Book Review: What the Wind Knows

What the Wind Knows

Amy Harmon

3/5

Anne has spent basically her entire life with her grandfather as her best friend. She has written novels, traveled the world, and just grown up with his constant presence. When he dies she promises to take his ashes back to Ireland where he was born and spent his childhood. She goes to the exact place he told her to and finds herself transported back to the 1920s to when her grandfather was a child. Mistaken for his mother, she takes it as an opportunity for more time with him and the man who has been raising him. 

It's a little bit of a weird premise and time travel always trips me up when I think about it too hard. But as a basic love story I think it was pretty interesting. Anne is a little bit of a difficult character to like though only because we have to be told how much we should admire her for her strength rather than observe it on the pages. I also don't trust protagonists who don't have any friends except for the ones who have to be their friends and then rely immediately on the male protagonist. I think to be a strong character even in a more romantic book you need to see how they interact and form friendships with other side characters. All of her friends were his friends and she didn't have a lot on her own timeline. 

The ending was confusing to me too. I didn't mind it as much as I probably should have because I like a neatly tied standalone, but I'm just kind of not impressed by how time travel was explained. I think that the rise and fall of the book was also a little weird, it was like we didn't get to the main conflict till 75 percent in and then it was over. It was like the revolution was supposed to feel important but didn't get the page time that it deserved, it really didn't feel like all that much of a problem.

It seems like a roast but it's always easier to point out flaws than it is to talk about what you like. I didn't hate it, I was generally rooting for the characters and wasn't able to completely figure out what was going to happen in the end. This is my fourth Amy Harmon boo, I think she's good at keeping me interested and making me want to finish reading. I do think she relies on similar relationship dynamics across different genres though. But I would read other books by her and recommend this one if you like a slightly trippy romance that's still pretty much just a romance.