Sharing You Book Review

Sharing You by Molly McAdams

Click here for the Amazon product page.
Click here for the Barnes and Noble product page.
Click here for the Books-a-Million product page.

Blurb:

Twenty-three year old Kamryn Cunningham has left behind a privileged, turbulent past for the anonymity of small-town life. Busy with her new bakery, she isn't interested in hook-ups or fix-ups. Then she meets the very sexy, very married Brody. Though she can't deny the pull between them, Kamryn isn't a cheater and she's not good at sharing.

Twenty-six year old Brody Saco may be married, but he isn't happy. when his girlfriend got pregnant six years ago, he did the right thing...and he's been paying for it ever since. Now, his marriage is nothing but a trap filled with hate, manipulation, and blame - the remnants of a tragedy that happened five years earlier. While he's never broken his vows, he can't stop the flood of emotion that meeting Kamryn unlocks.

Brought together by intense heat that is impossible to resist, Brody and Kamryn share stolen moments and nights that end too soon. But is their love strong enough to bear the weight of Kamryn's guilt? And is Brody strong enough to confront the pain of the past and finally break free of his conniving wife?

Review by Brittany:

I'm a little torn on my feelings about this book. There were parts of it that I enjoyed, but there were also parts that I didn't.

I have gotten a bit tired of authors using gratuitous sex to fill pages and to sell books, and I think this author did some of that. The relationship between Kamryn and Brody is basically only about the nights they sleep together, and the reader gets that in detail. But I felt like I never really understood what it was that made them want to be together. They fell in love at first sight and then proceeded to start an affair, without there being any development of an actual intimate, loving relationship. I spent the entire book not really understanding their intense desire to be together.

I also think the author had to try too hard to make characters likable or to justify their actions. She wrote Brody's wife in such a way that she's almost a monster, which is supposed to make the reader sympathetic and understanding to Brody's choice to sleep with someone else. Kamryn constantly focuses on her guilt and thinks about how she's not "that" girl, but she never does anything to change it. When time goes by without Brody leaving his wife, she then has the gall to be upset with him about it. Brody stays with his wife because she "needs help", but the whole thing just didn't quite sit right with me. I felt like the author was trying too hard to get readers to empathize and not blame her characters for being adulterous. Even the minor characters cheer them on.

I do think this author has a certain way of writing her female relationships that works. Kinlee, Kamryn's best friend, was probably my favorite character. Scenes in which those two interacted were my favorites, and there were often times when I laughed out loud reading some of the dialogue. McAdams does not write in the sophisticated way some of my favorite authors do, but she has a certain knack for humor and female relationships that I could appreciate.

Overall, I think this book could have been executed better. I didn't hate it, but I also didn't love it. I think McAdams could have benefited from fearlessly writing characters who weren't so full of excuses for their behavior.