Gone Too Soon by Dani Atkins ~ a Review

by Susan Roberts

"He'd have done everything differently, if he'd known.  He'd have held her tighter, kissed her longer,, or simply wound his arms around her and refused to let her go.  If he'd known." (p 1)

Amazon affiliate links are used on this site. A free book was provided by an honest review.

February 2021; Bookouture; 978-1800195134
ebook, print (388 pages); women's fiction

Gone Too Soon is an emotional journey through grief for a small tight-knit family.  Lisa is married to Alex and they have a six-year-old son named Connor.  Alex feels that Lisa saved him by seeing the person he was under his rough exterior and they had a happy and fulfilling marriage.  Connor and his mom have a very close relationship and they deeply connect over astronomy - she is an astronomer and is teaching him about the stars.  One normal morning, she has to take the train to present a paper at the Astronomy Fair.  She promises Connor that the two of them will go to the museum very soon.  Then she kisses her husband and son and leaves the catch the train.  But the train never gets to its destination because there is an accident and Lisa is critically injured.  When Alex finally finds the hospital that she's been taken to, the doctors inform him that Lisa is brain dead and will not recover.  The doctors also tell him that she wanted to be an organ donor and wanted to help other people regain their lives.  He agrees and her heart, eyes, lungs, and kidney are donated to four people.  In his grief, he feels that he has to meet the four people because part of Lisa lived on in them.  As he and Connor struggle with their grief, he eventually meets the four people who were able to have their lives back thanks to Lisa's gift.  

This story is also told from Molly's point of view.  She is the woman who received Lisa's heart.  As she struggles to come to terms with her new life, she begins to feel very strongly for Alex and Connor.  Will continuing to be friends with the four organ recipients prolong Alex's grief or will he begin to heal?  Can he and Connor become close again and become a family of two?

Gone Too Soon is an emotional book about a very sensitive topic. The author lets us feel the family's grief and the characters are so well written that you understand their struggles.  I can guarantee some tears as you read this book.  This is my first book by this author and I plan to read some of her earlier books now.  She tells a beautiful story that is full of grief but ends on a note of hopefulness for the future.

Buy Gone Too Soon at Amazon

(The ebook is a free read for Kindle Unlimited subscribers)

About the Author

Dani Atkins is an award-winning novelist. Her 2013 debut THEN AND ALWAYS (published as FRACTURED in the UK) has been translated into seventeen languages and has sold more than half a million copies globally.

Dani is the author of five other bestselling novels (THE STORY OF US, OUR SONG, THIS LOVE, WHILE I WAS SLEEPING and A MILLION DREAMS) and PERFECT STRANGERS, a standalone eBook novella. In 2018, THIS LOVE won the Romantic Novel of the Year Award at the RNA awards in London. 

Dani lives in a small village in the English countryside, in a 300-year-old cottage, with her husband, one Siamese cat, and a very soppy Border Collie.

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Susan Roberts lives in North Carolina with her husband of over 50 years.  She grew up in Michigan but now calls North Carolina home. Since her travel plans had to be canceled for this year, she is starting to make plans for travel in 2021. She reads almost anything (and the piles of books in her house prove that) but her favorite genres are Southern fiction, women's fiction, and historical fiction. Susan is a top 1% Goodreads Reviewer. You can connect with Susan on Facebook, Goodreads, or Twitter.

 

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