{"id":1402,"date":"2018-12-31T17:03:58","date_gmt":"2018-12-31T17:03:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/?p=1402"},"modified":"2018-12-31T17:03:58","modified_gmt":"2018-12-31T17:03:58","slug":"glenn-dromgooles-texas-reads-column-appears-weekly-at-lonestarliterary-com-100","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/?p=1402","title":{"rendered":"Glenn Dromgoole’s Texas Reads column appears weekly at LoneStarLiterary.com"},"content":{"rendered":"
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<\/span><\/span>Texas Reads<\/span>>> archive<\/span><\/a><\/span>Glenn Dromgoole<\/span><\/h1>\n

8.12.2018\u00a0 Author Colleen Hoover does more than write books<\/h1>\n

In the past six years, Colleen Hoover has published fourteen novels<\/span> in the young adult, new adult and romance genres, consistently ranking high on the New York Times best seller list.<\/p>\n

But she does more than that. She also operates The Bookworm Box, which is both a monthly subscription service offering signed novels and novelty items to subscribers and a brick-and-mortar bookstore in Sulphur Springs. All the books are signed and donated by the authors, and all profits go to charity \u2014 more than $1 million so far. Read more at thebookwormbox.com<\/span><\/a><\/span> or colleenhoover.com<\/span><\/a><\/span>.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Hoover continues producing novels that resonate with her growing legion of fans.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve just read her two latest \u2014 All Your Perfects<\/span><\/a><\/span> and Without Merit<\/span><\/a><\/span> \u2014 and while they\u2019re quite different types of stories, they\u2019re both page-turners. I zipped through each one in a day or so.<\/p>\n

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<\/a><\/span><\/span>All Your Perfects<\/span> (Atria, $28 hardcover, $16 paperback) deals with a couple in their thirties struggling to save their marriage.<\/p>\n

Told in Quinn\u2019s voice, the chapters alternate between \u201cthen\u201d and \u201cnow.\u201d \u201cThen\u201d was when she and Graham were falling in love. \u201cNow\u201d is seven years into their marriage. They have not been able to have children, or adopt, and that is affecting their intimacy in every way. And they can\u2019t seem to find ways to communicate what they\u2019re feeling.<\/p>\n

Quinn is distant, unhappy, probably depressed. Graham tries to remain upbeat. Or as Quinn puts it, \u201cHe fills the room with his presence. I fill it with my absence.\u201d<\/p>\n

Every twenty-eight days, Quinn is reminded of her inability to get pregnant, and it is devastating. Graham desires her as much as ever, but she\u2019s not reciprocating.<\/p>\n

Promises they made in the past \u2014 \u201cthen\u201d \u2014 may be the only thing keeping them together \u201cnow\u201d \u2013 but is it enough?<\/p>\n

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<\/a><\/span><\/span>Without Merit<\/span> (Atria, $25 hardcover, $16 paperback) is more of a young adult novel, I suppose, since the story\u2019s narrator is seventeen. But adults can appreciate it as well.<\/p>\n

The narrator is named Merit, and she has an identical twin sister named Honor. Merit collects trophies she hasn\u2019t won, and she is attracted to Honor\u2019s boyfriend, Sagan, who kisses Merit one day thinking he\u2019s kissing Honor.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s just the beginning of her odd family\u2019s story.<\/p>\n

They live in what used to be a church until their father, an atheist, bought it because the pastor\u2019s dog was barking too loud. Their invalid mother, Victoria, who is divorced from their father, lives in the basement and never comes out. Their father and his current wife, also named Victoria, have a four-year-old son named Moby.<\/p>\n

The family can never finish a meal without at least one member stomping off to their room and slamming the door. It is a house full of secrets, lies and misunderstandings until Merit one day exposes all the secrets, which threatens to tear apart the few remaining threads holding the strange family together.<\/p>\n

* * * * *<\/p>\n

Glenn Dromgoole<\/span> writes about Texas books and authors. Contact him at g.dromgoole@suddenlink.net.<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

>> Read his past Texas Reads columns in Lone Star Literary Life here.<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Texas Reads>> archiveGlenn Dromgoole 8.12.2018\u00a0 Author Colleen Hoover does more than write books In the past six years, Colleen Hoover has published fourteen novels in the young adult, new adult and romance genres, consistently ranking high on the New York Times best seller list. But she does more than that. She also operates The Bookworm […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1402","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1402","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1402"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1402\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1402"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1402"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1402"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}