Title: Truly
Author: Ruthie Knox
Series: New York
Genre: Contemporary romance
Published: 2013 (for sale 2014)
Pages: 138 (48 parts)
Format read: online, at Wattpad
Rating: A
I’ve been reading Truly by Ruthie Knox for just over two months now–it’s been the best part of my Mondays for weeks, and I don’t know what I’ll do now that the story is finished. (Maybe just stay in bed? What are the chances I can convince my boss that I’m ill each and every Monday? Oh, and manage to find a competent sub to cover my classes? Yeah, that’s what I thought too. Sigh…) At least I still have a new episode of Emma Approved to look forward to on Mondays. That’s something.
Truly is the story of May Fredericks, a Wisconsin native who just isn’t having the New York experience she’d been hoping for. Her celebrity boyfriend, new quarterback for the New York Jets, just proposed to her in the most backhanded way possible. She not only rejected him, she stabbed him in the hand with a shrimp fork. In public. The video has already gone viral on YouTube.
Seriously–what guy thinks a proposal that includes the words “[she’s] just as plain as you see her now” as a description of his beloved–who happens to be all dressed up for a formal fundraiser that they’re both at at the time, as he speaks into a microphone–as a good one?
No guy who doesn’t want to get his hand stabbed, that’s who.
Long story short (because I definitely don’t want to spoil anything here–go read it! Fast!), May ends up at a Packers-themed bar that she’d noticed in the neighborhood, and spends her last few dollars on a beer. There she notices grumpy guy Ben, and their first meeting is pure magic:
May hopped off her stool, sucked in her stomach, and approached. “What are you reading?” she asked.
The guy canted the book so she could read the cover, but his hand covered most of the title. All she could read was the word Dying.
Awesome.
“Any good?”
He didn’t look at her. He was a bent, dark head, an ear, a declaratory elbow. When she heard a low voice, it took her a second to understand that it belonged to him. “They’ve got their mother’s corpse in a coffin in the back of this wagon, and they’re taking her into town to bury her. The youngest kid thinks the dead mother is a fish, but he also thinks she can’t breathe, so he bores holes into the coffin and right into her face.”
The bridge of her nose wrinkled. A totally involuntary response.
“One of the two older sons is going insane,” he added. “The other one’s broken leg is starting to rot, and the sister’s knocked up.”
A few beats passed. She tried to think of some kind of segue into normal conversation. The best she could do was, “Yeah, but is it any good?”
“It’s super.” He injected the maximum amount of sarcasm into the word.
Okay, so when I said “magic”, I meant the dark kind, obviously. I’d like to say he gets much better from there, but it takes awhile for him to act like a semi-normal socially adept human being.
Fortunately, May can see right through his gruff I-hate-humanity exterior for what he really is: a good guy who’s been burned by life and a rotten ex. Through a truly (pun not exactly intended, but I’m pleased with it nonetheless so I’ll keep it) impressive chain of events, May ends up staying with Ben for a few days. Then he drives her back to Wisconsin, where he’s also from (hence the hanging out in the Packers bar bit) but has sworn he’ll never go back to.
They fall in love, of course. The path runs anything but smooth, naturally. And eventually, two lost souls move forward toward finding out what kind of people they truly (!) are, deep down, and what they’re going to do about it.
And how they’re going to do it–together.
I absolutely adore Ruthie Knox’s writing, so if you haven’t read anything by her, here’s your big chance! Hurry, though–it’s only up there for a limited time, and then you’ll have to wait until next year to buy it.
Don’t. Read it now–you won’t be sorry. Truly. 😉
(Seriously, though–is that book Ben’s reading a real thing? Because if so–scary.)
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