Review: Just Human + Still Human by Kerry Heavens - Vilma Iris | Lifestyle Blogger

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Review: Just Human + Still Human by Kerry Heavens

My Thoughts

A wonderful love story about second chances and the kind of love that withstands time, distance and the stuff of life.
It was deeply romantic and heartfelt with a cool,
contemporary vibe.

4halfstars

Synopsis

 

 

just humanMeet Liv and Danny…

Liv loves Danny. She knows she loves him more than he loves her, so she lets him go without a fight when his parents make him move back to America. She knows she will never love anyone like she loved him, but she has to move on.

Danny loves Liv. He knows he loves her more than she loves him, because she does nothing to get him to stay, so he goes quietly when his parents leave the UK. He knows he will never love anyone like he loved her, but he has to move on.

Twelve years on, they have made a good job of pretending, they may have almost forgotten. But when they get in touch via Facebook, it seems that it is all still there. 

They quickly find that they are intensely compatible in ways they hadn’t even begun to explore before they were forced apart. 

Can they put aside their fears and give it a go? Or will deep rooted doubts and insecurities tear them apart?

Series Review

Liv and Danny! I loved their story, full of heart and longing. Their love is one that could not be denied. A love not forgotten through the years and in spite the thousands of miles that divided them. I read the books back-to-back, feeling myself emotionally invested in these characters. Their story is fraught with misunderstandings and missed opportunities, but also with so many memorable, heartwarming moments.

At the start of the story, we meet Liv. She witnesses her boyfriend’s infidelity, marking the end of yet another relationship in her life. Liv is a flourishing business owner, smart, savvy and fiercely independent. But despite her success as an entrepreneur, her experience with love hasn’t been so successful. She’s not the type for one-night stands or casual encounters. Liv is in it to find her forever, but something hasn’t been right in her past relationships. Everything changes one day when her first love, and perhaps her only real love, suddenly messages her through Facebook… a short unexpected ding that was to change everything. It’s been twelve years since they’ve seen each other. Twelve years since her heart shattered the day he left the country. Suddenly, the floodgates open and all those feelings she had long buried come rushing out.

“I’ve tried very hard since then, not to hold everything up against what we had, but it’s impossible. There has been something missing in my life ever since that day and last week, for the first time in twelve years, something changed. The missing piece came into view and I had to come see if I could put myself back together.”

And Danny! I have to say I fell head over heels in love with this character. He has such a huge heart and immediately you realize how much he loves Liv… how he’s always loved her. He’s been living in Los Angeles and has started his own business as well, but he’s never managed to find the right girl. Or perhaps the issue is that he left the right girl behind so many years ago. So when the opportunity arises, he seizes it in pursuit of that girl.

“What is the acceptable length of time before you change your life to be with the person you love? A day was all I needed.”

Danny and Liv were inseparable as kids and then teenagers. They were each other’s first love. Upon seeing each other again, the heartbreak they experienced suddenly felt fresh all over again. But being with each other, even after so long, also felt so right… like the missing pieces all finally fell into place. Seeing them together was perfection. They are both not the most typical of people, but together, they make perfect sense. Their relationship seems right, effortless, full of the love and desire they have always yearned for. Before too long, however, the reality of their whirlwind re-acquaintance begets questions that are difficult to answer. How long would this last? Would Danny uproot life as he knew it and move to England?  Did he love her as much as she loved him? Would she be left heartbroken once again? Insecurities, doubts and fears begin to consume Liv’s thoughts.

“You left, but it wasn’t your fault. So you’ve stayed perfect in my memory. I guess my fear is, if I let myself love you, you might turn out to be just human. And if you’re just human, you could easily hurt me too. I couldn’t survive being hurt by you Danny.”

The story unfolds through alternating Liv and Danny point-of-views and you see how deeply they both love each other as well as how their insecurities continue to feed misunderstandings. At the brink of building a future together, however, everything falls apart, their hearts once again splintering in the process. In their eyes, those lingering insecurities are proven right. I felt their pain. Their sadness. And thank goodness I was able to jump straight into book 2, Still Human.

“We never should have started this. It was always going to end this way. Go back to your life Danny and I’ll go back to mine.”

What happens in the sequel really forces our protagonists to face their future more realistically. Choices need to be made on what they believe, on what they want for themselves moving forward. Particularly for Liv, she is simply too broken to let Danny back in. And if you didn’t fall in love with Danny in book 1 (which how could you not?!), book 2 leaves you clutching your chest tightly from all the feelings I felt for this man. He is wonderful personified and he is determined to hold onto their happily ever after, giving it everything he’s got.

“You told me once that you were afraid I would turn out to be just human and that I would hurt you. I told you then that I am just human and that I could be hurt just as easily. We’ll I’m still human… I’m still me and I know we could still destroy each other. But I don’t care because a life without you isn’t worth living.”

I loved this series. I loved their journey. I loved their love story. It was a story rife with heartbreak and enlivened by lovely, heartfelt moments. It felt fresh and unique and I loved both protagonists. I also really loved the supporting characters that were there through the thick and the thin of it. The ending is perfect, it was everything I wanted and more. I encourage you to immerse yourself in the turbulent, but beautiful love story of Danny and Liv.

“Sometimes people just need a second chance because sometimes we are not ready when fate hands us the first chance.”

series goodreads 2

 

Reading Order

just human just human cover

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