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The Thirteenth Chance Amy Matayo 9781503935778 Books

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The Thirteenth Chance Amy Matayo 9781503935778 Books

A dear friend has been encouraging me to read Amy Matayo's work. Even though I have a few of her novels on my Kindle the fact "The Thirteenth Chance" featured a sportsmen as it's hero attracted me to start with Matayo's latest. I figured if I was retiring my "man card" for a few days in reading a classic romance story then one featuring a sporty bloke helped ease my pain. Frivolity aside I have no qualms reading romance novels; so many of the great literary novels are romance so men you're missing out if you don't read some from time to time.

This lady can write. Really well.

Besides Matayo's excellent writing, what I loved about this story is Olivia Pratt. Oh my. It didn't take me long to adopt a "big brother" essence to Olivia as I read her story. Like her best friend, Kelly, there were moments when I wanted to throttle Mr Baseball. And I'm not one for violence. Olivia is delightfully whimsical. Yes, a little neurotic with a few OCD-traits but all that simply served to make Olivia more endearing. Oh, she loves Perry, her 15 year old Persian cat. Perhaps too much. Obsessively too much.

I loved how Matayo managed Olivia's insecurities and fears as her relationship with Rangers star pitcher, Will Vandergriff, developed. It was a delightful testament to the power of love. Love empowers, makes us not care what people think of us, helps us let go of our foibles and teaches us to forgive and trust.

Will and Olivia are neighbours. He asks Olivia to be his "fake" girlfriend to help him get over a little matter with another women. This means Olivia needs to attend his games which brings back haunting memories of her childhood attending her brother's games. There are deep wounds here which Matayo doesn't shy away from but also doesn't unrealistically "fix" as a result of Will's affection for her. (There's a part of me that would love to encourage Matayo to write a sequel further exploring Olivia's wounds and their healing.)

There's a playfulness to their blossoming relationship which is endearing. Both characters are at times gripped with insecurity which challenges the other but a genuine desire to care for the other develops as the story unfolds.

Yes, it's a relatively simple story but with two quality lead characters. I enjoyed the double first-person POV each chapter featuring a section viewed through each character's eyes. In particular, that gave us a tremendous insight into Olivia's anxieties but also to Will's surprising depth of character. He really is a decent guy after all.

And there's one scene that I especially wish I had written. I don't want to spoil it so won't mention which one but golly gosh it was good. Magical in fact.

I'm so pleased I listened to my friend and read my first Amy Matayo novel. Now my problem is I will have to read her back catalogue of works. Fortunately, many are already on my Kindle.

Congratulations Amy Matayo. I'm a little in awe of how you can write and present such nuanced realistic characters.


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The Thirteenth Chance Amy Matayo 9781503935778 Books Reviews

I really enjoyed this book, even though the start was kind of slow but it really picked up the pace about one-third of the way in the story. We see strait-laced, quirky ,selectively superstitious schoolteacher Olivia morph and become more social and outgoing, while opening up herself to new things.Her relationship with her mother and brother I found a little melodramatic, and the rationale for the way her parents behaved was a little too pat for me,once the circumstances were revealed.Olivia's friendship and later love for sweet but arrogant Will plays out beautifully and subtly.The romance is so clean that there is no cringe-worthy moment.The cat incident with Will was hilarious and just what he deserved and Olivia's Chicago trip had me laughing out loud.I gave this only 4 stars because I really hated Will's self-importance and how easily he was forgiven for his transgressions.This was a quick, funny and light read and was provided to me by the author as a giveaway.Thank you for giving me this opportunity to provide this unbiased review.
...but a few things kept jerking my head out of the story and I'd have to put the book down for a while, so it ended up taking me a week to get through a book I could normally finish on a weekend afternoon.

I liked Will's character. He's a star baseball player, but he's been on a losing streak and he's got to find a way to break it. He's arrogant and sure of himself, but vulnerable underneath. He's attracted to Olivia, but thinks she is a little strange at first. I liked the way he easily figured out that Olivia was lying and just kept feeding her line until she eventually got tangled up in it. But that brings me to what I didn't like. First off, Olivia lies to people and I couldn't grasp why. She wasn't just evasive, she made up details, and it didn't make me feel empathetic with her as a character. She has a cat that she loves and babies, and I can understand that, but why does she try to walk her cat on a leash?

Olivia is a teacher with germ issues, but those issues only come up briefly, the rest of the time they are forgotten. She needs a favor in a couple hours time, and who does she ask? Her neighbor whom she hates. She's sort of a shy nerdy, cat lover with a ponytail. But she takes out the ponytail, and now everyone can see that she is actually gorgeous. In the end, it was hard for me to visualize Olivia.

There were a few instances of the dialogue leading up to something, then jumping over what happens and suddenly being at a point after the fact, then going back and telling what happened, and that bugged me. This happened more than once and every time, it made the story lose momentum for me and I would just put the book down and walk away.

I kept going back though, because the gist of the storyline was really good. I finally got drawn in enough to finish.
A dear friend has been encouraging me to read Amy Matayo's work. Even though I have a few of her novels on my the fact "The Thirteenth Chance" featured a sportsmen as it's hero attracted me to start with Matayo's latest. I figured if I was retiring my "man card" for a few days in reading a classic romance story then one featuring a sporty bloke helped ease my pain. Frivolity aside I have no qualms reading romance novels; so many of the great literary novels are romance so men you're missing out if you don't read some from time to time.

This lady can write. Really well.

Besides Matayo's excellent writing, what I loved about this story is Olivia Pratt. Oh my. It didn't take me long to adopt a "big brother" essence to Olivia as I read her story. Like her best friend, Kelly, there were moments when I wanted to throttle Mr Baseball. And I'm not one for violence. Olivia is delightfully whimsical. Yes, a little neurotic with a few OCD-traits but all that simply served to make Olivia more endearing. Oh, she loves Perry, her 15 year old Persian cat. Perhaps too much. Obsessively too much.

I loved how Matayo managed Olivia's insecurities and fears as her relationship with Rangers star pitcher, Will Vandergriff, developed. It was a delightful testament to the power of love. Love empowers, makes us not care what people think of us, helps us let go of our foibles and teaches us to forgive and trust.

Will and Olivia are neighbours. He asks Olivia to be his "fake" girlfriend to help him get over a little matter with another women. This means Olivia needs to attend his games which brings back haunting memories of her childhood attending her brother's games. There are deep wounds here which Matayo doesn't shy away from but also doesn't unrealistically "fix" as a result of Will's affection for her. (There's a part of me that would love to encourage Matayo to write a sequel further exploring Olivia's wounds and their healing.)

There's a playfulness to their blossoming relationship which is endearing. Both characters are at times gripped with insecurity which challenges the other but a genuine desire to care for the other develops as the story unfolds.

Yes, it's a relatively simple story but with two quality lead characters. I enjoyed the double first-person POV each chapter featuring a section viewed through each character's eyes. In particular, that gave us a tremendous insight into Olivia's anxieties but also to Will's surprising depth of character. He really is a decent guy after all.

And there's one scene that I especially wish I had written. I don't want to spoil it so won't mention which one but golly gosh it was good. Magical in fact.

I'm so pleased I listened to my friend and read my first Amy Matayo novel. Now my problem is I will have to read her back catalogue of works. Fortunately, many are already on my .

Congratulations Amy Matayo. I'm a little in awe of how you can write and present such nuanced realistic characters.