Book Review – Ghosted by J.M. Darhower

Ghosted
<— I HAVE AN AWESOME BOOK RECOMMENDATION!!!!! This is a MUST READ! If you’re in a slump, this will fix it! Ghosted broke my heart, stole my heart, and healed it too (and it was SO clever how it all happened). FIVE STARS!!!

I am just beside myself in love with these characters. Oh please let there be a #2!!!!!!!!!!!

This was pure splendid sweetness (but steamy and funny, AND angsty, too)! The perfect second chance romance, and now, one of my absolute favorites. But I knew that would be the case, considering how much I love this author, and I was especially excited when our book-crew was falling all over themselves to recommend it to the rest of us. I. WAS. IN!!! :D!!!!

R: Ghosted, Maryse. I’m loving every single word. At the rate it’s going, it may make my top ten. A little girl whose idol is her famous dad, but she doesn’t know it? Kill me now. …BTW! OMG the way she’s doing the flashbacks is freaking fantastic. And I usually hate flashbacks!

Maryse: Oh yeah… Ghosted sounds PERFECT for me, too. I gotta. I just GOTTA!

Amy: Dang…y’all are killin’ me with Ghosted!!!

Jean: I AM NOT SORRY THAT I STARTED GHOSTED RIGHT NOW……SOOOO GOOD!!!!! Do it Amy….*i am the voice inside your head while you are running*!!!!

Maryse: I’m reading Ghosted and have been hooked since the very start. LOVING!!!!!!!!!!!

R: Jump on the Ghosted bandwagon. It’s super rewarding. And Maddie will make you smile until your face hurts. …I suggest dropping everything for Ghosted…

Melinda: I finished reading Ghosted and loved it.

Maryse: Oh I have GOOD reading days ahead of me, then, Amy. I’m 50% into Ghosted (it’s a long one) but still VERY happy to be indulging myself.

Kelly: I just finished the book! Loved it!

Kim: YAY!!!!! I LOVED this one!!!!! So awesome

Tav: Just finished it. Loved it

Tessa: Ghosted by JM Darhower – That’s how you do sweet contemporary. With a ton of realism and heart. …JM Darhower is just a brilliant writer.

OMG EXACTLY, TESSA!!!! That is how I felt. It’s sweet, but it’s real, and at times, it’s raw. It’s my perfect romance read. And R!! YES!!!! The flashbacks, so cleverly written… kind of genius in fact, that I was AS INTO the whole buildup, as I was into the present. And yes, as I mentioned, it’s a slightly longer book, but all the more for us to indulge in.

R: I had NO idea Ghosted was so long! I read it sooooo fast. I saw that in a review today and looked it up and yep, long! It could have been double and I wouldn’t have noticed.

There’s no rushing through a single detail, and yet, it’s not heavy with it, either. It flows, it’s real, it’s emotional (in all of the best ways), and the characters are 100% true to themselves throughout the entire story. I could see these people perfectly (yes, people!! They were THAT real – these are not just characters to me, they ARE people), from their adorable tiny daughter (gah!!!!!! MY HEART!!!) to his goofy-grumpy “sponsor” to her super-protective father.

Every single detail of their lives, their upbringing, their connections, their self-destruction… and their potential rebuild was perfectly fleshed out. This didn’t just play out like an awesome romance movie. Heck no. This was an entire addictive TV series that I couldn’t wait to get back to. And it was all in ONE book, for me to read to my heart’s content! 😀

So what’s it about?

Okay before you forge ahead to the rest of the review… I would request you skip the next section, because, while it’s pretty obvious from the blurb what it’s about, and I don’t really give anything away, I say go in blind as of now (or just read the blurb and nothing more). Because it’s HOW the author unravels their entire story for us, that makes this book SO special. Well, at least, one of the things that makes it so special. ;)) ‘Kay?

But for those that want to know more…

Kennedy and Jonathan met in a very prestigious private school (although Kennedy felt out of place there, and Jonathan was expected to be an up-and-coming politician who didn’t want to be there), but they met, and despite all odds (and trust me… there were plenty)…

You don’t know this, but that girl? She cries the entire way home from school. She isn’t crying because she got in trouble. It isn’t out of guilt or shame. Her tears have nothing to do with herself. She cries for you, because of the look she saw on your face when you walked away. There’s anger in your eyes again and tension in your jaw, and now she knows what that means.

…they found themselves… together.

Jonathan pursues his love of acting, and Kennedy supports him the whole way through, following him anywhere and everywhere, their love so strong it could withstand all of life’s insecurities. Ahhhhhhh young love. 😉

Because of course, as Jonathan begins making his way into Hollywood, and Kennedy continues working menial jobs to support them, the stress kicks in, and feelings of abandonment and rejections rear their ugly heads. And with good reason. The call of Hollywood is great, and the pressures, even greater.

The two aren’t seeing eye-to-eye anymore, and of course the elite of the industry are forcing him to make choices. So many of them… bad.

But this is today (although you’ll see plenty of yester-year too, and really appreciate the whole shebang). Jonathan is a hugely famous Hollywood super-hero star, and it’s killing her to see his face everywhere she goes…

I feel like an obsessed, lovesick fangirl, convinced the heartthrob was supposed to be mine, but he wasn’t.

and Kennedy’s been raising their very young daughter on her own (and working in a grocery store as an assistant manager the entire time).

And here I am— somebody, all right. Assistant Manager Somebody at Piggly Q Grocery in a ‘blink and miss it’ kind of town in upstate New York. Thirteen dollars an hour, forty-plus hours a week, with a full benefits package including (unpaid) vacation days.

Not that I’m ungrateful. I’m doing better than a lot of people. My rent is paid every month. My electricity hasn’t been cut off. I’ve even got overpriced cable! But deep inside, I know this isn’t the kind of greatness my parents envisioned for me.

Struggling, but making it on her own. Despite his attempts at connecting with them…

“It was no one you need to worry about, sweetheart,” Kennedy said, gazing down at a pair of twinkling blue eyes— something her sweet little girl had inherited from him. “The man was just a little lost, but I sent him back on his way.”

And now Jonathan is back in town. And he’s her daughter’s biggest hero (even though she doesn’t even realize he’s her father)…

“Breezeo,” she says again, a little louder this time, gone from my side in a blink. Running.

“Madison!” I call out, darting after her. “Stop!”

Maddie doesn’t stop, but I damn sure do. She’s barely ten feet away, heading for someone approaching the grocery store. She runs right up, blocking the path as she says it again. “Breezeo!”

Oh god.

Oh no.

No, no, no…

Breezeo.

Jonathan stands there, blinking down at her, confusion clouding his face.

And I’ll let you devour it from there. 😀 *waggles eyebrows* Trust me!!! YOU. WILL. LOVE IT!!!!!!!!!

5 stars!