Book Review
Blue Midnight by Tess Thompson
Book 1: Blue Mountain Collection
Publisher: Booktrope
Publication Date: June 26, 2014
Format: Paperback - 266 pages
Kindle - 5097 KB
Nook - 686 KB
ISBN: 978-1620154601
ASIN: B00LC9137C
BNID: 2940149726790
Genre: Romance Suspense / Women's Fiction
BUY THE BOOK: Blue Midnight
Disclaimer: I received a copy of the book from the author / publisher in exchange for my honest review and participation in a virtual book tour event hosted by Chick Lit Plus Blog Tours.
Book Description:
Thirteen years later, her husband leaves Blythe for his young associate. Devastated, she’s unable to imagine the next chapter of her life as she packs her family’s belongings to move across town. Unexpectedly, she finds the forgotten slip of paper bearing Finn’s phone number in the back of a drawer.
Hadn’t she tossed it years before as a newlywed, when she vowed to be the perfect wife and mother? Apparently not. Here it remained. Her road not taken.
Facing three weeks without her young daughters, Blythe sets out to find the man she left behind so long ago. With only the name of the small town where he once lived, Peregrine, Idaho, and the memory of their last kiss under a starry sky, she heads across the Pacific Northwest in search of him.
What she finds in the foothills of Blue Mountain challenges everything she thought she knew and is the very last thing she expected. Within days, her life changes forever. But it is her destiny and destinies cannot be denied.
The first book of the Blue Mountain Collection, laced with Thompson’s lovable but complex characters, Blue Midnight is a mature love story about second chances, family, and the complexities of trust and vulnerability after betrayal.
Book Excerpt:
Chapter 1
I found it at the very back of my bedside table drawer, next to a forgotten bottle of nail polish. I’d forgotten to empty the drawers in preparation for the movers that morning and was doing so now, shoving most of the neglected or forsaken contents into trash bags. But this scrap of paper, it stopped me. Shaped like a duck’s beak and wedged between the bottom of the drawer and the back panel, with just its tip exposed, it wasn’t enough, really, to indicate something of any significance. But I knew. I knew in an instant. I stood motionless, taking in every jagged detail. Then, I tugged; it came loose easily. This small slip of paper with a man’s name and number scrawled in blue ink seemed benign enough. Finn Lanigan 208-555-2004. And yet, the pulse at my neck quickened. Heat traveled from my center to every limb. I sank on molten legs to the stripped mattress. I held this scrap of paper, torn from a bar receipt, between damp fingers and stared at it like the ghost it was.
I’d tossed it years before, hadn’t I? Surely I had, in one of my moments that first year of marriage when my loyalty was resolute. Hadn’t I disposed of it when I embraced my choice? Apparently not. Here it lived. My temptation. My road not taken.
My daughters’ voices floated up the winding staircase from where they chased one another like wanton puppies in the now nearly empty 4,500 square feet of custom floors, intricate finish work, and marble countertops. I went to the window that faced the street and looked out onto our neighborhood park, empty this morning of children. Today was the first day of summer vacation and children and their mothers were sleeping late. How many hours of my life had I spent in that park, pushing my babies in swings, chasing after them as toddlers, and, when they were old enough to climb the play structures by themselves, chatting with other mothers about this milestone or that? The hours could not be calculated, of course, nor the wages lost by choosing to stay at home with my children instead of continuing my career.
The windows were open to let the fresh June air cleanse away all remnants of the scents of my family before the new owners claimed it with their own smells. Outside, the movers shouted to one another as they loaded the family room couch into the moving truck. My neighbor from two doors down walked by the truck, her eyes averted. Her manicured hands grasped the leash of her Labradoodle. She couldn’t look. It was easier to pretend the collective nightmare for almost every woman in our affluent Seattle neighborhood had not happened to someone in their circle, someone with whom they exercised, had dinner parties, and volunteered at private school. Someone they liked. A stay-at-home mom, almost forty-five, left by her husband for another woman and forced to leave her beautiful home and sought-after neighborhood. I was everyone’s worst-case scenario.
My eyes went back to the slip of paper in my hand.
If you change your mind, here’s this. Then he’d kissed me one last time under an Idaho star-scattered sky larger than any other. After the kiss I wished would last forever ended, as all good things must, I turned away, back to the life I’d agreed to, the wedding I’d committed to. It was the last kiss that ever weakened my knees, the last sky I noticed for thirteen years.
Now, Clementine, my seven-year-old, pounded up the stairs, followed by the tip-tap of her older sister Lola in her flip-flops. I shoved the slip of paper in the pocket of my shorts. I couldn’t know then why I didn’t just toss it in the garbage like I had so many memories and possessions in the weeks preceding. I know now. It was my destiny, and destinies cannot be denied.
I found it at the very back of my bedside table drawer, next to a forgotten bottle of nail polish. I’d forgotten to empty the drawers in preparation for the movers that morning and was doing so now, shoving most of the neglected or forsaken contents into trash bags. But this scrap of paper, it stopped me. Shaped like a duck’s beak and wedged between the bottom of the drawer and the back panel, with just its tip exposed, it wasn’t enough, really, to indicate something of any significance. But I knew. I knew in an instant. I stood motionless, taking in every jagged detail. Then, I tugged; it came loose easily. This small slip of paper with a man’s name and number scrawled in blue ink seemed benign enough. Finn Lanigan 208-555-2004. And yet, the pulse at my neck quickened. Heat traveled from my center to every limb. I sank on molten legs to the stripped mattress. I held this scrap of paper, torn from a bar receipt, between damp fingers and stared at it like the ghost it was.
I’d tossed it years before, hadn’t I? Surely I had, in one of my moments that first year of marriage when my loyalty was resolute. Hadn’t I disposed of it when I embraced my choice? Apparently not. Here it lived. My temptation. My road not taken.
My daughters’ voices floated up the winding staircase from where they chased one another like wanton puppies in the now nearly empty 4,500 square feet of custom floors, intricate finish work, and marble countertops. I went to the window that faced the street and looked out onto our neighborhood park, empty this morning of children. Today was the first day of summer vacation and children and their mothers were sleeping late. How many hours of my life had I spent in that park, pushing my babies in swings, chasing after them as toddlers, and, when they were old enough to climb the play structures by themselves, chatting with other mothers about this milestone or that? The hours could not be calculated, of course, nor the wages lost by choosing to stay at home with my children instead of continuing my career.
The windows were open to let the fresh June air cleanse away all remnants of the scents of my family before the new owners claimed it with their own smells. Outside, the movers shouted to one another as they loaded the family room couch into the moving truck. My neighbor from two doors down walked by the truck, her eyes averted. Her manicured hands grasped the leash of her Labradoodle. She couldn’t look. It was easier to pretend the collective nightmare for almost every woman in our affluent Seattle neighborhood had not happened to someone in their circle, someone with whom they exercised, had dinner parties, and volunteered at private school. Someone they liked. A stay-at-home mom, almost forty-five, left by her husband for another woman and forced to leave her beautiful home and sought-after neighborhood. I was everyone’s worst-case scenario.
My eyes went back to the slip of paper in my hand.
If you change your mind, here’s this. Then he’d kissed me one last time under an Idaho star-scattered sky larger than any other. After the kiss I wished would last forever ended, as all good things must, I turned away, back to the life I’d agreed to, the wedding I’d committed to. It was the last kiss that ever weakened my knees, the last sky I noticed for thirteen years.
Now, Clementine, my seven-year-old, pounded up the stairs, followed by the tip-tap of her older sister Lola in her flip-flops. I shoved the slip of paper in the pocket of my shorts. I couldn’t know then why I didn’t just toss it in the garbage like I had so many memories and possessions in the weeks preceding. I know now. It was my destiny, and destinies cannot be denied.
My Book Review:
After forty-five year old Blythe Heywood's thirteen year marriage ends in divorce when her husband leaves her for a younger woman, she is left devastated and uncertain of what to do next with her life. While packing up the remainder of her belongings from the marital home that was sold, Blythe finds a scrap of paper stuck in the back of her bedside table. The paper takes Blythe back to the past ... thirteen years ... when she traveled a month before her wedding to Peregrine, Idaho to attend the Sun Valley Folk Music Festival. While at the festival Blythe met thirty-six year old Finn Lanigan, and spent a three-day weekend with him. While the affair was innocent, they only shared a few kisses, there was something between them, a connection that Blythe never felt before or since, but Finn was her road not taken, and when their shared weekend came to an end, Blythe returned home to honor her commitment to marry Michael Graham. But Finn's last words stayed with her all these years ... "if you change your mind, here's this..." a note with his name and number, and one last kiss under an Idaho star-filled night ... When Michael remarries and takes their two children on his honeymoon to Hawaii for three weeks, Blythe's sister Bliss convinces her to take a road trip back to Peregrine, to that road not taken, and find Flinn. Blythe's road trip to Peregrine will be a journey of self-discovery that will change her life and even bring an unexpected second chance at love.
Blue Midnight is a wonderful story of self-discovery and second chances. Author Tess Thompson weaves a magical tale of romance with a mixture of mysticism, mystery and suspense that easily draws the reader into Blythe Heywood's story. Set in Seattle, Washington and Peregrine, Idaho, the reader follows Blythe on her emotional journey back to the road not taken, a journey of self-discovery and unexpected second chances that will change her life.
I love author Tess Thompson's smooth flowing style of storytelling. She easily draws the reader in as she weaves a spellbinding tale of romance with a touch of mystery and suspense. As this complex and multi-layered story unfolds with elements of lost love, disappointment, betrayal, heartbreak, family drama, secrets, loss, forgiveness, and unexpected second chances, the reader is swept away with the raw emotions, drama, and intriguing twists and turns that will keep them captivated and turning the pages.
Blue Midnight is a captivating story of taking an emotional journey back to the road not taken and truly finding oneself.
RATING: 5 STARS
About The Author
But, as she recently said to a friend, "Well, maybe not 'great' but certainly American."
The first of these, Riversong (Booktrope Editions), went on to become #1 on Barnes and Noble’s Nook Book chart in October 2011. Two years after its release, readership of Riversong continues to grow, spending weeks in the top 100 Kindle bestsellers; it’s known amongst her friends and family as “the little book that could.”
Caramel and Magnolias, the first in the Legley Bay Collection was released in the fall of 2012. In May of 2013 Tess released the sequel to Riversong called Riverbend and the third in the collection, Riverstar, in August 2013. Tea and Primroses, the second in the Legley Bay Collection was released February 16, 2014. The first in the Blue Mountain Collection, Blue Midnight was released June 30, 2014.
She's currently working on her first historical fiction, Duet For Three Hands, which will be released December 2014.
Like her characters in the River Valley Collection, Tess hails from a small town in southern Oregon. She currently lives in a suburb of Seattle, Washington with her two young daughters, ages 11 and 8, the loves of her life.
Although currently single, Tess has not given up on finding a love story of her own. Until her prince arrives, she's content creating what she hopes are epic, page-turning love stories with a little suspense and mystery for additional spice. She writes in her home office six days a week, sipping countless cups of herbal tea, with two naughty but adorable kittens, (Christmas presents for her daughters) Mittens and Midnight, at her feet. But hopefully said Prince arrives soon to save her from becoming a bitter, crazy cat lady. Did she mention how adorable the kittens are?
Tess loves to hear from you. Drop her a line or visit her Facebook Fan Page or follow her on twitter: @tesswrites.
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Tour Schedule:
August 26 – Keep Calm and Blog On – Review & Q&A
August 27 – Chick Lit Goddess – Q&A
August 27 – Crooks on Books – Review
August 28 – Ski-Wee’s Book Corner – Review
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September 1 – Chick Lit Plus – Review
As always, I love to read your reviews ^.^ I have looked into Chick Lit Plus publishing to apply for tours but I am not quite sure I understand the site :/ Aside from that, this was perfect! I love reading the excerpts <3
ReplyDeleteThank you for stopping by and for your kind comment, I appreciate it. :)
DeleteSo glad you loved it!
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