Living Out Loud - Staci Hart

Living Out Loud 

by Staci Hart

Sam's review:

There are books you want to recommend to your friends. You know, those books you read and loved. And then there are books that swallow you whole, that leave you wanting and hurting, that make you feel as if they abandoned you because they ended. You cannot get over how incredible those books are. In fact, you cannot stop thinking about them even as you start a new book.

Those are the books other stories pale to in comparison. Those are the books you want to force down someone's throat, make them sit next to you while reading just so you can be sure they read it.

Living Out Loud is such a book.

I started this ARC knowing Staci had the ability to crush and break me, but there was a part where I was ready to give up, to give in, because I could not handle Greg's pain. I mean, when does an author ever manage to make you love two characters so much, you rather stop reading than seeing them hurt? That's what she did to me. I messaged her, and she didn't exactly calm me down (yeah, authors are cruel like that), but of course I couldn't abandon Annie and Greg. I needed to see if they'd find what they'd been wishing for, if they'd get the smiles they deserve. 

As an author I should've spent my evening writing, but once I was in the book, not just as the beginning, but the into it for real, I found myself unable to write although I have deadlines and editing to do. I couldn't stop. The characters haunted me while I was walking the dog, and while I was trying to deal with my own characters. I wanted to be left alone, but Greg and Annie didn't follow that plea.

Everyone is placing expectations on you in today's world, but what if the only thing they expect of you is to be safe, to be away from risks? And what if you finally want to risk something, only to realize it might be the best and yet last thing you ever do? Would you do it, or would you stay back and hope something else comes along, less finite, but also less pleasant. Would that make you happy?

Living Out Loud is a book to make you think and feel and consider your own life. Are you living out loud, or just whispering by? 

This book is a must read. I know there'll be more books I'll read in 2018, especially because Kandi Steiner and Staci Hart will release more books, but this one? It already is one of my top reads of 2018 because I know it'll stay with me for a long time to come.

Thank you, Staci, for enduring my comments while reading, and for getting an ARC to me, and for having written this book.

You're getting five out of five book-boyfriends from me.

Everyone, stay glam! 😏

Sam