TBP May 2, 2017
352 Pages
On the cusp of turning fifty, Adam Sharp likes his life. He’s happy with his partner Claire, he excels in music trivia at quiz night at the local pub, he looks after his mother, and he does the occasional consulting job in IT.
But he can never quite shake off his nostalgia for what might have been: his blazing affair more than twenty years ago with an intelligent and strong-willed actress named Angelina Brown who taught him for the first time what it means to find—and then lose—love. How different might his life have been if he hadn’t let her walk away?
And then, out of nowhere, from the other side of the world, Angelina gets in touch. What does she want? Does Adam dare to live dangerously? -Goodreads
If you haven’t noticed, I love reading Graeme Simsion books. There is something about his writing that is honest and reliable even from a male’s perspective. This is still the case with The Best of Adam Sharp, however, I didn’t really enjoy this book.
Firstly, this book was different and I can see the author taking a risk. I don’t mind the risque scenes; they were surprising but I don’t mind them. What bothered me about this book was Adam and how boring he was even when his past was discussed. His tone never changes… not even once throughout the book. Because of that it made it extremely difficult to read this book (took me a week).
The book was slow and it dragged. There was no real life or passion within this book. It was hard to tell if Adam was actually in love or if it was more infatuation. It didn’t feel real at the beginning nor at the end. Overall that is what the book was lacking; deep emotion, real heartbreak, real anger etc..
Another issue I had was Adam is selfish and the love of his life was just as selfish and became even a worst person as she got older. This told a lot about Adam. He wasn’t the hero you want to love and I was disappointed in him and the weak characters around him. I say weak characters because no one really fought for what they wanted. I can’t even say Adam did because he went with whatever was allowed.
The music element was cute. It added some character to the book but the music didn’t define Adam nor was it as important as I thought it would be. The music was defined based on his relationship. Yeah, he did trivia at the pub but he music wasn’t his life nor was he missing it.
I wanted better from this book. I wanted to be moved because it was different from The Roise Project. I like where the author is going with this but it needs some more work. I didn’t feel this was a bad book but it wasn’t something I would read or recommend unfortunately.
2 Pickles
Motif by Tanya 