The Life I Never Asked For by Kira Adams – Book Review

A huge thank you to NetGalley, as well to the author and publisher, for providing me with an ARC of The Life I Never Asked For by Kira Adams in exchange for an honest review.

What It Is About

“You don’t know what you have until it’s gone… except I knew what I had. I had everything.”

Tobin had a dream life, in a pretty house, safe and peaceful, with a loving husband and an adorable daughter. Then everything changed in an instant and her perfect life got shattered to pieces.

But life is never black, white or even gray. While still grieving, devastated and broken, Tobin meets someone who slowly starts to pull her out of her shell. But getting to feel alive again might be more challenging than it seems, especially when you still feel like you don’t have the right to just move on…

The Life I Never Asked For by Kira Adams – My Review

“This is the beginning of the rest of my life. A life I never asked for, nor wanted. A life I need to figure out how to maneuver.”

I’m gonna be completely honest here and just say it – this was one of those books I can’t fully explain (or justify) why I enjoyed it so much. I certainly had a couple of issues with it. But I really, really did love it. I guess sometimes you just need to shush the critic in you and go after your heart.

It’s been so long since the last time I read a romance with a dark, heavy underlining story. I thought I was over them, but this felt good. I read the whole book in just one sitting, which doesn’t happen often. It’s not a very long book, but still.

The writing style was really good, nice and simple and with a good flow, just the way I like it. The amount of details… It was really good when it comes to certain things, but there were a few instances when things felt a bit rushed, while others were kind of unnecessary.

I don’t know much about grief or survivor’s guilt. But from what little I know, to me it seemed it was handled pretty well and realistic here.

We also get to see a new romance blooming in less than ideal circumstances. And I liked following Tobin and Kiefer slowly falling for each other. Even when they were struggling with it, there was a lot of chemistry between them. Bit of angst to, but mostly just butterflies.

This book was on the “cleaner” side. Though they were obviously attracted to each other, the only intimacy we got to see was kissing and cuddling, and honestly – it was so cute and adorable. I wouldn’t change a thing.

Not sure I liked how a couple of things were handled, though. And then, there were two things that are not exactly unheard of in romance books, but they bother me every single time. They are a bit spoilery, so I won’t say anything specific here.

I will say, though, that I’m not going to even pretend I understood all their reactions. They sure had their reasons, but I still don’t know many people who would act like that, especially given the circumstances.

But that is not a problem only with this book, but with all enemies-to-lovers. I often cannot understand where all the hostility is coming from and in most cases it is painfully obvious that the author just needed to create a conflict.

So yeah, the drama at the beginning and the drama towards the end felt a bit staged. But oh well. At least everything else was good.

All in all, this was quite an enjoyable experience. Not groundbreaking or life changing. But fun. Cute.

This book had its heartbreaking and even enraging moments, but it was mostly just emotional and really, really sweet. I could just pick it up and reread it right now.

Now I definitely wanna check out Kira Adams’ other books, especially since several are rated on Goodreads even better than this one. I can totally see Adams becoming one of my rare go to romance authors…