Book Review: Heart Like Mine by Amy Hatvany

Review: Heart Like Mine
Series: —
Author: Amy Hatvany
No of Pages: 370
Expected publication: March 19th 2013 by Washington Square Press
Received From: NetGalley
Rating: 3

Synopsis:

“When a young mother dies under mysterious circumstances, those she leaves behind begin looking for answers in the past—and find a long-buried secret they could have never imagined. Thirty-six-year-old Grace McAllister never longed for children. But when she meets Victor Hansen, a handsome, charismatic divorced restaurateur who is father to Max and Ava, Grace decides that, for the right man, she could learn to be an excellent part-time stepmom. After all, the kids live with their mother, Kelli. How hard could it be?

At thirteen, Ava Hansen is mature beyond her years. Since her parents’ divorce, she has been the one taking care of her emotionally unstable mother and her little brother—she pays the bills, does the laundry, and never complains because she loves her mama more than anyone. And while her father’s new girlfriend is nice enough, Ava still holds out hope that her parents will get back together and that they’ll be a family again.

But only days after Victor and Grace get engaged, Kelli dies suddenly under mysterious circumstances—and soon, Grace and Ava discover there was much more to Kelli’s life than either ever knew.

Narrated by Grace and Ava in the present with flashbacks into Kelli’s troubled past, Heart Like Mine is a poignant and hopeful portrait about womanhood, love, and the challenges of family life.”

My thoughts:

Ok… I had to sit and think about how I was going to do this review. So, let me take this one thing at a time.

Firstly, the cover seems lackluster but it does have a significance with the story. That red sweater means so much and honestly I didn’t even notice it until I started doing this review!

The plot was interesting. It also tugged at my heart strings. There are so many emotional ups and downs in this that you almost need to take a breather to be able to continue reading. But there was something else, the point of view kept changing, which normally I don’t have an issue with, but in this case, the pov would change and so would the tense. All of a sudden you would be in a memory of a person and then in yet another memory further into their past! It could get a bit convoluted and I had to do a few double takes to get my thoughts back to what was going on. Definitely took away from the story, for me. However, I understand the different points of view because there is just TOO much going on for any one person to know everything. Plus the fact that everyone keeps lying to each other doesn’t help, but it is art imitating real life so I just kind of tried to go with it. I did find myself trudging to the end hoping somewhere there was going to be happiness for someone out there! Anyone please!! Just ONE of them! But I’ll talk about the ending in a minute.

As for the characters, each one of them has their own reasons for being who they are. None are perfect, which of course makes them perfect! They all have to learn to grow and trust each other and so much happens to get them to that point! Grace was definitely my favorite! That girl has her stuff together! And then to be thrown into a relationship as a step-mother of two kids! Whew… it would throw anyone for a loop. I normally take the sides of the kids but for some reason I just wanted Grace to come out of this on top.

Now, the ending… after ALL of the drama, the crying and aches and pains that these people go through, I was hoping for something. SOMETHING! I don’t know. It just seemed so … meh to me. It’s not that it isn’t worth the read, exactly… it just felt like you were taken on a roller coaster and just kind of let off without a last hoorah! I hope that makes sense!

I have to say, I did read quite a few Goodreads reviews while trying to wrap my head around doing my own review, and there are quite a few out there and I can see where the people that gave this higher ratings are coming from, all I know though, was this wasn’t for me. BUT don’t let that stop you! The emotional turmoil and characters in this are brilliant and it’s definitely worth reading!