Save the Date Review

I took about 10 hours on my day off (Lincoln's Birthday) to begin, immersed myself in, and finish Jenny B. Jones' new February release Save the Date. Once again, Jenny has crafted a superb story, worthy of her reputation as a witty, award-winning writer.

Here's the blurb from the author's website:

Desperate times call for desperate proposals.

Former NFL star Alex Sinclair is a man who has it all–except the votes he needs to win his bid for Congress. Despite their mutual dislike, Alex makes Lucy a proposition: pose as his fiancee in return for the money she desperately needs to keep her girls home afloat. As Lucy is forced into South Carolina high society, she discovers the very people she wanted to stay away from are the ones who know secrets about her past. Bound to a man who isn’t quite what he seems, Lucy will find her heart on the line as she helps Alex in his campaign, knowing when it’s over she will have to walk away. But when God asks Alex and Lucy to scrap their playbook and follow his rules, will they finally say, “I do”?


I would have thought Jenny wouldn't be able to write a book that topped Just Between You and Me in my estimation, but I believe she might have done it! Judging on how long it took me to read it, that is, I should say she did it for sure. She's got the best banter of just about any writer I've ever read. I would just giggle like a schoolgirl reading her dialogue or descriptions. Really funny girl, that Jenny B. Jones. Makes me wish I had her on speed dial to make me laugh when I need a pick-me-up.

Who doesn't like a forced-arrangement for the hero and heroine? Jenny puts a nice, fresh spin on it. Both struggle with issues within their family, Lucy for her lack of it and Alex for his abundance of it. Coming to terms with understanding who you are and how that is or isn't reliant on who your parents are is an issue any reader can relate with. Finding our own path, and making sure it's a path God wants us on, is part of maturing in our faith. It was great to read about Lucy and Alex's faith journey.

Jenny did a great job of portraying her characters as they dealt very realistically with self-defeating and doubt-inflicting lies they had come to believe about themselves. It's truly amazing the lengths a person will go to in order to accommodate these lies. Everything revolves around feeding into the lie--both actions and words.  You can read last week's Thursday Therapeutic Thought on the lies our characters believe if you want more information.

Jenny writes about this in such a way that it's entirely plausible to believe the characters do what they do, operating from that self-defeating way of thinking. You never doubt what they do, just keep turning the pages to see how it will all unravel in the end. And that, friends, is the mark of a wonderful book.

Thanks, Jenny, for one-upping yourself. :)

*NetGalley.com provided a galley of Jenny's book in return for my honest review.*