Beautiful Whispers by Alice Ayden

Release Date: June 4, 2013
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars.

Synopsis:
Sharing a name with a famous author is tough, especially when you're a direct descendent living on the author's estate. Combine that with unexplained memory losses and conflicting stories from everyone around, one can understand why Jane Eva Austen had such a hard time trying to find her place in the world.

Despite the forgotten periods of time, she manages to live a fairly uneventful life until someone from the past returns to the estate. Unanswered questions, unending feuds and a nagging sense of deja vu makes the return all the more interesting and painful for Jane. Will she discover the missing memories in time to save herself? Will she forgo knowing everything to keep up appearances for the family or choose her heart?

Review:
This book was a prize sent to me from a Goodreads.com giveaway. Honestly, I'm torn about this book for several reasons. The premise behind the story and the way the plot reveals itself is well done. The reader is given enough information to answer some of their questions but not enough to ensure that he/she turns the page. The author did a great job in describing the estate and created a lot of colorful characters that brought a bit of levity after some of the more serious or darker parts of the story.

However, I was constantly thrown off by the fact that the main character, Jane, was to be 21 years-old. To me, she acted much younger than that. My first impression of the character was that she was in her early teens and her behavior does little to change that image until I nearly reached the end of the book. There is a sense of growth within the character during the book but to me, it wasn't believable from the start. Maybe if her actions were given a bit of explanation such as being caused by the trauma or memory loss, it would have been different for me.

I was also distracted by quite a few typos, grammar errors and punctuation mistakes. I realize that no manuscript is ever perfect. Even some of the best-selling authors have problems with their books. For me, the mistakes took me out of the story for a moment and that made it difficult to get back into the groove, so to speak. I wholeheartedly believe that will a little more polish, this could be a great read.

Overall, I thought the idea, the plot and many of the characters really made the book worth reading. The way the point-of-view switches between chapters does take a little getting used to, but it was interesting play on our generation being caught up with that of the past. If you're looking for a book filled with love, choices, unexplained time loss and intrigue, then this is one you should check out.

Beautiful Whispers by Alice Ayden is available at Amazon.com in both paperback and Kindle forms. Click the link below for purchasing details.
Beautiful Whispers by Alice Ayden