This Nearly Was Mine, A Novel by Nancy Farkas

Occasionally a romance novel comes along with such a unique story that I like to feature it on this blog.  Writer Nancy Farkas' This Nearly Was Mind is such a book.  The characters are, for lack of a better word, human, having frailties and struggles the reader can truly relate to.  If you are a lover of emotional, endearing stories this is a novel you should add to your library.  Readers are telling it all.  Take a look at some chosen reviews:

Amazon 5 Star Review by HeftyBanks:

"This novel has so much low key realness within its pages I felt like I was reading a diary more than a story at times. Most of the relationship dynamics within the pages are relationship dynamics we've all experienced at one time or another to one degree or another, but seldom with the depth that is brought forth here. The dialogue between characters is some of the most intimate dialogue I've read and again it made me feel like I was reading a diary about a relationship than a novel. Great story, great characters, great prose, just great."

Amazon 5 Star Review by Amazon Customer:

"This is a beautiful book. At first I was taken in by the vista of Spain (in the middle of snowy weather, a great idea!), and then the character grew up, grew older, kept returning to depict her life as relationships changed, grew, shifted--and it felt like I was hearing from a good friend about the challenges of love, children, bills, illness, trips--and above all of a recurring love that went through transitions with her. (The more I entered her life, though, the less I wanted the notes on how to make the book into a movie! I think other people loved it.) The final section, with its bittersweet picture of a love unfinished was poignant and beautiful. I loved the memory of this book, it will keep resurfacing for me!"

Amazon $4.99

 Synopsis:

In the summer of 1980, Annie, fresh out of graduate school, escapes a doomed engagement by fleeing to the Costa del Sol in Spain. The young traveler is seduced by the striking landscape and the shimmering sea, but not as profoundly as she was by Francisco, a local musician with a complicated past and a troubled soul. Her adventures propel her into adulthood and a life teased with what might have been.
 

Twenty-six years later, Annie’s teenage daughter Marielle, curious about her mother’s stories, searches for Francisco while on a backpacking trip through Spain. When Marielle’s search is successful, Annie’s thoughts return to her romantic past amidst the magnificent backdrop of the steamy Mediterranean coast. Francisco’s unexpected reappearance ignites powerful feelings she didn’t know were still simmering.

 

Annie obsessively questions every decision she made that summer and wonders about a life that could have been hers had she stayed. She is torn between her love and devotion to her husband and the intercontinental pull to the life she has fantasized about for decades.  

 

Will she sacrifice the life she’s built with her husband for one that nearly was hers so many years ago?