BLOG TOUR - FINDING ME, FINDING YOU BY SHEALY JAMES

By Sanne - Scandalous Book Blog - September 26, 2014

Parker wasn’t always a bad boy. It wasn’t until his life seemed to lose meaning that things started spiraling out of control. Nothing mattered though, not without her around. That was until he met Maggie, the introverted beauty that had taken one too many verbal beatings. Maggie wasn’t exactly shy, but she definitely wasn’t confident either. Until now she had been happy existing in her small world, but she was ready for a change. She vowed to make friends in college. Simple, right? Not quite. Maggie discovers she was in store for more than just friendship. Instead she finds a painful crush on an emotionally unavailable guy. As Maggie and Parker each head down the path of self-discovery, they learn it isn’t always easy to keep the ones you love when you are becoming the person you want to be.

What a truly beautiful story. I love books with shy girls/bad boys as my main protagonists so I was a little excited as well as anxious about how well executed the concept was with this one but what a magnificent tale of tragedy, sadness, redemption, friendship and love. It’s not like your typical story where the author generally covers a month or two in the lives of the characters and ties everything up with a nice big bow, Finding Me, Finding You goes from Freshman year of College right through to graduation, the ups and downs and everything in between. It’s a terrific coming of age drama where you not only care about the two main heroes of the piece but the myriad of superbly written secondary characters as well. The friendship is lovely to read about especially Max and Maggie. Although Parker has his promiscuous, dark and misunderstood side that’s not all there is to him, Shealy James is a master at peeling back the layers subtly and developing her cast of players at a realistic pace. They don’t go through miraculous overnight transformations in character but rather through time and experience. The writing is masterful and lyrical with believable dialogue and situations, if at times the pace seemed a little slow it never detracted much from my enjoyment of the story. I’m not going to delve into a discussion of the plot because you have to read this from start to finish and experience every emotion on opposite ends of the spectrum, laughing, crying, scowling and smirking, I did it all. Finding Me, Finding You is the perfect book to curl up with, a glass of wine and a humungous bar of chocolate in hand. Sit back and enjoy the wonderful emotional journey to graduation day and hopefully a HEA.

Review by Nicole McCurdy (Guest Reviewer)

Shealy James is Georgia native who teaches middle school math during the day and disappears into fiction at night. She is an avid reader and a writer who laughs in the face of middle school angst and welcomes humor, drama, and the all-important happy ending. Shealy is the author of Finding Me, Finding You (Finding Series Book 1), Finding Us (Finding Series Book 2) and Whole Life Re-Do (Whole Life Series Book 1).