Cover Image: A Life WIthout Water

A Life WIthout Water

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Member Reviews

Gosh what an emotional rollercoaster! To lose a child is devastating, experiencing every birthday thats past and what should have been and wasn't. Carol had divorced her husband some 20 years previous until her ex husband John appears again needing her help, he is sick.
Get a box of tissues, shut yourself away and just read this book. It's just thought provoking,sad but very well written! A must read! Thank you to Netgalley and Pink Sand Press for an advanced copy in return for an honest review.

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This was an emotional journal and tears may have been spilt. A beautiful story of loss and healing. Carol and John were bounded in marriage, torn apart and thrown back together. This was a story of love, loss and healing. This was beautifully written with the appearance of strong supporting family members. Carol and John are parents without a child who come together to fulfill their child's wishes. John is also very sick and in a show of grace Carol puts her grief aside to assist him on his journey. I really enjoyed this story and would highly recommend.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for providing me with an ARC of this book. All opinions are my own and freely given.

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This book shows a beautiful journey through loss. Katie, the main character, died 24 years ago in the care of her alcoholic dad (John). Now that he is ill, he finds his ex-wife (Carol) and they go on a road trip that Katie had wanted her entire life.

Told from the perspective of Carol, this book offers a tender story of hope during despair and partial closure that was much needed for Carol and John.

I will be reading the next book in this series!

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Some books have a way of absorbing you so that you forget all about the outside world, and this is one of those.

A truly mesmerising story of loss, grief, love and forgiveness.

Carol has buried herself in work for years, and even more so now that she has lost her beloved husband Tobias in a tragic accident.

When her ex husband John turns up with devastating news, she is taken back 24 years to another heart-breaking loss.

How much loss can one person take? As John and her set out on a journey to honour their daughter, they both manage to face up to their grief, to find forgiveness and to make peace.

And maybe, just maybe, Carol can find a way to live again.

This is a book that will make you fall apart, then put you back together, forever changed.

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I was excited to receive a copy of A Life Without Water based on the reviews and interest it was given on social media. I am sorry that I was not impressed. Rarely do I give up on a book but after the first couple of chapters I was done.. I continued and read the entire book. I even skipped the last couple of chapters and went to the end. Very predictable. The story was told in the first couple of chapters. Lack of character development and a very slow moving story leads me to not giving the book a great review. Also, the first book of a series should grab you. I will not read the next two books. Very disappointed.

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A Life Without Water combines terrible sadness and tragedy, heartfelt emotion and soul-searching, and, ultimately, peace for all the characters. Hard to put down, and achingly hard to read, this book ends with hope for Caroline, who has endured far too much for one person. I cheered for her at the end.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for providing this ARC.

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This book was sent to me electronically for review by Netgalley. This is heartbreaking…I have never read this concept before…it cannot be read in one quick reading…it is too emotional for that…

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EXCERPT: The anniversary of Katie's death hit Carol especially hard this year. Tomorrow would have been her thirtieth birthday. She'd be a grown woman. She'd have a career. A family.

Carol should have been a grandmother. She should have a family to visit, to hear their laughter and share their stories. She should have had a lifetime of memories with her daughter. Instead, she had nothing more than a tiny front tooth, an old stuffed bear, and a box of knickknacks she couldn't bring herself to throw away.

And an urn full of ashes.

ABOUT 'A LIFE WITHOUT WATER': Healing can take a lifetime...

Carol Denman divorced her husband over twenty years ago and has never looked back. But on the day before their daughter’s thirtieth birthday, John barges back into Carol’s life with a request that threatens the fragile stability she has built.

John Bowman is sick. Very sick. While he still can, he has some amends to make and some promises to fulfill. But to do that, he not only needs his ex-wife’s agreement…he needs her.

With the past hovering between them like a ghost, Carol and John embark on a decades-overdue road trip. Together they plunge back into a life without water…but which may ultimately set them free.

MY THOUGHTS: Marci Bolden tore my heart right out of my chest, tore it to pieces and pulverised it for good measure. Damn, it was good.

A Life Without Water is an emotional journey in forgiving, not only others but, most importantly, ourselves. It's a story of love, of loss, of acceptance and forgiving. Be prepared for an emotional rollercoaster and arm yourself with a good supply of tissues before you open the cover.

I always find it easy to relate to Bolden's characters, can usually see bits of myself in them. A Life Without Water is no exception. Had my ex-husband - who, incidentally shares the same name as Carol's ex) turned up on my doorstep, I would no doubt initially have reacted much like Carol. But if this was my story, I very much doubt that it would have continued as it did.

I liked the fact that Carol and John didn't instantly become friends again, that old resentments and hurts continued to raise their heads and demand to be dealt with. As the book moves on, both Carol and John get better at seeing how things actually were, rather than only recognizing their own perception of the event.

The ending was not what I expected at all, it is so much better. A truly beautiful read - yes it's sad, but it is also full of redemption and hope.

⭐⭐⭐⭐.5

#ALifeWothoutWater #NetGalley

#contemporaryfiction #familydrama #womensfiction #sliceoflife

I: @marciboldenauthor #pinksandpress

T: @BoldenMarci #PinkSandPress

THE AUTHOR: As a teen, Marci Bolden skipped over young adult books and jumped right into reading women's fiction and romance novels.

Marci lives in the Midwest with her husband, two teenaged kiddos, and numerous rescue pets. If she had an ounce of will power, Marci would embrace healthy living but until cupcakes and wine are no longer available at the local grocery store, she’ll put that ambition on hold and appease her guilt by reading self-help books and promising to join a gym “soon.”

DISCLOSURE: Thank you to Pink Sand Press via Netgalley for providing a digital ARC of A Life Without Water by Marci Bolden for review. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own personal opinions.

For an explanation of my rating system please refer to my Goodreads.com profile page or the about page on sandysbookaday.wordpress.com

This review is also published on Twitter, Amazon, Instagram and my webpage

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I really enjoyed reading this book, it was well written with characters that I took to my heart and a good relatable storyline. It was a heartbreaking read that I couldnt put down.

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My thanks to NetGalley and Pink Sand Press for an eARC copy of this book to read and review.

This is going to be a "its me, not the book" review. DNF at 16% as I didn't like the characters we were introduced to and it felt like "misery porn" to me.

SPOILERS FOLLOW

The MC h lost her daughter at a young age, she fled an abusive husband and divorced him, got re-married to the man she loved and when we are introduced to her in this book, she is newly widowed. Her ex comes back into her life to scatter their daughter's ashes on a road trip that they were planning to take before the daughter died because he has a terminal brain tumor and wants to do it before he dies, against the wishes of the h.

No thank you, not for me. If you enjoy family drama, this one might be a good fit for you. After the last two years we have been having, I don't have it in me to read something that I find as depressing as this.

There may be a character arc and things might get better, but I am not going for that ride.

Since I have to rate this for NetGalley, I'm going to give it 2, incredibly me and not the book, stars.

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A Life Without Water - gosh so many emotions that I don't know how to put them into coherent sentences to be honest.

I went into this book without reading the synopsis too closely, so when I started reading and then realised this was going to go down the death of a child path, I wasn't sure if I could continue. Having experienced that awful raw grief I'm always a little hesitant reading any novels that trigger those feelings again.

However, I did read it all and felt very much on an emotional roller coaster......angry, sad, disbelief and annoyance to name a few. The main characters John and Carol were both flawed in different ways and at times I was angry with one or the other of them. I struggled to see the positives of their marriage and felt that Carol was quite forgiving in the in the end. But like in life all the what ifs doesn't change the outcome and that is the horrible fact of this tragedy and story.

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This book gutted me. I read it in one sitting. Marci Bolden wove a beautiful and heartbreaking tale. It covers family, love, loss and forgiveness. You get a view of parents who are still going through the heartbreaking tragedy of losing a child, their relationship and themselves.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

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An emotional read on the themes of relationships, love, loss and finding peace. My thanks to NetGalley and publisher for the opportunity to read this in exchange for me review. It’s the first I’ve read by this author and I enjoyed it.

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A Life WIthout Water by Marci Bolden The story was overly dramatic, depressing and repetitive with unlikable characters. Carol (Caroline) and John were both unforgiving and unrelenting in their bickering and blaming each other for their failed marriage and the death of their young daughter. Not a good read for me.

Thank you to the publisher, author, and NetGalley for the opportunity to preview the book.

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I am reviewing this book for NetGalley and Pink Sands Press. I didn’t receive anything for my honest review. I knew nothing about this author but loved the description and cover. Carol Denman is still grieving her perfect husband, Tobias, when her ex, John, of 24 years shows up at her door to make amends. He wants her to take a trip to see all of the places their daughter didn't get to go to. What he tells her compels her to take the trip even though she’s still very angry at him. I didn’t like John anymore than she did when he showed up. As they set off in her RV and let down their guards and walls, each one becomes aware of the part they played in the event that tore them apart. I won’t say more because you just need to read it to absorb the story as it unfolds. I loved Tobias’s family and was glad the trip included meeting them as they were a bright spot! I loved this book and stayed up way too late reading each night. I see this is a first in a series and I’ll be reading on see where life takes Carol as she forgives herself and the others in her past that hurt her. Well done.

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This is the first book I have read by Marci Bolden. I picked up this book when I saw it on some friend's blogs and boy oh boy, it was so much more than I had expected. This book grabbed me from the beginning and had my emotions all over the place.

I do not want to give anymore away than what is in the description of the book, but I will tell you how it made me feel. First Carol was a character that had a lot of baggage. She is divorced from John and didn't like him very much, but she still had that attachment to him. When you have had a child with someone, there is always an invisible tie. She had some tough decisions to make and I don't know what I would have done in her shoes. John is a bit of a creep. He destroyed their marriage with his drinking and not supporting Carol when she really needed it, but he wants to make some amends before he dies. This is not a romance, they do not fall madly in love again. What you get with this book is a realistic human drama. A story of lost love, mortality, guilt, forgiveness, and a search for what is important as well as putting things to rest. This was an emotional story and one that I enjoyed, even though it had me in tears many times. I have just realized that this is the first in a trilogy, so I will have to pick up the next one.

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Thank you to Netgalley, Pink Sand Press and Marci Bolden for this e-copy in return for my honest review. A bittersweet story of life, love and loss and everything in between. An emotional roller coaster of a read that I'd definitely recommend. I've already ordered the next two books in this series.

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This was a nice and sweet read, that keeps you wondering about life and the choices we make in life. I haven't read anything else by Ms Bolden, and will go back and rectify that now. Recommended.

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A Life Without Water is the first of a heart-warming, emotional series by Marci Bolden. Reading this book led me to read the other two in the series because I loved it so much. The book made me cry but feel hopeful as I followed Carol's story of grief and healing.
Thanks to Net Galley and Pink Sand Press for the advance reader's copy of this book and the opportunity to review it.

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A well-written story about love and loss and finally finding the wherewithal to let the negative emotions flow out and let the positive ones in. Bolden is very good at describing her main characters emotions, and she doesn't shirk mixing the unpleasant with the good and changing the balance of those over time--to where you can close the book and know everything's going to be okay..

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