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Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Simply West of Heaven Review

BLURB:

Twelve year-old Ginnie and her BFF, Tillie, schemed to get Ginnie’s widowed dad to fall in love with Tillie’s divorced mom. It worked. But before they could become ‘for real’ sisters, Ginnie stumbled across her dead mom’s journals. Which was totally awesome sauce… until her dad took them away and won’t tell her why. Now all their plans are starting to unravel.

If that’s not bad enough, Ginnie’s favorite uncle drops the mother of all bombshells and leaves her in a maze of uncertainty. While her head is still spinning from that news,  a blast from her late mother’s past shows up and makes Tillie goes nutburgers. Ginnie realizes her best friend has her own agenda and Tillie’s plans to merge their families may not be so innocent.
SIMPLY WEST OF HEAVEN is a contemporary MG novel that follows Ginnie West as she tries to make sense of one too many curve balls tossed her way in the most pivotal summer of her life. 

Review:
This book was extremely emotional. I thought Monique wrote with feeling and was true to the emotions that went through each character, specifically Tillie and Ginnie, and they tried to deal with all the news, changes, and situations of which they never imagined they would be part.
I loved how Toran, Tillie, and Ginnie really stick together and have each other's backs through this story. Ironically my favorite part was when Tillie has her breakdown and the twins are the one's that help her and get her through it, rather than running to the adults for help. I felt it really gives kids confidence that they can deal with difficult situations that help them grow.
There was enough turmoil in this book to allow almost any person reading it to connect in some way to one or more characters, which brings a lot of life to this story. Also allows for sympathy and an eagerness to see the outcome. These conflicts also allow for a reader to understand where people are coming from and how their pasts affect their present lives, both inside and outside it's pages. And it brought to life the realities that people live with each and every day. Yet it ended with a good resolution and with the hint and the next book to come, which was definitely intriguing and exciting. I was very pleased with this book, as I was with the previous two books in this series.
Thanks to Monique for letting me read and review her books. It has been a true pleasure.



To learn more about Monique and her other books please see the following links:



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