Fair warning, I wrote this review a few days ago, and can't remember what's a spoiler and what's not, so, if you don't want any spoilers of any kind, you may wanna stay on the safe side and skip my review. Okay so here's the thing. I really liked Secret Maneuvers ...I did, but there's just no way I can give this anything higher then 3 stars, and here's the somewhat long list of why:- (ok I just re-read the synopsis, and I'm pretty sure this first one's a spoiler, so I'm using the tag: A very big pet peeve of mine, secret babies! Blech! Hate the story line, find it offensive, and somewhat of a cop out...an easy way to bring angst into the story and have to work the theme of forgiveness in...instead of coming up with an original idea, just throw a secret baby in! -Then, there's the editing. Now this didn't bug me as much as it should've, but it did pull me out of the story a couple times.... the tense....it seemed like it kept changing...well wait, first off, I thought from the synopsis that this would be in 3rd person narrative, so the dual first person pov's threw me...but I got over it semi quickly. The problem is ,that a few times the story went from from first person past to first person present ( I went vs I go) then a few times it felt like it wasn't a first person perspective at all...almost seemed like the book didn't know what it wanted to be, so instead it's a bit of a Renaissance book, and has a little bit of everything, style wise, in it. Like I said, it pulled me outta the story a few times :(Also some stuff just didn't make sense. I can't really explain this one without spoiling it, so I'll just leave it at that. The h as a mother: When her kid wasn't physically in front of her, the h very rarely had him in her mind. Granted she worried about the H finding out about his here-to-fore unknown kid, but that's about it. Now I'm not a parent, so correct me if I'm wrong, but don't parents usually give a shit about their kids, even when they're not physically right in front of them? Yeah, mother of the year she's not. Oh also she doesn't talk to her kid about his dad, before intro'ing them. Again i don't have kids, but it felt like she should have had a sit down with him first, before introducing her son to his dad. The HEA...a little too hunky dory. The use of the phrase dag-gum. I know it's a small thing, but this bugged the holy hell out of me. I know not everyone's ok with cursing, and I'm okay with that really....but I freaking hate this word....especially when the h does in fact curse, maybe not the worst of the worst of curse words, but she does curse....so why the hell does she have to use that stupid, irritating word is beyond me. So I get why the H is sorta a douche to the h, she kept the existence of his freaking kid from him, because of her own selfish reasons, but at one point he tells the h that She's moving to his home state, without a thought to compromise, without a thought to the difficulty his teenage son wold face leaving everything he knows behind...he just says it like its a no brainer ..and the h thought it was sweet. While, me on the other hand, I wanted to kick his douchey ass. It'd be one thing if they talked about it, and the h wanted to leave, and came up with the idea on her own, but the way the dude says it, geez, can u say asshole? Also the H is sorta passive. Like he never does anything til one of his buddies tells him...I get being supportive, but it made him come off like....well like he doesn't really give a shit. Seriously mad at the heroine. This chick needs therapy, no bones about it. Also couldn't help but fell like this H and h could really use couples counseling. nd the fact that it's never mentioned, bugged me to. On a positive note, I did like that h was kick ass in her own right....even if she didn't always come off that way. Liked that she could save herself. And that being a mom, doesn't preclude her from continuing to kickass. Also her son was pretty good kid, maybe a little older then his years, but still a good kid. Okay, now despite my issues with Secret Maneuvers, it's seeming to get a lot of positive reviews, so all my problems...could be just that, mine, so you may try this and freaking love it, so even though I liked it, I'm o where near loving it.
