Hearts Awakening

by Andrea Renee Cox

My favorite things about this book were the beautiful cover and Ethan. That little kid was so adorable and the most well-developed character in the entire story. I loved his journey and transformation.

Unfortunately, there were a lot more things that I disliked about this book, all revolving around the leading male character. Firstly, the leading man thought the leading lady was completely hideous... but then promptly asked her to marry him. Shortly afterward, “Ellie knew [Jackson] would respect her,” but this was the exact opposite of what Jackson had proven to her. Then there was this bit: “Nevertheless, he planned to hold a tight rein of authority over her in the coming days.” So, not only was he rude in asking an ugly woman to marry him so he didn't have to fall in love with her yet could still be married, and completely disrespectful to her, but he also was controlling of her.

And his character only got worse from there. He used both his first wife (deceased) and his second wife (the supposed ugly one) for selfish gain (first, earning a spot on the island; second, to take care of his children), then very heavily considered being unfaithful because of feelings rather than duty, even though this would point-blank defy God, not to mention the scandal (which he had detested about his first wife) that would further surround him and his very young sons. It was a shock to me that he never even thought about how his decision would affect them, even though they had seemed to be his top priority when he asked Ellie to marry him; suddenly they were forgotten because his passion outweighed his fatherly responsibilities. There were other times that he flew off the handle for no apparent reason (though he had excused it in his mind) and threatened his wife.

He was incredibly selfish, and this did not seem to change over the course of the story (except for the last two or three pages of the book). To me, that is not good character growth nor a solid character arc. Jackson was the most underdeveloped of all the characters, which was disappointing as he was one of the leads.

He also wasn't a hero, yet he was placed in the hero's role. Even a rogue-type character generally becomes selfless and nice to his wife along the course of a story, but Jackson hardly did. There were glimpses for a couple of paragraphs at a time that gave me a slight hope for him on occasion, but those were swiftly snuffed out due to his rage and bipolar personality. To me, a hero is a guy who, even though the world might think he chose the ugliest woman as his wife, he still finds her beautiful, he still respects her, and he cherishes her and her opinions. This guy tromped all over his wife's heart and couldn't have cared less if he'd been paid a billion dollars to do so.

I'm not sure if I will try another Parr book, because this one was lacking in a strong lead male. I don't know if that's because the current trend is to focus on strong female leads, but if that's the case, Ellie should have been a lot stronger too. However, I did really enjoy Ethan's character arc, so I think there's a lot of hope for this author to hone in on that for her leads in future books.

I was not compensated for this honest review.