I had my whole life mapped out. Perfect guy. Perfect friends. Everything was exactly the way I wanted it.
That was until that night--the one I can’t remember. It’s all my fault, and now the memories are all I have left of him. Of us.
My guilt drowns me until Sam Shea steps back into my life and helps me to the surface. He slowly opens my heart and crawls deep inside before I even realize what’s happening. I know I don’t deserve him.
While I’m trying to get used to my new life, pieces of that night slowly start to come back to me. Lies and secrets shatter everything I thought I knew.
Maybe I’m not the only one living with regret.
Living With Regret by Lisa DeJong is the third book in the Rain Series. Lisa weaves an emotion that is so heartfelt and so completely relatable that the reader can actually feel what the characters are going through as they turn each page. The way in which she is able to turn such a tragic story of loss into one of hope, love and new beginnings has me yearning for more from her. This series is a most read and I will warn you all that each book is a bit of a tear jerker but so completely worth every tissue. This was a 4 star read for me! Awesome job to the author!
The reader met Rachel briefly in the previous books as Cory's girlfriend and Beau's roommate. Her story is one that is just as tragic as Kate and Beau's but in a completely different way. Waking up in a hospital bed, with a body that is beyond battered and bruised, Rachel has no idea what happened or why she is there. She immediately looks for her boyfriend Cory, her love since high-school and wants to know why he isn't there by her side, waiting for her to wake up. It is then that she discovers that she is the reason that Cory isn't holding her hand, because he died in the car accident that put her in the hospital in a chemically induced coma for over 3 weeks.
"Choices. We make them everyday, but this one...this one is one I'll live to regret forever."
Once Rachel is released from the hospital, she spends time trying to wrap her mind around an accident that she doesn't remember, but that she knows is her fault because she was driving the car that night. Desperately trying to put the pieces together, of that night and her life, she begins spending time with her childhood best friend Sam who she hadn't had a relationship with for some time. Sam is someone from her past before she met Cory that she had loved in many different ways since she was eight years old but cut out of her life when Cory became a part of it. It is through spending time with Sam and talking with her friend Kate that Rachel begins to question everything about herself. Who was she without Cory? Why was she blind to the problems that were in their relationship? Why would she have gotten in the car after drinking? The answers that she uncovers shock not only her but the reader as well.
"We've all been given life, but we have to make a conscious decision to live."
The emotional rollercoaster that Lisa DeJong takes you one will leave you reaching for a tissue and cheering for Rachel to continue to fight her way out of the darkness of the tragedy of her life to the light that Sam provides her through his unconditional love and support. With every word she says to push him away you will want to yell at her to pull him just a little bit closer'; I know I did!
Lisa De Jong has a great gift a telling an amazing story that leaves us either on the verge of tears or completing balling like a baby! She did it to me in When It Rains and I was very close to tears in the third book in the series Living With Regret. Even though this is a series, each book is a standalone and in this book, we get visits from Beau and Kate from the first book and I loved getting a little glimpse of them. Living With Regret takes on a journey of unimaginable loss and learning to live each day and sometimes life or fate just has other plans for us.
The story starts with Rachel waking up from a coma in the hospital. She has no recollection of the accident or how she got there. The last thing she remembers is being with her long term boyfriend Cory, they were getting ready to come back home from college after the school year had ended. She quickly learns that they were both in a car accident but Cory did not make it. He was the passenger and was killed in the accident. Pain and guilt quickly engulf Rachel and she is left with so many unanswered questions. Her best friend has been keeping distant and she gets the feeling something is off. Because Rachel wants to be left alone to deal with her pain, she does not push it. The one person that is there for her to her surprise is Sam. Him and Rebecca were best friends up until she started her relationship with Cory. There was nothing ever more than friendship between them and now that she is back, he is determined to show her that life is worth living.
“Waking up in the hospital and learning what happened to Cory was like a rainstorm, and Sam’s been my rainbow. If you’d asked me weeks ago if I’d ever be friends with him again- like this- I would have seen no chance, but life has a way of bringing people back to us when we need them most.”
Sam has always been the bad boy in town, nobody knew him like Rachel did and it seems like he just got the bad rap. I instantly feel for him and loved how he was there for Rachel when all she did was push everyone away. But when Rachel starts to get her memory back for the events that led up to her accident, secrets are exposed and Sam is caught in the crossfire. Little by little she remembers that night and her perfect relationship with Cory is left rittled with holes and she is left heartbroken and devastated. Again the person that is there for her every time is Sam.
“Some girls wait their whole life for their fairytale to come along, and mine was standing right in front of me.”
This love story even though has a rough road to get to end leaves you believing in true love. It makes you fall in love with falling in love. It makes you believe in fate and destiny. That sometimes life steers you down a path that your think is the right only to show you that you were always headed in the wrong direction. It’s a heartbreaking and sometimes tough road but in the end, the journey was all worth it. No regrets from me on this one! 4 beautiful stars
Lisa De Jong is a wife, mother and full-time number cruncher who lives in the Midwest. Her writing journey involved insane amounts of coffee and many nights of very little sleep but she wouldn't change a thing. She also enjoys reading, football and music. She is the author of When It Rains, After the Rain, Plastic Hearts and Glass Hearts.
