The Moon and Back by Ginger Scott is live!
A beautifully heartfelt story that has both a sweet YA romance and a second-chance-rockstar-romance, this book had me hooked from start to finish.
Amazon
Blurb
Johnny Bishop crashed into my life like a hurricane. Not once, but twice.
The first time, we were teenagers. He was the star quarterback destined to save our small town’s high school team. I was the music nerd desperate to shine, but always falling short.
Until him.
Johnny was good at football, but he was great at music. And when I realized we shared a love of performing, I fell for his charm. I drank in his words and was hypnotized by the way he sang. I was never fully in the spotlight with him, but the way he held onto me and kept me close felt good enough. His star was bright enough for both of us, and his dreams were worth all the risks, even if they were my dreams first.
But when he left our town–leaving me in it–the damage in his wake was devastating. I spent a decade trying to piece together my broken heart. A decade trying to avoid his music, a nearly impossible feat considering he was selling out arenas and piling up Grammys. While he tore through city after city, I built a quiet life as a music teacher in my hometown.
I’d made peace with the fact that a now famous rockstar once held my hand and told me he loved me. But when he shows up unannounced, begging for help, I’m sucked right back into his gravitational pull.
I want to hate him. I want to punish him for turning his back on me. But I can’t when he’s so broken. And the more time we spend in our present talking about our past, the more I start to wonder if maybe Johnny left to save us all from the storm.
Maybe that story about me and the famous rockstar has a lot more story to be told.
Review
4 stars
A beautifully heartfelt story that has both a sweet YA romance and a second-chance-rockstar-romance, this book had me hooked from start to finish.
Brynn and Johnny met in their senior year of high school. He was new to the school, and a football star, she was a band geek with dreams of being drum major. They appeared to be opposites, but from their first meeting there was a spark between them and they quickly became good friends, and then more. While Brynn introduced Johnny to her love for music, her family offered him support and a reprieve from his difficult home life, and they fell in deep, all-consuming love. They were it for each other, until he suddenly left town and cut off all contact.
Ten years later, Brynn is the music teacher at her old high school, and Johnny is a famous rock star. They haven’t seen each other since he left town almost a decade ago, and Brynn has tried her hardest to move on with her life without the man who still owns her heart. But when he hits emotional rock bottom and has nowhere else to turn, he shows up in town asking Brynn for her help.
In alternating chapters between past and present we get to watch Brynn and Johnny’s story unfold. The past is sweetly romantic, with all of the wonder and hope of young romance, but dramatic as we learn about the difficulties of Johnny’s life. In the present, I could absolutely understand Brynn’s anger at his sudden reappearance, her frustration at his refusal to tell her why he left the way he did, and the painful re-opening of old wounds as she continues to grieve the loss of the boy she loved and the dreams that they once shared. But it seems that Johnny, full of remorse, still hasn’t quite let go either.
“I’m not me without you, Brynn Fisher. Not even close.”
It’s dramatic and emotional, and there’s a lot to navigate for the former high school sweethearts as they are suddenly thrust back into each other’s lives. There are so many questions, and some heartwrenching confessions to be made, and as Johnny’s dark past is slowly uncovered in more detail, it leads to more questions about the reason he left and what those dark days could mean for their future.
This is such a beautifully emotional story, with lots of feels, lots of intensity, and fantastic character dynamics. From friendships, parental relationships, and of course the romantic relationship, Scott creates great interplay between her characters, and I enjoyed all of the different aspects of the story. The book is written entirely from Bryn’s POV, and while I’m used to reading books with dual timelines written in alternating chapters, for some reason I can’t quite pinpoint, this book felt a little disjointed at times. And I think the whole concept of a drum major, and the detail of that storyline, was a little bit lost on me as a non-American, and while I got the gist of what was happening, I did zone out a little during those detailed scenes. But their love of music, and Johnny’s music in particular, is really beautifully woven through their story.
When weakness needs an angel, she’ll come with a song…
Showing you how much you’re worth and how much they were wrong.
Lightning strikes a thousand times, but never where you hope.
So let the shelter that she gives to you be bolder than the storm.
For me, it was all about the romance, and I loved the chemistry, the tension of the situation, and the intensity of Brynn and Johnny’s feelings for each other. Watching them come back into each other’s lives and slowly reconnect while trying so hard to keep their emotions under control, every little step forward was a win, and there are some beautiful moments between these two – from meaningful looks, shared memories and brief touches to nights in each other’s arms and their passionate reconnection.
It’s a slow burn as they come back together, but worth it for the wonderfully swoony ending which is SO satisfying after so much build up and emotion, and I finished this book with a pounding heart and a smile on my face. And just to note – the bonus epilogue is gold, and had me laughing out loud. I definitely recommend clicking on the link in the back of the book to experience the quick glimpse into their future together.
A gorgeous read. 4 stars.
An Advanced Review Copy was generously provided by the author in exchange for an honest review.
About the Author
Ginger Scott is an Amazon-bestselling and Goodreads Choice Award-nominated author of several young and new adult romances, including Waiting on the Sidelines, Going Long, Blindness, How We Deal With Gravity, This Is Falling, You and Everything After, The Girl I Was Before, Wild Reckless, Wicked Restless, In Your Dreams, The Hard Count, Hold My Breath, A Boy Like You, A Girl Like Me, Memphis and Cry Baby.
A sucker for a good romance, Ginger’s other passion is sports, and she often blends the two in her stories. (She’s also a sucker for a hot quarterback, catcher, pitcher, point guard…the list goes on.) Ginger has been writing and editing for newspapers, magazines and blogs for more than 15 years. She has told the stories of Olympians, politicians, actors, scientists, cowboys, criminals and towns. For more on her and her work, visit her website at http://www.littlemisswrite.com.
When she’s not writing, the odds are high that she’s somewhere near a baseball diamond, either watching her son field pop flies like Bryce Harper or cheering on her favorite baseball team, the Arizona Diamondbacks. Ginger lives in Arizona and is married to her college sweetheart whom she met at ASU (fork ’em, Devils).
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