The Butterfly Garden

    In this blog post, I reviewed Mary Campisi’s The Butterfly Garden, the sixth installment in the That Second Chance contemporary romance series. This beautiful tale is about family, and  dealing with life’s unexpected surprises that might be thrown your way. For Jenny Romano, she was a successful photographer who took photos across the world, making a name for herself. But when she receives a phone call that her sister was in a car accident in Ohio, she dropped everything and rushed over to be with her nieces and help her sister  Grace come out of her coma and get her through the crisis. She later learned that her brother-in-law died at the scene. While she handled taking care of her two nieces, she discovered her brother-in-law was unfaithful and kept that knowledge to herself. But then she met Dr. Elliot Drake, a single father, and a psychologist, to help her nieces and her sister cope with various issues from the crash. She began to trust her heart to him since she needed his advice on how to deal with her mother, who always criticized her throughout her life. For Grace, she needed to be strong for herself and her children, since her perfect world had unraveled with lies and deceit of a broken marriage. As Jenny begins to see Elliot more, she begins to fall for her and wins the heart for his daughter, Sydney. As Grace gets stronger to face the light and start a new life, Jenny decides to find a new meaning of the world home, when she can be with the man she loves and still travel to take photographs closer to home and to her sister.

This tear-jerking romance is so emotionally packed with the matters of the heart. This love story is wonderfully written and beautifully told to pull your heart strings taut..  I cared for both Jenny and Grace, two different sisters, who wanted to seek approval from their mother. They both had to deal with life-changing circumstances and being accepted for who and what they are, faults alone. Elliot was a charming man who cared for his daughter alone since his wife left him to pursue her dreams. But he helped Jenny through a turbulent crisis and cared for her with his whole heart. The location in Ohio was charming and quaint in a suburban cul-de-sac neighborhood with picturesque scenic settings. The theme of the story is acceptance and being loved for who you are while finding a second chance in love and family ties.

This heartfelt contemporary romance will move your heart and have you weeping every now and then. I rated this book, four out of five stars, because it was an emotional read.  If you love romances with non-stop romantic action, plenty of drama, and heart-stopping intrigue, The Butterfly Garden deserves to be read.. This is recommended for fans who love Hallmark Channel movies, Susan Wiggs, Debbie Macomber, and Barbara Delinsky.