Cathy Gohlke

Michael, a Titanic survivor living in New Jersey, develops a friendly correspondence with Annie, an Englishwoman whose brother died in the disaster, that evolves into love, but their budding relationship is threatened by the onset of World War I.

Promise Me This

Mary Horton

*sighs* Oh, how I wanted to like this . . . 

I'm sorry to say that I just didn't connect much at all with this book or its characters. I had heard a lot of good things about it and really REALLY wanted to like it. But alas - it wasn't meant to be.

 L I K E S: 

- The idea. Okay, here's the thing: the synopsis sounded SO GOOD. I really loved the idea behind this book & there are a lot of ways I think it could have worked - but it just didn't. So WOOHOO for good ideas! Not so much for execution.

- Owen. Oh, dear Owen. *sniffles* Though I liked some of the characters okay, Owen was the only one I felt attached to and . . . well, read the synopsis. He doesn't stick around long. D:

- Ummm . . . the cover is nice? *scratches head* I know there was something else I liked - but my mind is drawing a blank. We'll just round off the positives with mentioning how pretty this cover is. 'Tis a fine specimen, my friends. *approves*

 D I S L I K E S: 

- The writing. Oh boyyyyy. The writing about drove. me. crazy. It feels like someone is telling you things the ENTIRE book. You don't get the chance to feel any of the characters' emotions. Instead, you're told them. All the time. The writing is rather void of personality or depth. It felt flat, and because of that, the characters felt flat, too. Not to mention the fact that WE'RE JUMPING IN OTHER CHARACTERS' HEADS EVERY TWO SECONDS. I lost count of how many POVs are in this book, but I'm guessing at least ten or twelve. Would you please just pick a couple POVs and stay there?? Sometimes having a lot of POVs works really well, but in this case, all it ended up doing was making it impossible for me to connect to any of the characters.

- ANNIE. She got much better, I will admit, but I had a lot of Issues with this girl for the majority of the book. She comes across as being extremely petty, condescending, and unfeeling for the first 150 pages or so. (Seriously, she acted like she was 10 years old . . . and I was supposed to believe she was going on 15? *squints*) Not to mention the fact that she (view spoiler)[almost killed her aunt when she was lying helpless in bed. Granted, her aunt was HORRENDOUS, but I was just shocked that she never felt remorse for almost killing her. Instead, she regretted NOT having killed her. WHAT. THE. HECK.  (hide spoiler)] Yes, Annie improved greatly later in the book; but I just never liked her as a character or person very much.

- It just didn't work. I don't know how to put this exactly, but this book just did not work, at all. I was under the impression that the book started during WWI, with flashbacks to the Titanic. But it actually started in 1912 and went allllllll the way to 1919. THAT'S SEVEN YEARS, PEEPS. Seven. Years. Everything was rushed and muddled. I felt perpetually confused as to what year we were in. The setting was never really developed, and I felt things just got glossed over. There was so much potential for this story. I can come up with at least 3 or 4 plots that would have worked WAY better. But instead . . . this happened: a book that was trying too hard to include everything and instead ended up feeling cheap, forced, and confusing. 

- So many loose ends/missed opportunities/etc. In all, I'm just really disappointed and confused. A lot of interesting aspects of WWI could have been explored instead of just trying to cram in the ENTIRE war + the Titanic + that random time in between. A lot of loose ends and unsatisfactory explanations were given. I felt deprived of the richness and emotion that should have come with these heartbreaking historical events. I didn't FEEL anything. (Except perhaps frustration.) I don't mean to rant, my brain just feels like it's been majorly messed with, and I don't like that. :/

SO YEAH. I'm a very confused/disappointed bookdragon right now. I wanted to like this book, but it sadly fell short of all my expectations. I'm not in any way trying to bash this book - it just was genuinely not for me. :)

2 stars

Promise Me This

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