that the narrative swapped between Jodie and Simon, so I often saw the same things from both of their viewpoints.

This is a really heartwarming story of overcoming adversity and working hard to get what you want out of life. A story of what being a good friend is all about.

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Merissa (11953 KP) rated Where I'll Find You in Books

Jul 24, 2018

Where I'll Find You

J.A. Owenby | 2018 | Contemporary, Young Adult (YA)

8.0

(1 Ratings)

Book Rating

Where I'll Find You by J.A. Owenby

Where I'll Find You is a standalone novel about a young woman called Hadlee. Her life is full, with university studies, a job, living in shared accommodation, and a (very) un-supportive mother. The last thing she wants is a man in her life. However, Kaisen has other ideas, and keeps popping up when Hadlee doesn't expect it.

Although the characters are mostly good, the one I didn't get on with was (unfortunately) the main female, Hadlee. She is most definitely high-maintenance, both as a friend and a love interest. I understand life hasn't been easy for her, but she is definitely a drama-llama. She is supposed to be studying psychology, but her friends know more about it than she does, and she refuses to acknowledge anything that might trigger her, instead blaming others.

This is quite a hard review to write because I am a big fan of J.A. Owenby's, but this book just failed to hit the mark with me. Don't get me wrong, I still very much enjoyed it, but it wasn't a 5-star read like her others have been for me. The premise is a good one, and it is told with style and aplomb. It is intriguing and intricate, leaving plenty of questions in the reader's mind until the author is ready for them to be answered. There are no editing or grammatical errors that disrupted my reading flow. I have no hesitation in recommending this book, even though Hadlee and I didn't see eye to eye.

* A copy of this book was provided to me with no requirements for a review. I voluntarily read this book, and the comments here are my honest opinion. *

Merissa
Archaeolibrarian - I Dig Good Books!