Book Review: Where It All Began

I am loving the Blue Moon series by Lucy Score. Naturally, I like some of the books a lot more than the others, but overall I’m really enjoying it. I have just 1 book left in the series which I have just started – it’s a Christmas book so of course I’m reading it now for Christmas in July. But, I just read the second to last book in the series – Where It All Began – earlier this week.

This book is primarily a prequel to the series, but has present day beginning and ending chapters. It tells the love story between Phoebe and John Pierce so if you have read the previous books in the series, be prepared to cry! From the beginning of the series, readers know that the Pierce brothers (Carter, Beckett, and Jax) lost their father to cancer a few years prior. Their mother, Phoebe, starts dating again in the first book if I remember correctly and then she remarries in the 5th book I think. Her relationship with new husband, Franklin Merrill (father to Eva, Emma, and Gia), is really sweet and loving, but when you read about her and John you get to know a character that had always been gone in the readers’ minds and now you’re in love with his character and wish he didn’t die!

In the novel, Phoebe is a grad student who gets set up by Mrs. Nordemann (always the busybody!) to work at Pierce Acres for the summer. She will help young farmer, John Pierce, and in exchange she can stay at the farm house and get research done for her these on farming practices. Of course, John was expecting a young man named Allen, not a young woman named Phoebe Allen. After the initial surprise that Phoebe is a not a man, but in fact an attractive woman, the two learn to work together to complete their goals.They are very attracted to one another, but Phoebe intends to only stay for the summer and then hopefully land a job with the FDA so she can make money to help her family out. John doesn’t want anything temporary. He only wants to get involved with a woman that he can see building a life with him on the farm. Obviously, we know they end up together, but watching it all unfold and seeing them fall in love is everything. The love that develops between them and the life they build together is so sweet and emotional especially when you know their life together will get cut short when John gets sick. Seeing John become a father to their boys and allusion to the letters and journal entries he writes (which we get more glimpses of in Jax’s book, The Last Second Chance) just makes the whole book even more of a tearjerker because you love his character so much.

I knew this book would make me emotional, but I don’t think I expected to cry or get as emotional as I did reading it. Even though it’s a prequel and doesn’t have to be read in the series, I think if you’re a fan of the books it’s definitely worth a read. You get to see all the Blue Moon favorites as younger people like Mrs. Nordemann, Bruce Oakleigh, Elvira, Donovan Cardona’s parents who, along with Elvira, were also best friends with Phoebe and John, etc.

I loved the book and while I love Phoebe and Franklin together, it’s Phoebe and John Pierce forever for me!

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