Part of Your World (Part of Your World #2) by Abby Jimenez
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars
Category: Adult
Genre: Romance, Contemporary Romance, Women's Fiction
Content: Strong Language, Moderately descriptive sex
After a wild bet, gourmet grilled-cheese
sandwich, and cuddle with a baby goat, Alexis Montgomery has had her
world turned upside down. The cause: Daniel Grant, a ridiculously hot
carpenter who’s ten years younger than her and as casual as they
come—the complete opposite of sophisticated city-girl Alexis. And yet
their chemistry is undeniable.
While her ultra-wealthy parents
want her to carry on the family legacy of world-renowned surgeons,
Alexis doesn’t need glory or fame. She’s fine with being a “mere” ER
doctor. And every minute she spends with Daniel and the tight-knit town
where he lives, she’s discovering just what’s really important. Yet
letting their relationship become anything more than a short-term fling
would mean turning her back on her family and giving up the opportunity
to help thousands of people.
Bringing Daniel into her world is
impossible, and yet she can’t just give up the joy she’s found with him
either. With so many differences between them, how can Alexis possibly
choose between her world and his?
This was the first book I've read by this author and I loved it. I was so glued to this book! I haven't found a contemporary romance author that I like this much since I started reading Katherine Center's books. I loved these characters and how they end up falling in love. I love how Alexis learns to trust Daniel and the whole evolution of her character. I loved how Daniel was there for his family and I loved how everything gets resolved.
“I was a mosaic of someone else’s design where none of the fragments were put in the right place. And now I had finally put myself together and I recognized myself for the very first time.”
I also loved that this book made me laugh out loud a few times. A lot of rom-coms aren't nearly as funny as they should be. I love that the author added some very serious topics into this book that made it more than just a romance. The topic of emotional abuse was handled well. This and Katherine Center's Hello Stranger are my top two reads so far this year. I also want to mention that I hated cartoon looking covers on romance books, and for the most part I still do, but this one I like and I also love the one for Just For the Summer.
“I think my soul recognized hers the second I laid eyes on her.”
Yours Truly (Part of Your World #2) by Abby Jimenez
My rating: 3.5 of 5 stars
Category: Adult
Genre: Romance, Contemporary Romance, Women's Fiction
Content: Strong Language, Moderately descriptive sex
Dr. Briana Ortiz’s life is seriously flatlining.
Her divorce is just about finalized, her brother’s running out of time
to find a kidney donor, and that promotion she wants? Oh, that’s
probably going to the new man-doctor who’s already registering
eighty-friggin’-seven on Briana’s “pain in my ass” scale. But just when
all systems are set to hate, Dr. Jacob Maddox completely flips the game .
. . by sending Briana a letter.
And it’s a really good letter.
Like the kind that proves that Jacob isn’t actually Satan. Worse, he
might be this fantastically funny and subversively likeable guy who’s
terrible at first impressions. Because suddenly he and Bri are
exchanging letters, sharing lunch dates in her “sob closet,” and
discussing the merits of freakishly tiny horses. But when Jacob decides
to give Briana the best gift imaginable—a kidney for her brother—she
wonders just how she can resist this quietly sexy new doctor . . .
especially when he calls in a favor she can’t refuse.
After reading Part of Your World I was looking forward to this book. This one features Briana, best friend of Alexis from Part of Your World. I liked it in general but the third act break-up, the assumptions, and non-communications almost ruined this whole book for me. Luckily there was enough about this that I loved to lift my rating to 3.5 stars. What I loved were the characters. Briana and Jacob were great characters and I loved the way their relationship forms through letters and notes to each other. As a person that has dealt with social anxiety for years, I could relate to Jacob. I may not have it to the extent that he does in the book but there were several times when something felt very familiar. I loved how Briana was able to see Jacob and knew how to support him and help him through situations.
“It’s like I always say,” Mom said, wiping under her eyes. “Love shows up. That’s how you know when it’s real.”
That being said, I did not love some of the things Briana did in the last part of the book. For most of the book I thought Briana and Jacob communicated with each other pretty well, and it was nice and refreshing, but at some point in the last quarter of the book the characters stopped communicating their concerns with each other and went on assumptions alone, especially Briana. This leads up to the third act break-up that trauma also played a part in. I felt so let down by this book at that point.
I don't personally think a third act break-up is necessary for every romance book. This is something that got discussed recently in an author's reading group on FB that I follow. She writes a lot of romance and was saying that she didn't want to include that kind of a break-up in her book because it didn't fit. I really respect that she's going to write her book the way she feels will work best, instead of adhering to some formula. I wish that this one had been written a little differently but I still loved a lot about it.
The break-up in this book felt forced to me. I get that the character had trauma to deal with, but it didn't make sense to me that there was such a huge inability to trust at this point. On top of that, the trauma was brought on by something that we didn't get a lot of inner monologue about by the character, so it felt like it almost came out of nowhere. I also thought it was ridiculous that two doctors weren't smart enough to keep themselves out of this predicament to begin with. One of their mother's even pointed that out in the book.
“We’re all a little broken, Briana. We are a mosaic. We’re made up of all those we’ve met and all the things we’ve been through. There are parts of us that are colorful and dark and jagged and beautiful. And I love every piece of you. Even the ones you wish didn’t exist.”
Even after things get resolved, I just didn't like the way certain things happened, and that resulted in me not liking most of the last part of this book. Despite that I'm still really invested in this series and want to read more from this author. I love her writing style and I thought the other two things I read by her were really good.
Just For the Summer (Part of Your World #3) by Abby Jimenez
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Category: Adult
Genre: Romance, Contemporary Romance, Women's Fiction
Content: Strong Language, Moderately descriptive sex
Justin has a curse, and thanks to a Reddit
thread, it's now all over the internet. Every woman he dates goes on to
find their soul mate the second they break up. When a woman slides into
his DMs with the same problem, they come up with a plan: They'll date
each other and break up. Their curses will cancel each other’s out, and
they’ll both go on to find the love of their lives. It’s a bonkers idea…
and it just might work.
Emma hadn't planned that her next
assignment as a traveling nurse would be in Minnesota, but she and her
best friend agree that dating Justin is too good of an opportunity to
pass up, especially when they get to rent an adorable cottage on a
private island on Lake Minnetonka.
It's supposed to be a quick
fling, just for the summer. But when Emma's toxic mother shows up and
Justin has to assume guardianship of his three siblings, they're
suddenly navigating a lot more than they expected--including catching
real feelings for each other. What if this time Fate has actually
brought the perfect pair together?
I didn't think Abby Jimenez would be able to top Part of Your World, but for me, Just For the Summer ended up being a half star higher at a 5. This book did what I think the author was trying to do in Yours Truly with its third act breakup; show how trauma can affect a person at a very deep level. Only it was done so much better here, and really did feel believable, and didn't almost ruin the story for me. It made sense for the story, and didn't feel like it came out of nowhere. We were privy to a lot of thoughts that led up to the decision and that helped a lot.
“Unhealed trauma is a crack. And all the little hard things that trickle into it that would have rolled off someone else, settle. Then when life gets cold, that crack gets bigger, longer, deeper. It makes new breaks."
This book really hit me in the feels, especially towards the end. Emma's mom and the things that happened throughout Emma's life because of the way her mom was, left me so emotional. I love that these books are more than just fluff, but include people who are dealing with trauma and actually show them dealing with it. I'm glad I read these books in order because I liked the way this last book was tied to the others, in particular the first book, and how the characters are intertwined.
“You are not what happened to you. You are what you do next.”
There were some really funny parts in this book that had me laughing out loud too. That goes for everything I've read by this author so far. One of my main complaints about rom-coms is that they usually aren't all that funny, but this author knows how to make things funny. I particularly like the pet names she gives in her books. The Toilet King thing was pretty darn funny, and if Abby Jimenez didn't sell Toilet King t-shirts on her website, she should have! I'm looking forward to reading more Abby Jimenez books.
“The love stories sold us the wrong thing. The best kind of love doesn’t happen on moonlit walks and romantic vacations. It happens in between the folds of everyday life. It’s not grand gestures that show how you feel, it’s all the little secret things you do to make her life better that you never tell her about."
