Source: Purchased
Genre: Contemporary, Romance, Young Adult
My Rating:
From the author of Letters to the Lost comes a heart-wrenching story of two teens with big secrets and a love that could set them free.
Rev Fletcher is battling the demons of his past. But with loving adoptive parents by his side, he’s managed to keep them at bay...until he gets a letter from his abusive father and the trauma of his childhood comes hurtling back.
Emma Blue spends her time perfecting the computer game she built from scratch, rather than facing her parents’ crumbling marriage. She can solve any problem with the right code, but when an online troll’s harassment escalates, she’s truly afraid.
When Rev and Emma meet, they both long to lift the burden of their secrets and bond instantly over their shared turmoil. But when their situations turn dangerous, their trust in each other will be tested in ways they never expected. This must-read story will once again have readers falling for Brigid Kemmerer’s emotional storytelling.
After adoring Letters to the Lost, I waited far too long to read Rev's story and that's my bad but it was really good and just what I'd hoped to get for Rev’s story.
In Letters to the Lost we all knew Rev had a dark backstory, I mean, he was abused by his dad and was preached at and blamed each time he was hurt. That’s messed up and my heart broke for him each time we learnt something new because a guy that good and that kind did not deserve such a past. He got lucky and was adopted by a truly wonderful couple who couldn’t have been kinder. I cried when I read about why they adopted him and how they developed a connection with Rev. And when you found out the reason they’ve continued to foster children after they’d adopted Rev was because he asked them why they hadn’t. I mean, even once he had a safe home he still wanted his parents to help out others. That’s a truly good person.
Rev was kind-hearted, but he still had so many issues to work through from the abuse of his father and this is what we get in this book. He has to reconcile his father was to blame, not him, for everything that happened to him. Rev was paranoid that he was going to become like his father and he was nothing like that man. It was slow going but he did finally realise it. He had me crying because I cared so much for him and I wanted him to believe the best in his self. His progression in believing himself was helped by a new foster kid that was taken in, Matthew. He was older, a teenager, when he came to them, the oldest child that they’d taken in and this was a new experience for Rev. He worried about how he would react to having someone he could potentially hurt in the house. He thought he could harm him and Matthew helped him slowly realise that he wasn’t that type of person.
Rev was also helped along by Emma. I know this was very much Rev’s book, but it was a little bit Emma’s too. She was not my favourite character, but I liked that a lot of this book was about women in gaming and the sheer amount of abuse they receive simply for their gender. It’s disgusting and it’s half the reason I hate laying online in games because I just don’t want to put up with the idiots you always get that it’s a man’s world. I really respected her passion for gaming and her dedication for trying to make it in the gaming industry, she developed her very own game and she hadn’t even left school But because of it she faced abuse from an online troll who hated women and took it out on her. She was struggling with that when she met Rev by accident and slowly a connection developed. They had a sweet friendship and romance and Rev very much deserved this. Emma wasn’t perfect, I mean she made some idiot choices towards the end of the book, but I got why, but she helped Rev and he helped her and it was what he needed. He needed someone outside of his friends and family to help him realise a few things and drive him outside of his comfort zone and moving forward.
This was exactly the story we deserved for Rev and I’m so glad I read it in the end. I may have been slow about it but I’m so happy to see this book on my shelf.
Have you read this? Wasn’t Rev a sweetheart?
Posts
Social Icons