Your Perfect Year: A Novel

The male narrator is terrible. Couldnt listen tô the book

It ran long and seemed to drag in places. There were some endearing characters, like Leo. The plot would periodically take unexpected twists which kept me listening. Otherwise it ended pretty much as you expected when it started.

I liked the story and the writing better than the narration. It’s a style thing and perhaps, a bit of a tone thing… With two narrators it’s jarring when the sound quality shifts from one to the other and some of the characterizations were so over-the-top it was distracting.

*alert* Should have a trigger warning.

Female protagonist's fiance does something which could cause distress to some people like it did to me. A warning should be available.

This originally appeared at The Irresponsible Reader as part of a Quick Takes Catch-up post, emphasizing pithiness, not thoroughness.
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Ugh. A few years ago I was in the middle of a “I need to read more ‘General Fiction” kick and saw an advertisement (or something) for this—it wasn’t on a blog, I know that much. Something about the description appealed to me, and I got a good Whispersync deal, so the audio and ebook versions sat around since. I wanted to go through the ebook rather than the audio initially—but never seemed to find the time. But I finally broke down and just wanted to get it finished, it’s been calling to me for so long.

I should have held off a little (or a lot) longer. This book didn’t work for me in just about every imaginable way. Within a chapter or two you could see how the whole thing was going to go—including the “big surprise twist”. This is fine if the ride’s enjoyable. But it really wasn’t. The comedy wasn’t all that funny. The drama felt contrived (it’s fiction—all of it is contrived, I realize—but there’s “contrived” and there’s “feeling contrived”). The introspection and self-discovery really didn’t click for me, either.

The best thing I can say about it is that the arc of the publisher of only captial-L Literature and noteworthy Non-Fiction discovering the value and appeal of popular fiction was pleasant (and I just spoiled that…oops). A little self-serving for the writer of popular fiction, but I’m not going to criticize that.

Just pass on this one.

The book description and cover make this seem like a light chick lit read. But, it is not.
I loved the story concept, and initially thought this would be a warm and feel good type novel. But for the most part, it's not.
The characters are battling lots of issues in this book. The aftermath of suicide, dementia, cancer and a failing business just to name a few.
Written from two alternating points of view, Hannah - who filled out the daily planner and John - the man who found it, the story builds around the events that led to the making of the planner and the journey taken to find it's owner.
The story is slow paced with lots of detail. There may be a bit here and there that got lost in translation. But overall, it was very well written with interesting characters and quite a few good twists.
Even though this book was not what I initially expected, I found it to be a really good read.

May have been someone's perfect, but it wasn't mine. Freebie from Amazon.

An unexpectedly good book that got me "journalling" and how to be engaged with life...
Jonathan is rich and stuck in a meaningless life, until he finds a dayplanner on his bike. As he sets off to find the owner, he realizes that he is starting to enjoy his life.

It captivated me from beginning to end, a beautiful story that fills your heart with reconciliation. (Translated from Spanish)