What I loved about Rachel Hauk’s The Memory House:
This is an enjoyable love story with real characters, interesting settings, and redemption throughout. But it’s more than that—it’s an historical fiction time-slip, which adds another level of dimension. Ms. Hauck weaves not one, or two, but three different historical events into her novel. It starts out in present day New York with sergeant Beck Holiday, whose police officer-father was killed eighteen years earlier in the World Trade Center on 9/11. For reasons no one can figure, Beck has no memory of her father before that horrific day. In fact, she can’t remember much of anything before that fateful day, including childhood friend and first love Bruno Endicott. He enters the picture as a struggling sports agent fighting his way back after losing everything Jerry McGuire-style.
If these two characters aren’t interesting enough, we’re taken back in time to Waco, Texas in 1953 to meet newlywed (and newly pregnant) Everleigh Novak Applegate and her husband, Rhett. Spoiler Alert: Don’t get too attached to Rhett. Historic event number two takes place here—the 1953 Waco Tornado. It’s skillfully woven into the story line and leaves me cheering for Everleigh throughout the rest of the novel. She’s my favorite character. Closer to the end of the book, historic event number three kicks in—the 1960 Florida Hurricane Donna. Somewhere between these two events, we meet the fourth main character and Everleigh’s love interest, Don Callahan.
This book is a fast read and had my attention from page one.
What tripped me up:
Some aspects of the story were rushed while others dragged. There were a few coincidences that felt over the top, and there was a mysterious character that was never fully explained. Ms. Hauck focused well on the emotions of the main characters for the most part, but then completely glossed over the death of one of the character’s friends with the line—he would be missed. That was it. A best friend dies, and that’s all he got? It felt flat and cold.
Still, this was the first book by Rachel Hauck I’ve read, but it won’t be the last.
Four out of five stars.
