Review: CARRIE SOTO IS BACK by Taylor Jenkins Reid
Carrie Soto Is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid Also by this author: One True Loves, Daisy Jones & The Six
Published by Ballantine Books on August 30, 2022
Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction
Pages: 384
Source: Netgalley
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FTC Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley. All opinions are my own.
Taylor Jenkins Reid is the master of creating flawed characters that will capture your heart. She did it with The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, she did it with Daisy Jones & the Six, and she has done it yet again with Carrie Soto is Back.
When an injury forced her into retirement at the age of 32, Carrie Soto had cemented her reputation as the best female tennis player in the world. She had broken numerous records and had won an incredible 20 Grand Slam titles. Becoming that great of a player has come with a cost for Carrie though. Not only did she completely isolate herself from anyone she could have possibly formed a relationship with (friendship or romantic), but she was also cold and pretty arrogant when it came to speaking to the media and even to her opponents on the WTA tour, earning herself the nicknames “The Battle Axe” and “The B*tch.”
Tennis is everything to Carrie and so when, five years after her retirement, another player is threatening to beat her 20 Grand Slams, Carrie becomes obsessed with making a comeback to defend her record. She decides to come out of retirement for one season to play the Grand Slam tournaments, and she asks her beloved father, who had coached her for much of her career, to coach her one last time.
I’m a sucker for an underdog story anyway, but there’s just something even more special about a legendary player trying to make a comeback and rise from the bottom back to the top. What especially got me about this story is with the way Carrie behaves, so cold and arrogant at times, she should have been completely unlikeable as a protagonist. But instead of hating her, I just loved her all the more. There was just so much more to Carrie than what she showed the world, as well as a well hidden vulnerability, and it really surprised me how invested I became in watching her take this journey and watching TJR peel back the layers of Carrie’s personality and let us in.
The tennis matches we witness are all adrenaline rushes that made for riveting reading, but I also think readers will fall in love with this story whether they are tennis fans or not. While Carrie’s comeback in the world of professional tennis is obviously front and center, Carrie Soto is Back is about so much more than tennis. It’s a story about never giving up but also about accepting yourself as you are, and it’s also about love and the importance of letting people into your life. My favorite scenes in the book are the ones between Carrie and her father as they train. We get to see those both in the past when Carrie was first rising to the top, and then again through her comeback, and it’s clear they have a special bond. Those scenes were incredibly moving and I adored her dad because of all the good he tried to instill in her and how he always believed in her no matter what. I found myself tearing up a few times as he was talking to Carrie. She was his world and it showed in every word and action.
I devoured Carrie Soto is Back in less than a day, and there is no doubt in my mind that this is going to be a book and a protagonist that will stick with me for years to come.
About Taylor Jenkins Reid
TAYLOR JENKINS REID lives in Los Angeles and is the acclaimed author of One True Loves, Maybe in Another Life, After I Do, and Forever, Interrupted. Her most recent novel, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, came out June 13, 2017. Her novels have been named best books of summer by People, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, InStyle, PopSugar, BuzzFeed, Goodreads, and others.
In addition to her novels, Taylor’s essays have appeared in places such as the Los Angeles Times, The Huffington Post, and Money Magazine.
Review: BEND TOWARD THE SUN by Jen Devon
Bend Toward the Sun by Jen Devon Published by Griffin, St. Martin's Griffin on August 9, 2022
Genres: Contemporary Fiction, Romance
Pages: 384
Source: Netgalley
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Goodreads
FTC Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley. All opinions are my own.
Bend Toward the Sun by Jen Devon is one of the most beautiful love stories I’ve read in a long time. It’s a moving story about two people, both of whom have been broken by events from their pasts, who unexpectedly connect with one another.
Rowan McKinnon is a botanist who doesn’t believe in love. Rowan finds solace in plants and in academia, and has no interest in emotional entanglements of any kind. She’s a one-night stand girl all the way. Little does she know, but Harry Brady is about to try to change that. Harry is a doctor who has taken a leave of absence from his job. His self-confidence is shattered after losing a patient, and he has come home to work on his family’s new vineyard and to hopefully heal and recover his self-confidence. A surprisingly intense encounter with Rowan at a family game of hide and seek turns Harry’s world upside down.
I was fully invested in Rowan and Harry from that intense first encounter. The sparks between them were insane and it was clear they were attracted to one another in spite of themselves. The sexual tension between them only continues to grow when Rowan accepts a job at the vineyard and spends months there getting the grounds into shape. I’m a sucker for watching two people grow closer after they’ve gotten off to an initial rocky start, so I just soaked up every scene that brought Rowan and Harry together since it was so obvious that they really needed each other. Rowan, in particular, has built walls around herself, and I loved watching Harry try to break them down. It was truly an emotional tug of war between them at times.
Watching to see what would happen between Rowan and Harry was captivating on its own, but I also just absolutely loved the author’s writing style. Every sentence is lush and beautiful without feeling overdone, and I loved how vividly she brings the setting to life. I could practically smell the grapes and reach out and touch the vines, and that sensation just immersed me in the story all the more.
Equal parts heart-wrenching and heartwarming, Bend Toward the Sun is an intensely emotional story about love, family, grief, and healing that will ultimately leave you with a smile on your face. This one’s a gem that romance fans won’t want to miss! 5 STARS
About Jen Devon
Jen Devon writes steamy, cinematic contemporary romances about imperfect people finding their perfect match. A former ecology academic and university lecturer, she currently works in the tech industry and dreams of writing full-time. She’s an avid gardener, photographer, and boardgamer, a thrift store enthusiast and unapologetic nerd. She’s a mom of five (three kids, two rescue mutts) and lives in central Ohio with her engineer husband.
Her debut novel BEND TOWARD THE SUN will be available from St. Martin’s / Griffin on August 9, 2022, wherever books are sold.
Top Ten Tuesday – Completed Series I Wish Had More Books
Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Top Ten Tuesday has been one of my favorite memes ever since I started blogging, so huge thanks to Jana for taking over the hosting duties!
This week’s TTT topic is Completed Series I Wish Had More Books. I actually struggled with this topic a bit, mainly because in my mind, if an author is still alive and writing, I always have a hope that the series they’ve written could eventually have more books. I selected some favorites that I am assuming are finished, but I was lazy and didn’t research, so my bad if it has already been announced that more books are forthcoming and I missed it (or heard about and forgot, haha).
(Possibly) Completed Series I Wish Had More Books
1. PEACHTREE BLUFF SERIES by Kristy Woodson Harvey
2. SIX OF CROWS DUOLOGY by Leigh Bardugo
3. THE LUNAR CHRONICLES BY MARISSA MEYER
4. THE BROWN SISTERS by Talia Hibbert
5. THE WINTERNIGHT TRILOGY by Katherine Arden
6. RED WINTER TRILOGY by Annette Marie
7. STALKING JACK THE RIPPER SERIES by Kerri Maniscalco
8. THE ILLUMINAE FILES by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff
9. SHADES OF MAGIC by V.E. Schwab
10. ARC OF A SCYTHE by Neal Shusterman
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