Tuesday, July 23, 2013

Blog Tour: Losing Francesca by J.A. Huss~ Review, Book Trailer & Giveaway

 
I am crazy excited to have the blog tour for Losing Francesca by J.A. Huss, hosted by Xpresso Book Tours, on the blog today. I LOVE J.A. and her writing and I can't wait to share my review and the book trailer with you. Oh, and don't forget to enter the giveaway!

To follow the rest of the tour, click on the tour banner above.

  Losing Francesca
Author: J.A. Huss
Publication Date: July 1, 2013
 ~Synopsis~
Francesca Sabatini came to America to take in the sights, celebrate her high school graduation, and have fun wasting time before college starts in the fall.

That's not what happens.

Fresh off the plane and barely on American soil more than a handful of minutes, Francesca's face is recognized by TSA scanners to be a match for a child who was kidnapped twelve years ago.

Brody Mason remembers the day Fiona Sullivan went missing during a family vacation in Italy and it's haunted him his whole life. So when Francesca shows up at the Sullivan farm down the road, he's compelled to figure out if this girl really is his long-lost friend.

But Francesca knows she's not Fiona Sullivan. She knows exactly who she is. At least she thinks she knows – until Brody Mason relentlessly pursues her and she begins to have feelings for him. Maybe being Fiona isn't so bad?

Reality becomes blurred, secrets are revealed, and life will never be the same when the final questions are answered: Is she Francesca or Fiona? And where does she really belong?


~Prelude~
When I saw the tour signup and read the synopsis for Losing Francesca, I was very intrigued and decided to join the tour. I love young adult contemporary novels so I knew this would be right up my alley. J.A. Huss is a fantastic author and I absolutely loved Tragic so I couldn’t wait to read this one. I was not disappointed.
 ~Review~
Losing Francesca is a young adult contemporary romance but it was also so much more. It had the perfect amount of suspense, intrigue and romance to it that left me on the edge of my seat. I swear every one of my Goodreads status updates involved WTF and what is going on. This book was in no way predictable and I had to keep reading because I desperately needed to know what the truth really was and how this book would end.

Francesca is sent to live with the Sullivan family in Ohio, by order of a judge, until Fiona Sullivan’s 18 birthday in seven weeks. She is believed to be Fiona, who went missing on a family vacation in Italy 12 years ago. She swears she is not Fiona Sullivan over and over but the more time she spends with the Sullivans and with Brody Mason, Fiona’s childhood best friend, the more questions she has about her life and what the truth really is.

Francesca/Fiona was very feisty and very stubborn. When she first went to the Sullivans, she refused to speak English as a form of rebellion and she would only say “Io non sono Fiona Sullivan.” She was angry and scared and unsure of how to handle such a situation so I sympathized with her. Her father kept her very guarded and she lived a very secretive and dangerous life. However, her attitude started to grind on my nerves because I felt like she was acting childish and like a spoiled brat. Frank Sullivan had lost his wife and his daughter, Sean Sullivan had lost his mother and sister. Even though she knew she wasn’t Fiona, I think she could have been more adult and at least empathized with their situation and handled herself better in the beginning. However, when she started spending time with Brody and getting to know the Sullivan’s a little better, her attitude changed dramatically and I began to really like her. She grew up a lot and starting seeing things from the perspective of everyone else involved. She recognized that her life was very different from normal and she kind of liked the idea of “normal.”

“It’s amazing really, how much easier it is to be happy and honest than it is to be angry and lying.”

I absolutely adored Brody. He has been pining after Francesca since they were children and her disappearance has been eating away at him for the last 12 years. He always knew she was his soulmate, even from childhood, and when she disappeared he became angry and troubled. When he finds out Fiona is back, she is all he can think about and I loved his dedication to bring her around and make her see what everyone else does. He doesn’t want to lose her again and he will do anything to keep her this time. His love and dedication was sweet and endearing. He was also incredibly sexy and charming. I loved the way he exuded confidence in himself and his ability to convince Francesca of who she really is.

“I relive that feeling over and over and it strikes me as funny that the feeling you get over a boy, the swooning, as they call it in stories, is real. I swooned.”

I was sitting on the edge of my seat throughout this entire book. I never really knew whether Francesca was really Fiona or not. I constantly wavered back and forth between, “She has to be Fiona” and “Maybe she isn’t Fiona.” This book was so well written that even when I thought I could predict what was going to happen and I may even have figured out some parts early on, I always had doubts about what I thought I knew. The balance between mystery and romance was perfect. I was just as caught up in the romance as I was in the intrigue of the plot. The interactions between Francesca and Brody were sweet and I loved seeing the way spending time with him softened her. I also absolutely loved the development of her relationship with the Sullivans and her growth as a character. She started to see what a normal life with a normal family could be like and while she is certain she isn’t Fiona Sullivan, she begins to think she might want to be. I loved that the intrigue and mystery was saved until the very end and all secrets weren’t revealed until then. I needed to find out if Francesca was really Fiona and there was no way I could stop until I knew.

“I feel like I’m floating between identities, between families, between boyfriends, between futures. I’ve had to lose myself so many times, I’m not even sure who I am right now. I can’t go on like this, wondering whoI was, who I should be, who I will be.”

J.A. Huss is a fantastic writer and she is so versatile. It amazes me the way she can move through genres and write incredible books that are so different but all so amazing. This book had everything I look for in a YA contemporary novel and I was blown away. The ending could be contrived as too perfect by I liked the happily ever after that it implied because sometimes I just need to believe that it exists and that there can be peace and love and a ride off into the sunset.

~IPOD Picks~
“Fireflies” by Ron Pope
“You Found Me” by The Fray
“We Belong Together” by Gavin Degraw





AUTHOR BIO 
J. A. Huss likes to write new adult books that make you think and keep you guessing. Her favorite genre to read is space opera, but since practically no one reads those books, she writes new adult science fiction, paranormal romance, contemporary romance, urban fantasy, and books about Junco (who refuses to be saddled with a label).

She has an undergraduate degree in horses, (yes, really–Thank you, Colorado State University) and a master’s degree in forensic toxicology from the University of Florida. She used to have a job driving around Colorado doing pretty much nothing but shooting the breeze with farmers, but now she just writes, runs the New Adult Addiction and Clean Teen Reads Book Blogs, and runs an online science classroom for homeschoolers.

Author links:


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*An e-ARC of this book was provided to me by J.A. and Xpresso book tours for a fair and honest review. All opinions are my own and unbiased.*

Thanks J.A. and Giselle!


7 comments:

  1. Thanks for the review - and I agree, sometimes you just need that HEA. I've never written one before this book, so I was due. :) So glad you enjoyed the book!

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  2. I am so happy I got to be a part of this tour. I adored this book. You are truly a versatile writer. Tragic was so different but I loved both books so much. For your first HEA, you rocked it! :-)

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  3. Yay glad you enjoyed it, Chelsea! It sounds like a fantastic mystery with Francesca's identity! Making me uber curious! Fab review!

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  4. Thank you! I became a huge J.A. fan after Tragic and I was so amazed by this book. It definitely had me on my toes :-)

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  5. LOL... I've written so many dark books, I just couldn't take it any more. I needed something sweet. :)

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  6. Oh wow this sounds awesome! Chilling too! Will definitely be checking this out, great review hon!

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  7. Thanks! It was definitely a thrilling book. I was seriously bouncing back and forth the whole time with thinking I knew what was going on and having serious doubts.

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