A wonderful new novel from best selling author, Kathryn Freeman. Highly recommended.What if your dreams were so close you could reach out and touch them? How could anyone resist Michael Tennant, with his hypnotic blue eyes and voice like molten chocolate? Jessie Simmons certainly can’t. But Jessie’s a single mum who can’t sing to save her life – there’s no way she’ll ever cross paths with the … star tenor. At least that’s what she thinks until she’s unexpectedly invited to take part in a new reality TV show. The premise? Professional singers teach hopeless amateurs how to sing. The surprise? Jessie’s partner is none other than Michael Tennant!As she becomes better acquainted with the man behind the voice, will Jessie find out the hard way that you should never meet your idols? Or will she get more than she bargained for?
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I’m sure we’ve all daydreamed about meeting our star crushes in RL. How, with just one look, they’d fall instantly in lust, I mean, love with us. Yeah, right, that’s why they’re called daydreams for a reason *snorts*.
My reality would probably be making a huge T-I-T out of myself *shudders*. Klutz – thy name is Laura!
I could empathise with single mum Jessie’s elation and apprehension about meeting the man she’d secretly fantasised about in person. Sweaty palms doesn’t even cover it! I wouldn’t be able to string two words together. I’d be praying for the ground to swallow me whole.
I became immersed in the budding romance between Jessie and Michael. I especially loved that they were older, so both had their own ‘baggage’ to deal with and personal responsibilities.
Despite his fame and fortune, Michael doesn’t have it all – go figure! He really endeared himself to me with his social ineptitude which led to some giggling on my behalf (especially with Jessie’s boys). I know, I know, I’m a bad person but he was too cute in these moments. In my defence though, he’s still in my ‘I’d-climb-him-like-a-tree’ category. Too much? Sorry… *blushes*
Jessie and Michael’s chemistry was plain for all to see (fair warning: your kindle may get slightly hot), but a relationship needs more than chemistry to work.
Falling in love is easy, but when you live in two different worlds it’s never going to plain sailing.
Sometimes a story comes along where you wish you could give it more than five stars. This is one such story. For me, it’s a perfect ten.
I was on tenterhooks about how Jessie and Michael’s story was going to turn out. I was all ‘yay’ one minute, then ‘oh no’ the next.
I’m a newbie to Kathryn Freeman’s work, but if RFAS is anything to go by I’ll be adding her to my auto-buy list.
One final thing, please tell me I wasn’t the only left humming S Club 7 after reading this book?
*shakes head*
No?!
*shrugs*
Huh, just must’ve been me then…
Who hasn’t had a crush on a superstar and dreamed of meeting them in person, right? Conjured up a scenario where said superstar falls for them and sweeps them off their feet?
Well, the first few chapters of Reach for a Star play out exactly this way. Pharmacist Jessie meets singing superstar Michael when her sons sign her up for a reality tv show, and against all her expectations, somehow they fall for each other!
At the end of the show, however, reality intervenes with a cold hard thump, because Jessie has two sons, aged 10 and 13. By a wild coincidence, that’s precisely the age this reader’s two sons are at, so I know EXACTLY what Jessie’s going through when she feels she has to put them first. Michael’s a genuinely good guy, but he’s an introvert who doesn’t interact well with people on an individual basis. He can’t always find the words to express how he feels and he really doesn’t have any experience either with having to make compromises in relationships or with kids. He tries his best, though, and his best is pretty darn good – but his and Jessie’s worlds are a very long way apart, and for a while it really does look like love isn’t going to conquer all.
This is such an interesting take on the Cinderella trope, looking at the collision of fantasy and reality and the choices we have to make in the cold hard light of day to put those we love best first. Jessie’s decision to let her dream slip away because her sons were the most important people in her life was realism at its most pure and heartbreaking. Of course this is a romance and she and Michael do get their happily ever after, but it’s handled in a really clear-eyed way, making it clear they’ve both had to make compromises and accept changes they wouldn’t have embraced without the incentive of needing to in order to be with the one you love. It’s a genuinely lovely story with characters who felt absolutely real, and I thoroughly enjoyed the read. Five stars.
Disclaimer: I received a review copy of this book via Rachel’s Random Resources.
Favorite Quotes:
Christ, she was murdering the song. While he winced and cringed, she continued to murder it all the way to the end. His eardrums ringing with tuneless screeching his cat – if he’d had one – would have been appalled by, Michael wondered what he was supposed to do now.
What happened? The cat didn’t just get your tongue, it seemed to have chewed it right off.
My Review:
Ms. Freeman’s writing was engaging and heart-squeezing and I liked the premise and enjoyed the colorful and clever strokes of levity as well as most of the storylines. However, I struggled with the overabundance of angst – there was just so much of it with a steady stream of inner musings of insecurities and self-doubts in both main characters. Don’t get me wrong – the writing was ace with insightful observations and entertaining scenarios, my opinion is skewed by a personal aversion for the bitter tang of conflict and inner turmoil, although the majority of my book buddies gobble it up like candy.
The book was well populated and showcased an interesting mix of relevant issues, family drama, parenting concerns, and character quirks. The various settings spanned the globe as Michael, an introverted, and uptight international celebrity vocalist who was uncomfortable with fame, toured his talents across several continents while pining for Jessie, his new love interest and an everyday divorced mom who should only sing when alone in the car, and was even more uncomfortable with his fame than he was.