Watching the Sky Cry by J.B. Hartnett

Release Date: 09.24.2016

Synopsis:

Ten years is a long time when you’re thirty-two. We’d seen our share of ups and downs, but I could honestly say, they were mostly up. That’s the thing about happiness though. It lulls you into a false sense of security.

Neither one of us ever thought we’d ever be touched by crippling loss or immeasurable grief. But not all stories have a happy ending, and I knew, better than anyone, that sometimes, one of you won’t make it till the end. One of you has to go first. And one of you will be left behind to pick up the pieces.

That one is me.

But starting over isn’t what I thought it would be. I need escape from the memories that plague me, remind me. So I went back to where it all began. To the town where I was born. To the place whose beauty could pierce my pain. Where I experienced my first kiss, where I fell in love, where a man was my earth. And I…

I was his sky.

Review:

I was lured into reading Watching the Sky Cry by the beautiful title and the intriguing blurb but when I finished this story I felt like it was missing something,maybe there were too many different plots to follow or maybe it was the disjointed telling.

Rylie and Quentin's complicated reunion broke my heart page after page,I could easily imagine how difficult it can be to find your way back into the life of your first love after twenty years.  Fortunately I felt relieved when I turned the last page.

Excerpt:

You never had a girlfriend.” I whispered.

“No, Rylie. I didn’t.”

I pushed away from him, my mouth coating itself in preparation for what was to come, and ran toward the field behind his parents’ house. I threw up everything in my stomach, but I kept heaving with wracking sobs, unable to keep my shit together. If I’d listened….if I’d answered his letters…if I hadn’t met Nick…

His hands were in my hair, pulling it back, but it was no use. I was a mess in every way possible.

“This isn’t…” I hiccupped, “how I imagined this going.”

“Yeah?” he said softly. “How’d you imagine it?”

“We would have it out, and then we’d have angry sex, and then we’d fall in love and have babies and live happily ever after.”

See? Honesty.

“Oh Rylie,” he said with humor in his voice, not at all bothered when he wiped the edges of my disgusting mouth with his hand. “I’ll be pissing you off again…probably on purpose just so we can have that angry sex you just mentioned.”