Running Its Course

Coming of Age Series

By: Nicole Higginbotham-Hogue

Narrated by: Dori O'Dea

Josh is an overachiever whose only competition is Erin, his coach's daughter. Erin is striving to win at all costs, until she finds out that she might have feelings for Josh. Jane, Erin's best friend, is struggling with her identity and balance of friends and family.

In a twisted, true-to-life story, these characters find out more about themselves, each other, and their beliefs.

©2016 Nicole Higginbotham-Hogue (P)2019 Nicole Higginbotham-Hogue

Good Listen

I enjoyed this story, it was sweet
I liked Josh, Erin and Jane. They all have unique personalities and difficulties to overcome. I really like Jane's struggles with her identity, it's relatable. This is my favourite book by this author so far.

This is my second book with Dori O'Dea as a narrator. I enjoyed her performance much more in this one than the other, she brought more emotion to this one.
The audio production needs some editing. Some full chunks were repeated - ex. the beginning of chapter 3 where we meet Jane shows up at the end of chapter 2, so we hear the same thing word for word right after each other.
#AudiobookObsession

enjoyed this one

short, good listen. very relatable story and characters. enjoyed the narrators take of the story.
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Great coming out journey

I would definitely have benefited from this story when I was young. This story gives a young person of any orientation the validation that exploring their sexuality is okay. It isn't always simple but it is possible to be who we are meant to be. I found the spiritual and religious aspects of this story well done too. Truly where was this book in 1969? Thank you Nicole Higgingbotham-Hogue for providing in particular a young adult novel that is like a road map of options, roadblocks and friendship.

Liked It!

Josh is an overachiever whose only competition is Erin, his coach's daughter. Erin is striving to win at all costs, until she finds out that she might have feelings for Josh. Jane, Erin's best friend, is struggling with her identity and balance of friends and family.

In a twisted, true-to-life story, these characters find out more about themselves, each other, and their beliefs.

This book is very relatable and very interesting. I really liked it and recommend that you give it a listen.

AudioBookObsession Review

Challenge’s

This book has a very real storyline that is quite emotional and may trigger some. It is unfortunately a more and more commonly issue. Excellent narration from Dori.
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Painfully Juvenile YA

PREFACE: only after I'd completed my review, I compared my thoughts to other reviews. Such a disconnect! I'd wondered if we'd experienced the same book.

I paused to rethink everything. I realize much (but not all) of my displeasure results from listening to a recorded book. In the past, I've listened to an audiobook of a story I loved and truly disliked the audiobook (narration, quality of audio, editing, etc.)

Keep in mind, my review is of my experience of the AUDIOBOOK ONLY.

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Honestly, I don't remember the last time I disliked a book so much. If I'd paid for it, I'd have requested a refund 10% in. However, I committed to providing an honest review, so here it goes....

Lots of redundancy in the first 3 chapters alone, and in other areas throughout the book. In many cases, it seemed like chapters or storylines were wrote independently of each other without consideration for pacing or continuity. Very confusing.

It's packed with cliched one-liners and rapidly cycles through a series of issues like rape, homosexuality/coming out, and dating/cheating almost flippantly, without any depth or emotion at all. That's a disservice to those who deal with these issues every day.

Often when new characters were introduced, it seemed to list their full bio in a matter-of-fact way, rather than just getting to know them as the story progressed. I never connected with or became invested in any of them. At all. In fact, I found them all mildly as annoying.

Narration: nearly all characters sound identical. This made it very hard to distinguish scenes/dialogue. Audio quality also seemed off, slightly echoing maybe? Very choppy. At times, narrator seemed too close to the microphone. And at one point, the physical act of hiccups was spoken! Pause. "Hiccup" Pause.

A generous 2-stars for effort.

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