The Memory of Butterflies: A Novel

This story is full of love , hope ,healing and tragedy . In just the turn of a page I was hooked to this gripping story of tail told to protect the ones you love . The characters were brilliant and. strong ,one of my favorite book by Grace Greene . I highly recommend this book and hope you do too.

This is a stand alone novel with a HEA. It is not really a romance but it is a story about love. It is hard to write this review because there is just so much to this novel but to write it all would spoil the story. So, that being said, the story is set in a small town but the heroine lives with her grandmother is a very small backwoods cabin in a remote country area. The grandmother is very old and sick and the young heroine is a teen in high school. They very much keep to themselves and have very little of material wealth but they are very close and devoted to one another.The young girl gets invited to a cook-out with a very popular boy. Of course she is excited that he has shown her attention and she has no experience with young boys or their intentions and immature thoughts and ways. He encourages her to drink and she does and she soon discovers she is pregnant. Her grandmother looks on the child as a gift from God but feels she should tell the young boy. She tries but his family wants nothing to do with "her" problem and he leaves town for college.They live in a remote area with the only visitors being a visiting nurse and the young man that delivers their groceries. She manages to have the child with no one really knowing. The visiting nurse records the birth with the mother listed and the father unknown. She refuses to name the father. The story gets very interesting from this point. As I said, there is too much to write without spoiling the story. Your heart goes out to this 18 year old mother, no experience with life, etc. except what her grandparents taught her. They do not go into town and do not mix socially, so it is just the three of them until the grandfather dies and then the grandmother's health starts to decline. I kept thinking of the story NELL while reading this one. The young girl did go to high school and she is not literate by any means but there is no TV, cell phones, etc. in their life. They live a very simple lifestyle so she is shielded from most modern things and thinking.This is a story that holds you spellbound. it is hard to put the book down. Secrets are slowly revealed and you can see life repeating itself through the generations. The heroine is the main character and she tells her story. Life, death, sadness, joy, it is all here. It is a very good story and I definitely recommend it. It is appropriate for any age. On the sexy scale it is a zero. There are no sexy scenes, it is referred to, etc. but you get no details. It is a good lesson in what happens when What a web of lies we weave when first we practice to deceive!!! Good read.SPOILER--I really liked the heroine and felt empathy for her until she seemed to have no remorse about robbing a young man of his daughter. In the end it tried to show it was for her best interest but I'm sorry. She loved the child beyond reason and yet she didn't think he would have felt the same? She had no compassion for him. Her "I'm sorry" didn't cut it for me. Her reasons for keeping quiet were selfish and self-serving. I felt bad for Ellen, her mother wanted her to go out and live her life - as long as she lived it the way she wanted her to - she was definitely a "smother-mother". That got a little annoying!!I was not paid for this review. I am not an author nor do I know one. I am not kin to this writer. I am a reader and this is my opinion, nothing more, nothing less. 9/6/17

The Memory of Butterflies by Grace Greene is a moving story of family, secrets and forgiveness. To keep the family secrets hidden, a young mother lies, but when her secrets are forced to be revealed, it could end up destroying everything and everyone she loves. Hannah Cooper’s daughter, Ellen, is leaving for college soon. The change is bittersweet as she desires her daughter to have the opportunities she was forced to give up but she also isn’t eager for life alone. As Ellen prepares for her senior year and college, Hannah rebuilds the family home that was destroyed in a fire and returns to her roots in Cooper’s Hollow along the beautiful and rustic Cub Creek in Virginia. With the help of her longtime friend, Roger Westray, Hannah begins shifting through the ashes. Soon the secrets she fought hard to keep hidden rise from the ashes and when one rumor circulates, Hannah is forced to reveal her secrets. Can they survive the earth shattering truth?Once again, Grace Greene writes a story with a tough subject with realism and heart. There is no clear heroine or villain. Sometimes with life’s choices, there are no winners or losers. You feel for Hannah as she is faced with difficult choices as a young woman and now as a mother who raised her daughter alone. It's easy to see the “should have done” choices but what would you have done in Hannah’s shoes? As one character points out, “Life doesn’t always lend itself to clear, easy choices.” There is one particular scene near the end that had me crying my eyes out as Hannah finally faces the pain she has been pushing aside for so long and the realization that she needs to stop hiding, to stop running and face what may come. The reactions and emotions portrayed by the characters are very realistic. It was a fast read. I finished it in a few hours as I couldn’t put it down. I recommend The Memory of Butterflies.The Memory of Butterflies is available in paperback, eBook, and audiobook.

I've just finished reading this and needed to put my thoughts down with the story still so fresh.Where to begin?We meet Hannah and Ellen when Ellen is about to graduate high school and Hannah is rebuilding her home out of town that burnt down.And then we get taken back in time and all the secrets of Coopers Hollow are shown to us.And then back to the present and the secrets come exploding out. How will things move forward? Can the events of the past be overcome and forgiven?

Very slow and predictable. I felt like there were times I wanted to change some of the story to suit my way. Liked to concept but just took way too long to get there, and there were times that the author would start you down a path (like the lock box that went to specialist to get opened and find out what was in it) that seemed to just drop. Make it like a love story it is not way to short and not specific for readers.

Boring

your interest is held, what will happen next & why. Unique ending, right to the last paragraph. Very well written, each emotion is felt by the reader.

i loved this book,it was a great story.

Loved he book