Review: Left Drowning by Jessica Park

Left Drowning by Jessica Park
Publisher: Skyscape
Publication date: July 16th 2013
My rating:  5 stars

 What does it take to rise from life’s depths, swim against the current, and breathe?

Weighted down by the loss of her parents, Blythe McGuire struggles to keep her head above water as she trudges through her last year at Matthews College. Then a chance meeting sends Blythe crashing into something she doesn’t expect—an undeniable attraction to a dark-haired senior named Chris Shepherd, whose past may be even more complicated than her own. As their relationship deepens, Chris pulls Blythe out of the stupor she’s been in since the night a fire took half her family. She begins to heal, and even, haltingly, to love this guy who helps her find new paths to pleasure and self-discovery. But as Blythe moves into calmer waters, she realizes Chris is the one still strangled by his family’s traumatic history. As dark currents threaten to pull him under, Blythe may be the only person who can keep him from drowning.

*This book is intended for mature audiences due to strong language and sexual content.

Note: due to mature content recommended for Ages 17+

Left Drowning started off harmlessly enough and then ripped through ALL of my emotions, bringing me to soaring heights only to crash me down to earth shattering lows!!  Jessica Park thankfully left me on a blissful high.  Ms. Park, you have done a number on me, and I’m still recovering from the rollercoaster ride my heart and mind rode!!  

When we first meet Blythe, she’s not putting her best foot forward.  She’s coming home, after some college party, in a drunken stupor and barely makes it into her dorm room.  She’s been drifting along like this for much of her college years, numb to everything around her.  Blythe hasn’t dealt with her past and so it still cripples her.  But then a change starts to take place when she meets a brood of siblings, quirky, loud, and lovable, and she starts to slowly come out of her fog.  There’s Estelle and Eric, the twins, and Sabin the outgoing, flirt, and then there’s Chris, the oldest sibling and thief of Blythe’s heart. 

Chris feels safe and in control to Blythe and so she starts to reconcile her past a little more and more with his support.  The brothers and sisters help as well, and Blythe the connection she makes with each of them heals her just a little more. With every passing day, though, Blythe is falling harder and harder for Chris, even with his warnings that she’s too good for him, she’s too much for him, and more than he can take.

On closer inspection it becomes apparent that the siblings are not the perfect fun loving group shown to the outside.  Blythe knows a dark cloud hangs over them but doesn’t push.  She knows the need for privacy and the desire to pretend everything is okay can be necessary to survive.  She hopes that the connection she shares with Chris will turn into something more when they both can handle it.  She’s willing to wait for it, it’s everything to her.

Like I said in the beginning, Jessica Park took me on one hell of a rollercoaster ride.  I was climbing up a slow hill creaking along, getting higher and higher, my heart and hopes in a crescendo at the top.  Happy, happy, joy, joy, wonderful highs!! Delicious, steamy, OH-MY-STARS-STEAMY-SCENES!!  Then without warning I’m crashing down the other side down, heart dumped somewhere at the bottom.  I CRIED angry tears, sad tears, and I was generally sort of raging for a good 20% of this book!  My poor husband.  Even a couple of my friends were not spared and got some ranty texts from me.  There may or may not have been cursing involved (there was, lots of words beginning with the letter F!!!).  I didn’t know if I could forgive or forget.  But then the miracle that is Jessica Park’s writing, she turned it all around.  I got answers, and reasons, and I’m almost ashamed at how much I wanted to murder a certain character knowing what I now know.  My heart breaks for everything that was endured and so I can forgive, and I understand.  Plus, things were not all that they seemed….

I loved the final revelations, and how Ms. Park brilliantly put this whole story together.  I figured out a few things in the beginning, but didn’t have the full scope until the end.  I’m still so emotional and so affected from this read, my feelings are still very much at the surface, but I completely LOVED it!!  I’ve been a big fan of Jessica Park since Flat-Out Love, and she did not disappoint with Left Drowning!