09 Jan 2020

Blog Tour: Every Other Weekend by Abigail Johnson – Review and Giveaway!

Posted in Blog Tour, Giveaways |

Every Other Weekend

Author: Abigail Johnson

Publication Date: January 7th, 2020

Publisher: Inkyard Press

Synopsis: What if your safe place…is a person?

Adam Moynihan’s life used to be awesome. Straight As, close friends and a home life so perfect that it could have been a TV show straight out of the 50s. Then his oldest brother died. Now his fun-loving mom cries constantly, he and his remaining brother can’t talk without fighting, and the father he always admired proved himself a coward by moving out when they needed him most.

Jolene Timber’s life is nothing like the movies she loves—not the happy ones anyway. As an aspiring director, she should know, because she’s been reimagining her life as a film ever since she was a kid. With her divorced parents at each other’s throats and using her as a pawn, no amount of mental reediting will give her the love she’s starving for.

Forced to spend every other weekend in the same apartment building, the boy who thinks forgiveness makes him weak and the girl who thinks love is for fools begin an unlikely friendship. The weekends he dreaded and she endured soon become the best part of their lives. But when one’s life begins to mend while the other’s spirals out of control, they realize that falling in love while surrounded by its demise means nothing is ever guaranteed.

I wanted to read this book ever since I saw the blurb that starts off the synopsis: What if your safe place…is a person?

When I started reading this book, I had NO IDEA I was going to fall in love with it like I did. Wow, it was just so amazing! I love a good contemporary romance, but this had so much more – it was also a novel that had a sort of self-discovery theme, and it dealt with family issues, friendship, and a new love that changes everything.

The characters in this book are just so beautifully written. I love the detail that went into creating them; you can tell that the author of this book really loved them as she wrote them, and that made the book even more enjoyable to read. I don’t like when characters are just kind of thrown in there without us knowing much about them or why they are the way they are, and that wasn’t an issue here. These characters are multi-dimensional and written in a way that you will wish you were actually friends with them in the real world.

The emotions that run through Every Other Weekend from the very start of the book until the last page are beautiful, and will be enough to take you on a rollercoaster ride along with them. I felt everything the main character felt, and it made the story that much more real.

This book is so beautiful. I loved the whole every other weekend/realization of a romance kind of thing this book has going on – it shows you that a person can be your safe place – it doesn’t have to be an actual place after all.

I can relate to that. Not to get mushy, but I met my husband when I was 18 (I’m 30 now), and in the twelve and a half years that we have been together, I have always felt this way about him. No matter where we are, I always felt safe with him. So I have a soft spot for books that kind of take on this theme.

If you are looking for a heartwarming contemporary YA, please don’t miss out on Every Other Weekend. It’s amazing and beautiful and is perfect for fans of YA.

Note: I received a copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!

Abigail was born in Pennsylvania. When she was twelve, her family traded in snow storms for year round summers, and moved to Arizona. Abigail chronicled the entire cross-country road trip (in a purple spiral bound notebook that she still has) and has been writing ever since. She became a tetraplegic after breaking her neck in a car accident when she was seventeen, but hasn’t let that stop her from bodysurfing in Mexico, writing and directing a high school production of Cinderella, and becoming a published author.