I very much liked this one. I'm still debating if I'll write a full review but I really liked it. ( )

Johnelle Morrissey appears to have the perfect life - a loving husband, a wonderful son, a supportive and fun best friend, and a great job that she enjoys. All of that literally comes crashing down when the plane she's on has engine failure. One of the three people to survive the crash, Johnelle suffers a traumatic brain injury that puts her memories and feelings at risk.

Alice Choate, Johnelle's best friend, has been in love with Johnelle for almost as long as she can remember, but she's stood by without revealing her feelings to Johnelle, wanting to do nothing that would jeopardize their friendship. As Alice attempts to help Johnelle put together the pieces of her former life, Johnelle finds that her love for her husband has seemingly disappeared, while her love for Alice has morphed into romantic feelings.

This is the first book that I've read by KG MacGregor, and it certainly won't be the last. The story felt very realistic to me, and the author really made Charleston come alive in the book, as well. The Circular Church, the street names, the neighborhoods, even the brief mention of the serial killer Lavinia Fisher - all of these things are real places and real history. First Calvary Baptist isn't a real place, but considering how it was portrayed in the book, that's a good thing. ;)

I also really liked the slow pacing of the story. It gives Johnelle a long time to recuperate from her injuries, both physical and mental, and to allow the relationship between Johnelle and Alice to develop well. A lot of romance books I read seem to suffer from the "instalove" phenomenon, but not this one; it takes Alice and Johnelle a long time to transition from friendship to relationship, and I really appreciated that. It definitely made the story feel much more realistic. Some might not appreciate the lack of "heat" in the book, but I think that it definitely fit the story and the characters (and there were a couple of sex scenes toward the end of the book).

I really liked the character of Ian, who was Johnelle's son. He seemed like a very realistic, very caring young man. Dwight (Johnelle's husband)...not so much. I could sort-of empathize with him at points, because his whole world was turned upside down with Johnelle's accident. But even at the beginning, he was hinting that he wanted Johnelle to give up her job, because he wanted her to be there when he was home (he traveled a lot for his own job). This only intensified once Johnelle was in the accident, to the point that he came across as quite stuffy and a shade misogynistic. He also didn't really support Johnelle's goals for her recovery, preferring to sell her short, which was super annoying. And the end, when he virtually has her held prisoner by her own parents, made me want to punch him in the face. Seriously. At least he finally figured it out at the end that no matter how hard he clung to Johnelle, he couldn't force her to love him again, and he let her go. But it took a long time for him to reach that point, and he came across as rather unsympathetic for much of the book.

The ending of the book wasn't tied up in a neat bow, and I actually quite liked that. There were a lot of loose ends that were still "loose" - the settlement, the impending divorce, whether Johnelle would ever be able to go back to her former job, etc. But real life often is a tangle of loose threads, and so I think that made the book feel even more realistic.

My only quibble with this book (and it's a small one) is that it really needed more commas, which would have made many sentences flow more smoothly.

I would definitely recommend this book to people who are looking for a good f/f romance that has a slow build with a lot of realistic characters. ( )

For me, the best thing about this book was the friendship between Johnelle and Alice. Their deep emotional bond transcended marriage. Even if it was entirely platonic, their love for each other was very evident. I love that Alice stayed in Johnelle's life even after she knew she could never have her. It seems to be more reflective of real life than what we normally read in lesfic--the usual trope that if she can't have the love of her life, then she should stay as far away as possible. It shows that women can have meaningful relationships that are just as emotionally satisfying as marriages and raising families. But of course, this being lesfic, Johnelle gets to have her cake and eat it too. :)

4.5 stars ( )

A light, easy-to-read lesbian romance. Not great, and maybe not even good, literature, and the plot doesn't really make sense. However, I totally enjoyed reading it. It's going to be fun to see what my book group thinks about this.

If you decide to read this, DO NOT READ THE BACK COVER!!! The whole plot is given away. So annoying. ( )

between 2 and 2.5. this was actually just what i needed - an easy, light, sometimes funny read with some pretty likable main characters that is decently written. it's not even close to being free of problems, but was still enjoyable. my main issues with it are that the premise actually contradicts itself a few times (johnelle's happiness with dwight prior to the accident vs how that's framed later; the same with reframing her relationship with alice), the character of dwight not being drawn out well (macgregor can't seem to decide whether or not to make dwight a good guy), the seeming anachronisms (saying they communicated with long emails in what would have been the early 90's, that alice could be such a successful real estate agent with the ease of commissions she had right after what was the real estate bubble bursting), and (objectively, this is a personal problem, not a writing one) the heavy presence of the church in everything (every single sunday they went to church or it was explained why they missed it, everyone always talked to everyone else in the language of praying for each other, almost all the relationships were from church or youth group). i also thought it was a little strange that jonelle felt so badly for leaving dwight and not at all badly for making alice wait for 20 years for their relationship.

but it's pretty easy to put most of it aside because it's entertaining, and it's compelling enough to want to keep reading, there are enough amusing pieces to temper the ones that don't ring true, and i was in the mood for a feel good light read. i'd be up for trying her again sometime but probably wouldn't keep going if the next one isn't better. ( )