Blogging for Books: A Review of "The Opposite of Maybe" by Maddie Dawson

     Before we begin this review, you should know I was given a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review, via Blogging for Books. If you are a reader, have a blog, and are interested, go over and check out how you, too, can become a book reviewer. Click here to get started!

Here is me (well, my hand), holding my copy of this charming book

      This book starts out a little slow; a strange thing to say about a book that begins with an intimate scene, I know, but bear with me. While we are getting to know the characters, Jonathan and Rosie, you feel that they are a little slow, as in stuck in a rut, lives going nowhere. Then Rosie's grandmother, Soapie, steps in and livens things up a bit. The book picks up the pace even further when Jonathan proposes to Rosie (after fifteen years of presumably unwedded bliss) and then wishes to whisk her away to California so that he can open a teacup museum. I'm not kidding. A. Teacup. Museum. Jonathan is the character I dislike the most in this book, and there are a couple of others that could audition for that role. He's arrogant, rude, selfish, and controlling.

     Then there's Rosie. I really did not like her for a while, until she got a backbone. She says "No" to California at the last hour and goes to stay with her grandmother, and you'd think that would be the last of Jonathan and the teacups, but unfortunately it isn't. There are some painful revelations while Rosie is there at her grandmother's (how much did Soapie enjoy being saddled with a kid after her daughter died? Not so much). And then there's also Tony, the handsome Italian guy her grandmother allowed to move in to the house to take care of her and pick her up off the ground when she falls. After all, Soapie is pretty old and falls frequently. At first, Rosie is unhappy with Tony being there, and wants to hire a stuffy British lady to take care of her grandmother, but Soapie holds out and Tony stays. His situation is strange; he's a guy who does anything to get five minutes with his son Milo because his wife and her new girlfriend feel that his presence in the boy's life is confusing. I know, right?

     Then Soapie's significant other arrives on the scene; George is a guy whose wife is institutionalized due to Alzheimer's but it's clear he and Soapie have been an item for quite some time. Somehow, this works and doesn't make the reader dislike George. You'll have to read it to understand. So there they are: Soapie, George, Tony, and Rosie...a sort of dysfunctional family but you take them where you can get them.

     There are three major events in this book that change the lives of the characters. I won't tell you what they are, but I will tell you that I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Some character driven books can drag too much, and while that may have been an issue in this book in a couple of areas, the writing is charming and the characters are flawed and human, making it easy to engage as a reader. I found myself unable to put the book down once I cracked it open, and I'd give it 4.7 out of 5 stars. A must read!

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