Berls
Written on Jun 15, 2021
This was an unexpected story for me. I know I read the blurb back when I requested it for review, but it’s been a little bit and I forgot what it was about. Ultimately, a quick fun love story with a bit of humor and a lot of good luck!
The characters are really just incredibly good people and so it’s hard not to love them. I enjoyed watching Liz travel the world fulfilling her bucket list, meanwhile just bringing and spreading her goodness all over the world basically. I also loved that these characters were older (50), already married and divorced or widowed. I enjoy reading young love, but there’s something different and special about older love – they’ve seen the best and worst of life and falling in love has a different look. And an unexpected addition to the book was a bit of LGTB romance. Very little and it’s side characters, but I loved seeing it and, even more, loved that it was just naturally incorporated into the book (because these are good people who don’t think twice about their friends and siblings loving who they love!). I’m enjoying seeing this natural incorporation into more and more books.
The plot is a little less practical. But really, can you expect practical when the story is about someone winning the lottery? And then to top it off, having 3 months to live unless she gets miraculously lucky again? It’s a feel good book about being a good person when you have nothing but time (not a job, not lack of finances) to hold you back from really experiencing life.
The narration was really good for the most part. I did have one slight irritation – despite delivering a pretty good French accent (for my admittedly untrained ear), some pretty standard words were mispronounced (e.g., Seine). But other than that I enjoyed both Tim Paige and Stephanie Rose’s narration and thought they complemented each other well. I read through this at my standard 2x speed, but it felt much faster. I will likely pickup more books from Rich Amooi!
