Book Review: "The Someday List" by Stacy Hawkins Adams

Rachelle Covington has it all. A fabulous home, a handsome and prestigious husband, two beautiful children, and a place in the upper crust that's quite comfortable. But her life is not all it's cracked up to be. When her husband goes away on business trip and the kids are sent off to the grandparents for a month, Rachelle takes up the challenge of a dying friend to start a list of things to do before she dies. She heads back to Jubilant, Texas, to reconnect with her past, her purpose, and herself. But when her ex shows up in town looking very fine and very single, Rachelle must confront feelings she thought she'd long buried. Will she give up everything to recover the past? Or will she find a reason to plan for the future? The Someday List is an honest look at what makes us who we are and what can throw us off track. Author Stacy Hawkins Adams writes with a voice that is fresh, sincere, and completely real. Her characters jump off the page and into her readers' hearts.

This is a book that has a lot of edgy topics throughout. It's not very often that so many heavy subjects throw together in one story and work out as well as it did here. There's adultery, alcoholism, and cancer, just to name a few topics. The book blends all these subjects together yet it doesn't feel like it's too heavy to read. The characters are, while not all likable, very realistic and could be someone you knew. This book was very unique that it's a Christian fiction book and involves a woman who has divorced and remarried. Her current husband is distant from her and has been having an affair. Meanwhile Rachelle has reconnected with her first husband who she left for her own selfish reasons even though he did absolutely nothing wrong. It was interesting to see the interactions Rachelle had with the two men. The reader really feels for Rachelle's first husband Troy as opposed to Rachelle's current husband Gabe. Even though he starts trying to redeem himself, it's hard to like him when you learn about the reasons of why Rachelle's first marriage broke up. While it's a Christian fiction book, it is not preachy. You never feel as if a message is being pushed into your face while you're reading.

This was the first book that I've read by Stacy Adams and I enjoyed it very much. One thing I found that I liked about this book was that even though this book was by an African American author, I found that I could relate to the story. I do enjoy multi-cultural fiction because I get to learn about other cultures and customs that are not familiar to me. However sometimes it's also nice to just read about characters and just read about them for who they are and focus more on the story. Either way, I definitely will be reading more books by this author as well as the remaining books in this series.

The Someday List by Stacy Hawkins Adams is published by Revell (2008)