I’ll Stand by You by Sharon Sala

I'll stand by youNarrated by Amy Rubinate

The listener is introduced to Adorable “Dori” Grant as she wakes up to start her typical day. Dori is an unwed teen mom who works the morning shift as a dishwasher at Granny’s Country Kitchen while her grandfather babysits her four-month-old son. She’s never divulged who the father of the baby is, and lets the gossips believe what they wish about her circumstances. After Dori’s morning starts, you’re introduced one by one to more residents of Blessings, Georgia – the diner’s owner, the local hair salon’s employees, members of Dori’s neighborhood and church, and Johnny Pine, who is raising his younger brothers now that their mother is dead from a meth overdose and their father’s in prison.

Although it’s contemporary, I’ll Stand by You has the vibe of the 1940s-era romance Morning Glory by LaVyrle Spencer. Dori and Johnny are two young people really down on their luck, facing a bleak future but making the best of every small thing they can get, and in spite of everything, are optimistic about life. When Johnny’s seven-year-old brother Beep gets assaulted at school by older bullies, however, Johnny lets everyone around him know that he is no pushover; and when Dori faces grief and discrimination, she shows her spine of steel as well. And just like Morning Glory, there are some wonderful, supportive people in the small town of Blessings as well as some two-faced hypocrites and downright bad villains.

Dori’s life is changed forever when her grandfather’s house burns down, and by chance Johnny and his brothers are there to lend a helping hand, even though they were only nodding acquaintances before. They create a sort of emergency family unit while Dori works through her adversities. It was in turns touching and emotional, then heartwarming and uplifting. In truth, I was expecting a lot more suspense, having read Sala’s Rebel Ridge series. This was not Romantic Suspense, even though there were some villains; this was, like Morning Glory, a straight-up small town romance. It wasn’t even as deeply emotional as Morning Glory – the villains were a little too stereotypical, and the ending maybe a little too easily resolved, although I was rooting for them. In fact, in light of the bullying of little Beep at the beginning, I was a little disturbed at some of the turns in the plot – did the end really justify the means? But taking a step back and just letting the story wash over me was the answer.

I haven’t been narrator Amy Rubinate’s biggest fan. One of my main complaints was her delivery of the humor in Kristan Higgins’ contemporary, small-town romances. But Higgins has a completely different writing style, one filled with quirky, often self-deprecating humor that Rubinate’s more monotone narrative patterns didn’t enhance. Rubinate’s voice was more in line with Sala’s sweet story of pain and loss and climbing out of the depths. Not that it was devoid of wit, but Sala doesn’t write in the same humorous vein as authors like Higgins, Rachel Gibson, and Susan Elizabeth Phillips. A quirk of Sala’s writing is her abrupt change of POV, seemingly every few paragraphs (a criticism I saw in reviews of the print version as well), and Rubinate could have used a slightly longer pause to help accentuate the change. She used a mild Southern accent that reflected the area and even the station of the characters, with well-placed registers for Johnny, his younger brothers, Dori, and her grandfather – all the characters. She infused a righteous tone into the holier-than-thou neighbor, and you felt the warmth of Dory’s boss at the diner.

All in all, it was a better-than-average escape/entertainment, especially for a reader looking for an uplifting, hopeful ending and for the villains to get what they really deserve.

Melinda


Narration: B

Book Content: B

Steam Factor: Glad I had my earbuds in, although really, really tame

Violence: Fighting

Genre: Contemporary Romance

Publisher: Tantor

 

 

 

I’ll Stand by You was provided to AudioGals by Tantor Audio for review.