I received a copy of this book from Xpresso Book Tours in exhange for a review. When I read about this book is sounded really interesting. The main character even shares my name (even though it’s spelled differently), so I knew I had to give it a try. Unfortunately it wasn’t what I expected and I was quite disappointed.
Publication date: October 3rd 2017
Genres: Adult, Contemporary
Description:
Kandace has always been close to her family, especially since the incident that nearly paralyzed her mother and set their lives in a tailspin. In tragedy’s wake, Kandace serves as mom to her sisters while keeping up the house and her job to pay the bills. When unforeseen trouble strikes home, threatening to destroy the family, Kandace pulls together her courage to leave town on a rescue mission––to California and the father she hasn’t seen in years.When Kandace gets stranded in St. Louis, she is trapped––she can’t go home and she doesn’t have enough money to reach Los Angeles. She then meets April, an ambitious exotic dancer with attitude, who has a one thousand dollar wager––that Kandace can make the money she desperately needs dancing at ritzy gentleman’s club The Palace in one night. Rumored for fast money and faster pills, once inside the club, anything could happen. Kandace initially balks at the offer, refusing to become a statistic, but with time running out, she thinks about taking a risk, just once.
Can Kandace strip her clothes for money if it is the only way to repair her broken family?
If she goes through with it, would it change her? Will the club’s fantasy lifestyle take the good girl from Pittsburgh, and reveal a darker side of herself she’s never seen?
Goodbye, Good Girl is a coming of age story about going the distance for family, no matter the cost, about friendship, and finding beautiful hearts in dark places.
Cover
While I’m still not a fan of people on covers, I do like the colors used here. It makes me think of the summer.
Plot
This book is described as a coming of age story and doing everything for family no matter the cost. This sounded like it was going to be very interesting. I have to say the first few chapters were. We read about Kandace and her mother. They’ve been having some hard times since an accident and she does what she can. Her father really isn’t around and he is very missed. This is when the story got kind of weird. Out of nowhere there is some guy at her house, asking about her Dad and where he can find him. He seems rather agressive and it scares her, especially when she walks in and her mother isn’t responding. Between wanting her Dad home and her Mom needing help for her pain and drug issues, Kandace needs her Dad home. Why her mother tells her to go is beyond me. How is an 18 year old with only two hundred dollars supposed to find her father, when she doesn’t even know where he is? Of course, her friend Markus is good with computers and basically hacks everything he shouldn’t to try and find an address for her. That her boyfriend Kyle, did want to head out with her and help her, is understandble, but I thought it was rather selfish when she blamed him when he needed to get home. This is when the story went really far. While I get she is desperate, she is an 18 year old, who should know when things don’t sound right. The fact that she went with a girl, she just met and agreed to go be an exotic dancer is so stupid. For all she knew, April could’ve been a prostitute and she could’ve ended up in the hands of something she couldn’t get out of. Then she goes to dance and just takes the pills handed to her like it’s no big deal. This is when I almost stopped reading this book. It was all just too much. Especially with getting thousands of dollars of clothes and a plane ticket and even a car from the owner of the club. This just didn’t feel right. When her father does finally appear, it was so different than expected. The fact that everything went on like it was all normal, just didn’t feel right. I don’t really feel like Kandace grew at all in this book. I feel like she took a step back with what she could really be. I have to say that I did like the friendship April and Kandace had. At times April was really funny. It was also nice to read a bok that wasn’t completely about romance. She started out with a boyfriend, but that was part of the storyline that didn’t get a lot of attention in the book.
Characters
Kandace loves her family and I honestly believe she has a big heart. If it was up to her, all of her family would be together in one place and everything would be okay. She is so naive in certain ways though. Kandace knows her mother has a problem with pain medication, yet she takes drugs so easy when she’s at the club. It’s easy to tell she loves her Dad. She drops everything to try and find him when she thinks he’s in trouble. She loves her sisters as well. While she is on her way, she is constantly worried that she isn’t there for them at that time. I think she goes along with people too easily. It’s kind of alarming how easy she let April talk her into exotic dancing and walking around naked.
April is kind of a free spirit. She didn’t have a great upbringing, so she sees dancing as her only opportunity at that moment. I think she means well in her own way and is really just looking for friendship and a family. April was cheated out of a loving situation growing up.
I feel like this book could’ve had a lot of potential, but just all the factors together was just too much and slightly unrealistic to me. I rather be really positive about books I read, but I can’t change it when a book just doesn’t click. I guess this wasn’t my cup of tea. Unfortunately, we can’t like all the books we read.
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