As You Come Undone

(The Walker Boys #3), by Molli Moran

Publication: July 9, 2018

as you come undone About the book:

She’s not looking for love and neither is he. But when their worlds collide, they can’t ignore what their hearts want.

Jenna Rutledge doesn’t have time for any more complications. She’s already busy battling for a divorce from her heartless ex and re-opening her small-town library. She absolutely doesn’t have time for a fling—unless it’s with charming Ethan Walker, who she meets on an escape to the beach. For two scorching nights, she forgets the reality waiting back home and all the reasons not to open up to Ethan.

But back home, she misses how he made her feel—happy, safe, and wanted for the first time in too long. Luckily, the universe isn’t through throwing the two of them together, bad timing or not.

Ethan always puts his family first and himself last. He didn’t plan on vivacious Jenna shaking up his plans, and shattering his self-control and his routines—but she’s the one person who makes him come undone. He can’t deny his feelings for her or that, for the first time, he sees a path to happiness for himself…if he can get to Jenna’s heart.

Jenna is running out of time to decide what she believes in more: Ethan’s staying power or her fear of being hurt again. But with their toughest test threatening everything, she’ll have to make a decision once and for all.

My Review

Seeing that I had an unusual free day today, I decided to pick something from my NetGalley shelf to read and review. Although published in July 2018 I promise that I just downloaded this in January of 2019! As you Come Undone is the 3rd novel in the Walker Brothers series, but I haven’t read any of the previous in the series. Actually, I don’t think I realized it was a family saga until I started it today. But enough babbling…

Here is what I liked about the novel. First and foremost is Ethan himself. What an incredible character! He was kind, loving, sexy as hell, romantic, giving, patient, and so on. I was hooked as soon as he reached the Reese’s for Jenna in the convenience store!

Secondly, Jenna had the potential to be an incredible lead female character. She was smart, beautiful, funny, and a great friend. I love seeing character rise about crap that they have experienced and/or endured and making a happy life for themselves, which gave her amazing potential of being a fantastic character. Although I had other issues with her, she scored huge points with me for being a previous book blogger turned librarian!

I also loved the Southern setting and Southern hospitality, especially when they frequented Louisa’s diner. The small town vibe was strong in this one (to a point) and it gave the novel an overall homey feel. And of course, I have to mention the incredible sexy scenes between Ethan and Jenna. Bravo to Molli Moran for thinking up and publishing some very hot and intimate moments 🙂

Unfortunately, there were several things that I struggled with. First of all, Jenna’s angst was drawn out waaaay too long! She was only 24 and yes she was getting a divorce but she is not the first person to be cheated on by a douche of a person so I found myself getting very tired of her issues very early on in the novel. She met this incredible person and suddenly she had multiple personalities. One minute she was happy with Ethan, having great sex, meeting friends and family and so on. But the next minute she’s scared and things are moving too fast and she’s running. But then she misses him. Then she pushes him away. Had this back and forth of emotions been in a shorter novel I probably wouldn’t even mention it. However, this went on for over 300 pages.

Secondly, I struggled with the writing style. I think I’ve just gotten so accustomed to first-person narratives that this being told from the third-person was odd for me. With such heavy emotions being dealt with, I think it would have been more believable told from the first-person. Not trying to be nit-picky, it just felt forced and honestly, at times, I was confused about who was saying what.

Lastly, and please understand that this in no way suggests any personal issues with the LBGTQ+ community, but isn’t this set in a tiny town in Georgia? I realize that it’s 2019 but there were three different characters identifying as being bisexual in this novel. O.k., so one of those characters actually lived in Texas but also a tiny town. I have lived a multitude of places and had the pleasure of befriending numerous people from all walks of life with a variety of sexual orientations, however, I struggle with both Jenna and Ethan both having best friends in this little Southern town openly identifying as bisexual. Furthermore, I struggle with absolutely no one in the town caring about it. In a perfect world, no one would care or even think about someone’s sexual orientation, unfortunately, that is not the case. But what is even stranger to me is that is was such a prominent issue early in the novel, only to be sort of forgotten about later on. Why was it discussed in such an oddly emotional way so frequently in the first 1/3 or so of the novel, but then only came up maybe once more when Ethan was having yet another heart to heart with Darren?

My apologies for carrying on and on and please understand that I did like this book. As stated previously, I have nothing but love for Ethan and I had several moments of love for Jenna. I think that if this book was shorter and written in the first person, it would have been a 4 or 5 star read for me.

*Thanks to NetGalley for providing this review copy in exchange for my honest review.