Review by MeenuAnnadurai -- Yesterday by Samyann
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MeenuAnnadurai
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- Latest Review: Yesterday by Samyann
Review by MeenuAnnadurai -- Yesterday by Samyann
[Following is a volunteer review of "Yesterday" by Samyann.]
Yesterday is a romantic historical fiction by Samyann, which is wholly based on the concept of reincarnation, tales of prior lives and soulmates. To begin with, I’m personally a big fan of stories of this kind which revolves around reincarnation and stuffs. That’s the main reason why I opted to read this book in the first place and in addition to that, the book had a very impressive blurb which could hardly be resisted.
Yesterday is a story of a girl called Amanda Parker, who has a long history of losing the people she love to fate/death. So she starts believing she is cursed and it’s she who is the reason behind all the unfortunate incidents happened to her loved ones. And as a result she develops a habit of restraining herself from making any deep bond with people. But all these self inflicted barriers of Amanda are on the verge of shattering down as soon as she meets the young and handsome Chicago Cop Mark Callahan. They seem to share an indescribable soulful connection right from their very first meeting. That’s when the story marches towards the path of previous lives and reincarnation.
The plot emphasis on various historical events that took place in the United States. Samyann had set one part of the story on the backdrop of The American Civil War and The Great Chicago Fire. I’m someone who isn’t well aware of the American history, I’m totally alien to whatever that has been discussed in this book but still, I was able to fathom the essence of it through the author’s tremendous writing skills. There were lot of things to learn from this novel, in the aspect of history, psychiatry, astronomy. And angel bells, I have never come across this term 'angel bells' ever before in my life but it was really fascinating while reading it. Especially when the author made the connection between the chimes of the grandfather clock with church bells, built my curiosity to read the book further. The author had touched all these topics with such an efficacy that at the end of the book the readers will almost feel like a pro in these areas.
The story juggles between the present and the 1860’s to 1870’s. Samyann had marvelously written both of these stories in such a way that the readers could immediately recognize which era these characters are from. And that is something really amazing. But the juggling between these two time periods lacked coherence. The flow was missing in the book, with the end of each chapter the readers could vividly feel a mild abrupt brake in the flow. And at a couple of instances it was bit confusing and slightly difficult to comprehend what was going on. Though the story is about reincarnation, the correlation between the present and past depicted in the book felt forced and draggy at times. Finding relevancy between both stories took quite sometime but towards the end it all dawned upon perfectly and produced the desirable end-product the author had intend to do.
As I told before, this book was really informative and that’s the greatest plus of this book. The book was adorably romantic but to be frank the dialogues between the lead characters were quite cheesy. The character development of both Amanda and Mark could’ve been more deep and detailed, the emotional factor was missing where it needed the most. For example, when Mark was in a near death situation, I expected Amanda would lose her sense and end up in a bad mental state but on contrary to that Amanda didn't exhibit much emotion at all, that was utterly disappointing and was out of character. Amanda’s character was so damaged and fragile but the author has failed to inject some emotion into it, so connecting with Amanda at an emotional level felt nearly impossible.
Mark’s persistent shower of love and Mary’s constant support through thick and thin are the key factors that kept Amanda stay put despite the chaos occurring around her. The relationship which Amanda shared with both of them was refreshing and made me envy for it so much.
On the other hand, the characters from the past was written extraordinarily well. Every character was characterized with great perfection. Unlike Amanda’s character, relating with Bonnie’s character was completely effortless and the emotional turmoil she went through was heartbreaking. There were lot of wonderful supporting characters, all of them were absolutely endearing. The motherly care Bonnie received from a slave maid Magdalene. The author has beautifully portrayed the relationship between the slave servants and the white kids with so much love and sensibility and this really need to be appreciated. Love and aid showered by Penelope, Margaret and Chester was also heartwarming. The charming and cocky character of Daniel would make anybody fall in love with him. I really loved all the characters who were in Bonnie’s life. This part of the story will always stay in my heart and I should thank the author for these wonderful characters. And Samyann had brought that era live in front of our eyes through her magnificent words.
On the whole the book was written down efficiently. Apart from a couple of typos, the book has been edited well. The idea of the plot, the amount of hard work put into it and the research done for the outcome of this book is noteworthy. But in my opinion the plot could’ve been more solid and vivid. My rating for this book would be 3 out of 4 stars. If it's not for certain flaws in the plot line and the lack of emotional attachment with the lead character Amanda, I would’ve given four star rating. I would recommend this book to all the historical fiction lovers and to people who believe in reincarnation and soulmates. I’m sure they will enjoy this book a lot.
******
Yesterday
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
Yesterday is a romantic historical fiction by Samyann, which is wholly based on the concept of reincarnation, tales of prior lives and soulmates. To begin with, I’m personally a big fan of stories of this kind which revolves around reincarnation and stuffs. That’s the main reason why I opted to read this book in the first place and in addition to that, the book had a very impressive blurb which could hardly be resisted.
Yesterday is a story of a girl called Amanda Parker, who has a long history of losing the people she love to fate/death. So she starts believing she is cursed and it’s she who is the reason behind all the unfortunate incidents happened to her loved ones. And as a result she develops a habit of restraining herself from making any deep bond with people. But all these self inflicted barriers of Amanda are on the verge of shattering down as soon as she meets the young and handsome Chicago Cop Mark Callahan. They seem to share an indescribable soulful connection right from their very first meeting. That’s when the story marches towards the path of previous lives and reincarnation.
The plot emphasis on various historical events that took place in the United States. Samyann had set one part of the story on the backdrop of The American Civil War and The Great Chicago Fire. I’m someone who isn’t well aware of the American history, I’m totally alien to whatever that has been discussed in this book but still, I was able to fathom the essence of it through the author’s tremendous writing skills. There were lot of things to learn from this novel, in the aspect of history, psychiatry, astronomy. And angel bells, I have never come across this term 'angel bells' ever before in my life but it was really fascinating while reading it. Especially when the author made the connection between the chimes of the grandfather clock with church bells, built my curiosity to read the book further. The author had touched all these topics with such an efficacy that at the end of the book the readers will almost feel like a pro in these areas.
The story juggles between the present and the 1860’s to 1870’s. Samyann had marvelously written both of these stories in such a way that the readers could immediately recognize which era these characters are from. And that is something really amazing. But the juggling between these two time periods lacked coherence. The flow was missing in the book, with the end of each chapter the readers could vividly feel a mild abrupt brake in the flow. And at a couple of instances it was bit confusing and slightly difficult to comprehend what was going on. Though the story is about reincarnation, the correlation between the present and past depicted in the book felt forced and draggy at times. Finding relevancy between both stories took quite sometime but towards the end it all dawned upon perfectly and produced the desirable end-product the author had intend to do.
As I told before, this book was really informative and that’s the greatest plus of this book. The book was adorably romantic but to be frank the dialogues between the lead characters were quite cheesy. The character development of both Amanda and Mark could’ve been more deep and detailed, the emotional factor was missing where it needed the most. For example, when Mark was in a near death situation, I expected Amanda would lose her sense and end up in a bad mental state but on contrary to that Amanda didn't exhibit much emotion at all, that was utterly disappointing and was out of character. Amanda’s character was so damaged and fragile but the author has failed to inject some emotion into it, so connecting with Amanda at an emotional level felt nearly impossible.
Mark’s persistent shower of love and Mary’s constant support through thick and thin are the key factors that kept Amanda stay put despite the chaos occurring around her. The relationship which Amanda shared with both of them was refreshing and made me envy for it so much.
On the other hand, the characters from the past was written extraordinarily well. Every character was characterized with great perfection. Unlike Amanda’s character, relating with Bonnie’s character was completely effortless and the emotional turmoil she went through was heartbreaking. There were lot of wonderful supporting characters, all of them were absolutely endearing. The motherly care Bonnie received from a slave maid Magdalene. The author has beautifully portrayed the relationship between the slave servants and the white kids with so much love and sensibility and this really need to be appreciated. Love and aid showered by Penelope, Margaret and Chester was also heartwarming. The charming and cocky character of Daniel would make anybody fall in love with him. I really loved all the characters who were in Bonnie’s life. This part of the story will always stay in my heart and I should thank the author for these wonderful characters. And Samyann had brought that era live in front of our eyes through her magnificent words.
On the whole the book was written down efficiently. Apart from a couple of typos, the book has been edited well. The idea of the plot, the amount of hard work put into it and the research done for the outcome of this book is noteworthy. But in my opinion the plot could’ve been more solid and vivid. My rating for this book would be 3 out of 4 stars. If it's not for certain flaws in the plot line and the lack of emotional attachment with the lead character Amanda, I would’ve given four star rating. I would recommend this book to all the historical fiction lovers and to people who believe in reincarnation and soulmates. I’m sure they will enjoy this book a lot.
******
Yesterday
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon
Latest Review: Yesterday by Samyann
