C.A. Gray

C.A. Gray is abestselling author of YA trilogies with a focus on blendingscientific concepts like quantum physics and neuroscience.

Heraction-packed stories avoid graphic content but don't shy away from high stakes.

Aside from writing, she practices naturopathic medicineand hosts a podcast.

In her spare time, she enjoys crafting,listening to audio books, and studying the Bible.

Author: Beth Moran: 

ISBN: 978-1804833605

I love Beth Moran books,even if they do follow a predictable formula. I wouldn’t have knownthat if I hadn’t read so many of her books, but they are stillenjoyable.

The formula is this: anearly 30-something woman, down and out for one reason or another,moves to Sherwood Forest (always there), trying to pick up the piecesof her life. She is there to work for a quirky, lovable older womanwho becomes a surrogate mother figure for her, but who later getsdiagnosed with a terminal disease, which becomes a big part of theplot. While there, said protagonist also finds herself immersed in agroup of multi generational women–a club, a church group, acommunity, or in the case of this book, a support group–where sheslowly begins to thaw out her frozen heart and learn to care aboutother people again after having been badly hurt. Also, at the veryoutset, a gorgeous man appears. He’s just a teaser throughout mostof the book, though constantly in the protagonist’s mind. As timegoes on, though, she begins to open up to the possibility of him too…but, then, there’s a misunderstanding. (I HATE this part.Misunderstandings make me anxious in real life, so I do not enjoy thetrope in fiction at all, either. I usually just have to grit my teethand get through it.) In this case I saw it coming a mile away…fortunately when it happened, it was resolved relatively quickly.

The particulars of thisstory: Sophie was a florist who did wedding flowers as a hobby, andwas planning the flowers for her sister’s wedding, when her sisterand both parents were suddenly killed in a car crash. She hasnothing, and then because she lost so much herself, she finds herselfinadvertently in a business in which she helps bereaved families asthey sort out the pieces of the live of a loved one. In thiscapacity, Hattie, an art therapist in Sherwood Forest, hires her tohelp her sort out her affairs while she’s still (ostensibly) youngand healthy… only she has some strange caveats. Sophie is requiredto sign a non-disclosure agreement, and forced to lie about thereason for her presence there, claiming she is an historical authorhired to write the details of Hattie’s life. This becomesespecially difficult when Sophie meets and falls instantly in lovewith Gideon, the young caretaker for Hattie’s grounds who also isshe thinks) Hattie’s cousin. She’s forced to lie to him aboutwhat she’s doing there from the word go… and you can see howthat’s likely to go awry.

Still, though they followa very clear formula, Beth Moran’s books are always feel-good andfocused on the importance of love of all types, and relationships.