My ARC Review of Worthy of Love? by J LEA

This is a beautifully written story about a young woman who has had a rough life so far. She wonders will life ever get any better when life takes a turn for the unexpected and walks in the man of her dreams.
Lori is in her last year of high school; Her mother, and younger brother and her have moved to a new town to get away from the past and start anew to help Lori with giving her a new start. The book goes back and forth showing Lori when she was younger in time when things were good and right when things started going bad in her life to current place in the book. Lori has such bad feelings about herself-she thinks she is unlovable and undeserving of happiness and love i.e having a boyfriend, being in a relationship , being loved by her family, just even having friends.

Lori’s life changes when she meets Parker on her way to a speed dating event when he stops to help her change her tire after it blows and she thinks that was the last time she will ever see him but, no, she runs into him again later that night at the speed dating event and they hit it off. In Lori’s world, this is big news because she has never really wanted to let a guy into her world and get close to her and Parker is someone she feels comfortable with and feels at ease with. With Lori, this is cause to celebrate for she doesn’t ever get like this and for her to want to have feelings, it is a good thing.

Parker is a good guy and he too felt something very strong for Lori. There relationship was wonderful and everyone was going along great until he suddenly-BOOM the unthinkable happened- Lori and Parker were no more. Their relationship could no longer be because of his job-Lori kept secrets which was her age (18) and that she was in HS and those secrets impacted their relationship. It would have helped if Parker had mentioned what he did for a living too but because of secrets, that hurt their relationship. I had to keep a box of tissues by me as I read this book. Watching as their relationship imploded hurt because Lori was so heartbroken and Parker was like a man with a dozen root canals done-he was unbearable to be around-super grumpy and nasty at times to Lori. It was sad to see how they wanted to be together but couldn’t. The secondary cast of characters were good, especially Elias, Lori’s best friend. The humor in this book was wonderful and kept us, the reader in good spirits when there was sadness and at times we thought the MC wouldn’t make it. In the end, Parker wised up and realized what he had was worth fighting for and went for Lori with all that he had. Lori realized she needed to let Parker in, and let him in on her secrets , her pain, her everything. They embraced each other’s’ past and present and it was beautiful.

I was so glad to see the journey the MC took because it was beautiful journey. I enjoyed reading this story, even the not so pretty parts; I cried and laughed and just devoured this book. I was sad when it ended but the wonderful epilogue was fantastic. Parker and Lori made a perfect couple and their story was great. This story does feature a teacher/student relationship BUT it was not written in a nasty way. It was beautifully written and the author made this story very real and handled the topic in a sensitive way.

***A gifted copy was provided by the author for my honest review****

My rating: 4.8 stars *****


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