BJ’s Standout Reads September 2018
Rock Star’s Heart by Kella Campbell
This is the classic normal girl hooks up with a rockstar. She’s boring by comparison to his night after night screaming fans, groupies, drugs, naked in public shenanigans. She meets him backstage after his show, and then the story takes a very interesting turn—she is hired by band management to pose as his girlfriend and clean up his image. She takes it on as she would any other job. But what happens when she sees past his party boy exterior and falls for him?
I was totally into this book. The pace kept me interested, and the story was very engaging and made me feel like this sort of scenario could totally happen.
It Ends with Us by Colleen Hoover
In this one we bounce back and forth between Lily’s present and Lily’s past as told through her journal entries. In her past she is a teenager living with a father who abuses her mother. In her present she meets and falls in love with the man she eventually marries—the very driven neurosurgeon Rile. One night Rile gets upset at her and pushes her very aggressively. They talk it out and she tells him that if he lays another hand on her she’ll leave him.
You know where this is going, right? The rest of the book I was bracing myself waiting for the next incident to happen. And I knew it would happen. So, how will it end? Will she stay with him because she loves him or will she leave because she realizes she needs to love herself more? The author also provided her own experience with her abusive father in the afterword, and I am sure it was a grueling book for her to write about, as it was so close to home. It provides insight into the world of domestic violence that is so hard for the rest of us to understand.
BJ Knapp is the author of Beside the Music, available for purchase here. Please sign up for the Backstage with BJ Knapp mailing list to get updates on events, signings, dog pictures and so much more.
added on 09.26.18