Sunday, December 9, 2012

The Edge of Never by Jessica Ann Redmerski

Ok so I know I promised to put out my review on the Lux Series by Jennifer L. Armentrout except I've just been distracted because I read this book called The Edge of Never which is by Jessica Ann Redmerski (obviously because you've seen the blog title and the book cover but anyway..) – I just wanted to get my feelings off my chest for that book before I can even focus back on the Lux Series.. (And if your wanting an update ! I'm about 1/3 of the way through which means I've finished the Obsidian section of the post.. At the moment I'm reading Opal (Lux #3) and it is really really good ! but that is another story for another day.)

Hmm how should I even start with The Edge of Never.. ~I think I'll start with the things it taught me and then work backwards: plot outline, characters and a little bit of English analysis to the cooking pot for this scrumptious recipe~ This book first started out as a little bit of a clich̩ for me, there were a couple of times when I felt like putting the book down.. but that was before the book started to suck me in Рthe biggest thing the book has taught me is to live in the moment..

“You dwell on the past, you can’t move forward. Spend too much time planning for the future and you just push yourself backwards, or you stay stagnant in the same place all your life.”

“Live in the moment.. where everything is just right, take your time and limit your bad memories and you’ll get wherever it is you’re going a lot faster and with less bumps in the road along the way.”

Basically these two quotes sum up the whole book.. But the challenge is to actually do it. It might be written in a book but it is a lot harder to actually do than it is to say. This book revolves around two people – Camryn Bennett and Andrew Parrish who both are total strangers to one another, however they find themselves on a bus traveling to nowhere, both are trying to find or regain their lost lives – Camryn's past drives her to leave town after her fall out with her bestfriend (since year two) over Damon (Nat's boyfriend who has been eyeing Camryn since year seven in school) and Andrew is traveling to Wyoming to visit his father who is dying of an inoperable tumor in his brain. On the bus, the pair grow to like each other a lot. They stick together and their relationship starts to blossom – each with their own quirky nature both seem to bounce off each other constantly – you can feel the underlying romance starting to blossom before they do ! .. It isn't until a run in with the Parrish family that you see the strength the two of them have together, she trusts him after saving her from the clutches of a sick man at a bus station and she returns the favor by sticking it to his bossy sibling Aidan.

~But hold on.. You'd think the story stops there wouldn't you well it doesn't~ the pair decide to journey back to Texas on a road trip of sorts – the pair's relationship reaches a new high after they decide to open up to each other like both of them haven't before. Andrew coaxes Camryn out of her tall and unyielding stronghold she has built around herself to hide her past from the world. Andrew teaches Camryn to indeed live "out-of-the-box" instead of dreaming – to actually conquer fear and to actually embrace her gifts and to ultimately live a whole life again.

~I enjoyed Camryn as a character, right from the get go I felt a connection with her~ At the start of the book, Redmerski presents Camryn as a sort of dependent and lost woman, but it really wasn't until she decided to do something with her life that the onion layers really started to peel back... ~Sorry that I likened her to an onion, she isn't like an onion although there were times where I almost cried.. ~ Camryn actually had the guts to stand up for herself and actually embrace life (with the help of Andrew of course) – she developed into a woman who could say what she wanted and actually went for it. She was strong enough to accept the past and to finally lay it to rest.

Andrew was the sort of guy that all women should want (except you must remember that this is just a story) – he treated Camryn like she held his world in her hands – and she did. You could tell from the start that they were out to achieve things together, he was taught to be a man (or more like a stereotypical version of an "alpha male" – he was drilled to not talk about feelings because according to his father "crying is for pussies." He seemed strong and masculine at the start of the book – however Camryn managed to strip away the armor he wore to protect himself from any emotion that threatened to tear him apart – she taught him that being emotional was okay ~And it's true – having emotion and showing it is what makes us human~ she gave him enough strength to conquer his demons...

BUT. THE SECRET.. *Queue the dramatic music* I got about 4/5 into the book and I was questioning the whole secret sort of thing. I mean up until then there was nothing of the sort – but trust me when I say this, it came out of nowhere. ~Look I can't really tell you what the secret was, but I can tell you it explained a lot about different tensions in the Parrish family... And trust me I'm trying really hard at the moment to not spoil it for you.. ~

The plot was really great up until the last bit of the story, the story rushes over things a lot in the end, it seemed as if Jessica had to rush to finish the book or maybe even conform to a fixed word count. She seemed to rush and gloss over the tie ups ~what I mean by that is the little "what ifs" in the story to the characters – she didn't explore enough detail and to be perfectly honest the story didn't end with a boom – more of a lessened bang – I felt less impacted even though the story built up perfectly... ~ However regardless of that small problem with the book it was really really good and I loved it, to be honest it isn't a book I'd read over and over again (this book is like a twice read book). I'd recommend this book to people who want to learn some really impacting morals, love characters that have demons to face and those who love a romance that isn't only built upon sex but memories and experiences (but trust me the sex scenes were good too – they weren't over the top like some books I've read, the book focused on an actual relationship rather than just a physical one). I liked it a lot and I hope you do to.

Ryan:)