Oh, my BookNerds know how to throw me for a loop. My situation with this Book of the Month was similar, in a way, to the month we read My Beautiful Failure. I got this book from the library, read the description, and had zero interest in reading it at all. I set it down on my coffee table and neglected it for weeks. I picked it up several weeks later, added it to my TBR on Goodreads and read some reviews. I still had no desire to read it. I set it back down on my coffee table and started to think about ways to tell Jacque that I was opting out of this month's read. Then Jacque tweeted me to ask if I'd started it. I saw the tweet today, Sunday afternoon, while I was lazing on my couch reading another book. Instead of tweeting her back that I wasn't going to read it -- which was completely my plan -- I picked it up and started reading. 
 And then I read the entire book in a matter of hours. 
 Wow. First of all, the writing style is very easy. It just flows. It makes it a fast and easy read. Second, I was fascinated by the characters. In the author's note at the end of the book, Jennifer Brown explains how she never understood how abused women never left their abusers, and how often women are quick to say, "One time and I would leave!" They have never been in the situation, yet they are so sure they wouldn't stand for it. But...they've never been in the situation. "..we don't often often enter romantic relationships based on what's going on in our minds," she says, "We love, and because we love, 'I would never...' becomes an incredibly inaccurate prediction." 
 In several of the reviews I read, people did not like Alex. But I guess what struck me about her is that she was very rational. The arguments that she had in her head made sense. And throughout the relationship she wasn't often speaking from a deluded point of view. She knew she was being abused. She saw that the relationship was hurting her physically as well as hurting all her relationships. But... The but. 
 I read this book in a matter of hours because I wanted to see how she would come out of it. (I never assumed that Jennifer Brown would end the book with her protagonist still in the relationship, as recovery is part of the journey.) And in the end it was a little reaching out -- very realistic to Alex and what she could do at that point. Not a big lightbulb, per se, but one small, scared hand reaching out. 
 This was a very well-written and powerful book. I've said it before, that I always love when books surprise me, so thank you to the Book Nerds and to Jennifer Brown! Oh, and you didn't think I could end this review without swooning over Zack, did you?! #TeamZack 
 Read what the other Book Nerds had to say about it on the blog: www.booknerdsacrossamerica.com