On Mystic Lake by Kristin Hannah - Book Review

Hello and welcome back or welcome if you are new here! I'm so glad you're here.

In this post, I want to share a review on the latest book I've read. I really like doing book reviews as I really get sucked into whatever I'm reading normally, and this gives me a way to express my love for the story even after it's ended.

Today, I will be sharing with a you a review of On Mystic Lake by Kristin Hannah. I first have to preface by saying that Kristin Hannah is the author of my favorite book of all time, The Nightingale, so maybe I'm a little biased about her work because of that but truly, I find her to just be a remarkable author and I love pieces from her I've read so far. On Mystic Lake literally was a book that I had put off reading because it is definitely a love story, no doubt about it and personally, I don't tend to gravitate towards love stories. I'm more of a historical fiction kind of girl with a love story maybe in the mix but really don't tend to grab for a love story on it's own. Because of this, I really put off reading this book. My mother-in-law had lent it to me after I read The Nightingale and I just kind of put it on my shelf and thought maybe I'd eventually read but didn't really have it on my list. But for whatever reason, I was just in the mood for a new read and since we are in this pandemic, I've not been going out shopping so I obviously wasn't going to get out and go to my local bookstore and buy a new book so I instead started looking at what exactly we had to read at home as my husband and I have quite a few books but we don't tend to read each other's book since we have quite different tastes. The book I picked up was this one and oh my word. I am so glad it's the one I went for. It was a surprisingly addictive story and I found it very hard to put it down. Those are the best ones, aren't they? The ones you think you won't fancy too much but then end up just absolutely loving.

To give a little glimpse into the story, On Mystic Lake focuses on the life of Annalise Colwater (also known as Annie Bourne for the majority of the book). Annie grew up in the small town of Mystic in northwest Washington state but after high school she went off to Stanford, meeting her lawyer husband, Blake, and they move to California where Annie is a housewife and stay-at-home mom to their teenage daughter, Natalie. Once Annie’s daughter leaves to study abroad, Blake gives Annie some tragic news which sends Annie running to stay with her father back in Mystic. Once in Mystic, she learns of more tragedy that struck her two high school best friends, Nick and Kathy. The now widowed Nick is struggling with addiction while his 6 year-old daughter, Izzy, is going through strangely dark times. When Annie learns of Nick’s struggles, she sets out to help with Izzy which gave Annie something to do to distract from her own problems. Needless to say, emotional connections run deep once she is around Nick again and everything seems to be going just the way it should until one day the 40 year-old, Annie, gets one of the biggest shocks of her life. This twist takes her away from Mystic and back to California to be with Blake and into a rollercoaster of emotions and change.

Seriously, I was so hooked on this book. The amount of twists it has is incredible and it nearly always goes a different direction just when you think you’ve got it figured out. This one of those books that has almost cheering for the characters or finding yourself wanting to scream at them when they don’t do what they should. Just absolutely gripping and incredible. I want to say more but I also don’t want to give anything away in case someone does take advantage of this amazing book and read it.

Needless to say, I highly recommend this book if you are looking for a good romance novel or just want one of those reads that you can get lost in. For me personally, I am still grieving and craving more of this story and I finished it nearly 6 days ago. I am just so emotionally attached to the characters and plot and the ending leaves you definitely wondering more. But, sadly I cannot see a sequel coming considering this book was published in 1999... a girl can always dream, eh?

At any rate, thank you so much for reading. I do hope if this book sounds interesting to you that you do give it a read or if you’ve read it already, I’d love to hear your thoughts so be sure to leave me a comment down below.

Here is a link to On Mystic Lake by Kristin Hannah.

Thank you so much for reading! I truly appreciate the time you took to read my post.

Until next time.