Love Notes by Julie Boozer (Book chat)

I haven't seen a split like that since The Trinket Box (supernatural or Altzheimers'). My own view is that something about the end didn't strike me as quite right. It felt like she was being bought off, and I think even the character felt like that because she does protest but gets overruled.

 

I find myself on the fence. I spent most of the book wishing she would stand up to him, just once, and the fact she never managed to left a nasty taste. There are no consequences for him at all.

 

Picked up a fresh copy so I'm gonna give it a read again and see what I remember.

 

Umm. Just Umm. It is sweet in bits, but some of it left a really nasty taste. There are overtones which are really heartbreaking. Sooner or later its going to hit her that Dad was only three miles away for her entire childhood, and didn't come to see her, but because he gave her money when he died she's not allowed to be angry as she would naturally be.

 

Yeah, its a good book, but it does make the reader uncomfortable. There were bits where I wanted to shake Annie and drag her along to some case histories, because the idea that he will always be your father? Yeah, Not. Some people are just genetic doners.

In her place, I'd have taken the cash, and made a sizable donation to a charity he'd hate, before living it up on the rest. Let him buy his easy conscience, it doesn't buy back the years, he's dead, and I can still think whatever I want about him.

 

I saw an article in the paper by novelist Sarah Ivens ("No father who walks out on his child has the right to be proud..."), and it really sums up what bothers me about this story. What does a man who walks out on his child have a right to expect, and yet her father seems really entitled.

 

Thinking over it, I think the one thing I would like to know which is never revealed is what would the father have done with the money if she hadn't bent over backwards to fulfill his every whim. Would he have still given her the money even if she had said no to everything? Would he still be as "proud", if her answer to his requests was no, I'm not helping out and my life is fine just the way it is thank you very much.

Also, I really don't like the way the book seems to say that fast and free living is right and that quiet, sensible living is the wrong option. It's all about her learning to let go and live a little due to her father's upcoming demise at which point she gets the reward, so to speak.