I was thrilled to be finished with this book! Not because it was fantastic and I couldn’t wait to talk about it, but because I simply wanted to be done!
Stephanie Maddox works her dream job with the FBI. Getting there has taken her nearly two decades of hard work and personal sacrifices—the most important, she fears, being a close relationship with her teenage son, Zachary. One day while straightening her son’s room, Steph is shaken to discover a loaded gun hidden in his closet. Then comes a knock at her door—a colleague who utters three devastating words: “It’s about Zachary.”
I’m a mother and I could understand Stephanie’s need to protect her son, but her character annoyed me! SO MUCH! She’s made her way through the ranks of the FBI, so one would assume she’s an intelligent woman, but her actions didn’t always show that. While I can relate to the mom fear factor clouding her judgement, I expected more from this woman. It also bothered me that she seemed to put her career above her child. While I know I’ve put things before my child before, it doesn’t mean I think it should be a regular occurrence as it seemed to be for Steph.
I finished this book, interested enough to continue, hoping something with a wow factor would happen! It didn’t. I’m completely clueless about the whys and hows of this story. Perhaps it was the skimming I did through parts of the book, but I closed the book feeling like things were unresolved. As if the book just stopped and I was missing the last chapter.
A disjointed read that was often repetitive, this reader is going to keep away from this author until she can get the bad taste of this book out of her head.
My thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the advanced copy of Keep You Close.
Rating: 2 stars
Reviewer: Jennifer
Title: Keep You Close
Author: Karen Cleveland
Release Date: May 28, 2019
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