Title - Letters to My Mother
Author - Rebecca Heath
Format - Kindle
ASIN: B0041844MW
This book is written partly as a story where the main character is relating what happened to her in the past, and also as a series of letters written to her parents whilst she was at college, which she found amongst her mothers belongings, when clearing her house.
Kate is a naive 19yr old student at Washington State in Seattle. She takes on a job as a typist for Dr. Rosenau and they eventually start an affair. He is her first boyfriend, and she is still a virgin and very naive in the affairs of the heart. David is very gentlemanly and does not take advantage of her so it didn't feel sordid.
The story started off quite well, but it soon became fairly predictable and I could see where it was heading. Kate and David (Dr.Rosenau) went out on his boat, and for quite a good percentage of the start of the book there were numerous yachting terms, which I had to keep looking up the meaning of on my kindle and I got a bit bored of it. As I reached 20% of the book I was glad it had finally stopped.
I got annoyed by David calling Kate "Dear" and "Dearest", and asked my Dad if that is something men used to call their loved ones in those times, and he didn't feel it was. It just sounded very patronising to me.
I felt that the story could have been dragged out a bit more and felt that there was quite a big time gap at the end, and then an abrupt ending.
I did quite like the characters, and there was quite a good storyline to it, which kept me reading. Some more yachting did come into the equation but this did add to the story. I won't spoil it by saying what.
This book was given to me by the author to review. This is no way influenced my review and the words are all my own.
Thank you for reviewing my book, Letters To My Mother.
ReplyDeleteEnough readers have remarked on the book's abrupt ending that I would like to revise it, but first a few words on what I was trying to convey.
As you noted, the story is told in two parts: the contemporary prologue, which relates Kate's finding her college letters among her mother's belongings, and the remainder of the book, the story of Kate's romance with David many years before. This part of the book ends at the final paragraph minus one, where David is seeing Kate off at the airport. The very last paragraph is a continuation of the prologue and is present day; I was hoping by separating these last two paragraphs with four spaces that it would be apparent they don't belong together, but either the idea didn't come across or it did and failed, anyway. The prologue and final paragraph were actually written as a college essay and it's only years later it occurred to me they could be used to "frame" the novel.
One of the great advantages of writing an ebook is that this format allows the author to make revisions and publish again. In order to make the relationship between the prologue and final paragraph clearer, I'm considering putting both in italics and I would appreciate your opinion and that of anyone else who may have read the book. I could drop the final paragraph entirely but I feel that if it were apparent the prologue and last paragraph are part of a whole, that the latter provides a summing up of the story.
Thank you.
Rebecca Heath
Hi Rebecca,
DeleteThank you for your response to my review. I feel that you need to leave the last paragraph in as it is important. Without leaving spoilers here, I think that it is needed but I felt it just needed more substance/content.
Personally I don't think you need to put it in italics and that it was fine as it was, and I worked out ok it was a continuation of the prologue. Maybe I'm being an old romantic and I just wanted more to come of the final paragraph! Ha ha.
All in all it was a good story, and was only the length of the yachting part at the beginning that put me off, as on your kindle you obviously see the percentage of the book, and to me it took up too much.
It's great that you managed to make the book out of a college essay. I just wish I could do it, and appreciate the hard work that goes into it, thats why I hate to leave low reviews, but I do try to make them constructive. On Goodreads a 3* still means I liked it.
Thanks again for the opportunity of reviewing it.
I haven't heard of this one. The cover intrigues me though. Great review.
ReplyDeleteIt's not one I'd heard of either, so I was pleased to read it. Not the best one I've read but I did enjoy it. I agree with you Alexis it is a great cover.
ReplyDelete