Maybe This Time

Maybe This Time by Jennifer Cruise

Source: ARC from publicity firm/St. Martin’s Press

Grade: 4 stars out of 5

10 years after they divorced, Andie visits ex-husband North to return 119 alimony checks and to tell him she’s getting married again. Ouch. North then drops a bomb of his own and offers Andie a deal she really can’t refuse: $10,000 a month for taking care of two children down in a house in Ohio where their father (North’s distant cousin), their Aunt May, their grandmother, and almost a governess died. Andie accepts and finds herself in a haunted house with a pyromaniac, a screaming 8-year-old, and a housekeeper that likes her tea spiked (heavy handed please). They can be only 3 reasons why there are ghosts 1) everyone’s been drugged; 2) someone is pulling a really nasty prank; 3) there really are ghosts. Andie is bringing reinforcements.

Jennifer Cruise’s Maybe This Time was flirtatious read. It draws the reader in then pushing them away; it forces them to dream about the book—borderline nightmare—then wakes the reader up at 6 in the morning because the next chapter is dying to be read; it melts the body into the couch while reading for 4 hours straight then the reader realizes they can’t move because your muscles have been locked in place. But the reader does not care because this is some good stuff read. (Not that I speak from experience coughcough.)

One thing that I loved most about this novel that I just do not get enough of in YA lit is the closeness in families. In Maybe This Time family plays a large role with Carter and Alice, the children, Flo and Lydia, North’s and Andie’s mother, and Southie (Sullivan), North’s brother. It is not this cold-shoulder-mention-once type of deal, but they play vital key components to the novel with their rich dialogue and funny antics. But the children are the spotlight with a great relationship of sister and brother. Even when Alice is extremely stubborn and constantly screaming, there was no feeling of irritation from me. I found both children endearing and brave to endure it all.

The tension between North and Andie is 60% sexual and 40% love at least from what I garnered throughout the book. It can get a bit frustrating at times. I did enjoy the banter between the two and there were hints of deep affection between the two.

There is a mild twist in the end and another funny twist at the last page that I thought ended Maybe This Time on a right note.

In all I found Maybe This Time to be a blast to read and will end it with a quote by the editor of the novel Jennifer Enderlin: “I’m stopping you in the street. I’m grabbing you by the lapels and I’m saying “You’ve got to read this book.”’

Cover B+
It’s cute—very.

Maybe This Time releases later this month: Amazon / Indie Bound / Book Depository

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OR you can win a copy! Thanks to the same marketing manager who sent me my copy (thank you!!!!) and to St.Martin's Press, I have one copy to give away. For an extra entry, let me know in the comments if you believe in ghosts!