Nora Goes Off Script, Annabel Monaghan

jeanniezelos

Jun 9

Nora Goes Off Script, Annabel Monaghan

Genre: Romance,

Well, Wow. I loved this.
I read a lot of different genres including good old romance, but for me the story has to have more than the light and cute, couple meet, fall in love, quick bit of sad then the HEA. Lately somehow that's all I seem to find, books like the Hallmark afternoon films my late husband adored. He'd have a tear by the end, I'd be " What? Really". Millions of folk love these sorts of reads, I'm not knocking them, but they're not for me. When Nora talks about her TRC stories, it made me smile, that's exactly what I mean.

Nora was wonderful, picked herself up after her husband left " to find himself, she was holding him back" or some such nonsense, leaving her with debts, house needing repairs, and of course two adorable kids. She just knuckled down and wrote a story about it. She usually writes romances for The Romance Channel ( as above!), but this one is a bit darker and more intense than her usual, and her agent pitches it elsewhere...cue a whole life change for Nora.
I loved Nora, she's been through so much, supporting the family on her own long before Ben left. In fact she's financially better off without him, something many of us know about. Arthur and Bernadette, the kids, are great. Sensible, almost adult at times but with the kid bit bursting through at others. She has some great friends too, plus of course the small town folk that are always around, those who most try yo avoid, who have a way of manipulating others, or saying things in a double handed way.
Then the film crew. I loved Wheezie, and of course Martin, and his ever younger girlfriends...Leo though, I didn't like him at all to begin. I was thinking " really? This guy is the one she falls for?" Over time though, as he settled I grew to see a different side of him, and fell in love along with Nora. And then came the big crash. Huge, but very quiet crash.

What I loved about when it all went wrong is that it was fully explored, drawn out, there were times when I thought "is this the time they get back?" only to find it wasn't. That part was perfect for me, I like the drama to be fully wrung out, every bit of emotion explored, pulled out, not over in a couple of pages as so often happens. Then when things finally did work out it was just so so satisfying, again there's still upset and hurt, its not " wow, OK, all is wonderful now" There were some very real reactions.

Stars: Five, a fabulous story for me, felt very real and had drama in bucket loads.

ARC supplied by Netgalley and publishers

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