I enjoyed the premise of this book, but I found the characters difficult to connect to and not particularly likeable.

DNF. It was another overlooked book I had read and reviewed, but never entered. Perhaps I had planned to try it again at a later date, but frankly, the day just never came. I didn't care for the story, or it's characters. Sorry. Just not for me.

Unfortunately, I have not been able to read and review this book.

After losing and replacing my broken Kindle and getting a new phone I was unable to download the title again for review as it was no longer available on Netgalley.

I’m really sorry about this and hope that it won’t affect you allowing me to read and review your titles in the future.

Thank you so much for giving me this opportunity.
Natalie.

So true and heartfelt this will tug at your heartstrings right from the very start. Compelling and gripping. A real page-turner from start to finish.

"Dear Jane" is not an easy book to read and some parts of it were really hard. It's awful to be aware of the fact that there are children in this world who go through what she experienced.

This is a love story devoted to the strength that can be found within yourself. She finds truth, balance and parallels through the endearing novel “Jane Eyre”, to her own life experiences.

The quotes from Jane Eyre before each new chapter helped connect Kit Kat to Jane through the different experiences and I think that some younger readers may think about picking up Jane Eyre to read in order to find out more about this character who helped Kit Kat embrace herself and learn about who she is.

Thank you to NetGalley, Black Rose Writing and Marina DelVecchio for providing an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was my first book by this author, It was pretty enjoyable. I would give this book a 3.5 star rating! It was a pretty Quick and easy read!

Very interesting book! I read this over the course of a few days and just couldn't put it down. The narrator was a likable character, who I found myself sympathising with constantly.

Dear Jane; Wow! What a story. It is at once an immersive and bitterly disturbing story, you can't look away or put it down even for a minute until you've absorbed every word of it. I've read books on child abuse, but it never gets any easier whether it's fiction or non-fiction. It's always hard to contemplate that anyone would be filled with such self-hate that they would project such violence and hate onto their own children.

I love that the story brings with parts of the Classic tale of Jane Eyre (<strong>definitely have to go give it a reread</strong>), each page begins with a quote from this wonderful classic. It is indeed true that books have a difference in many of us bibliophiles lives at one point and in one form or the other.

This is also true for our protagonist Eketra Koutros, now renamed Kathryn by her adoptive mother. What would it be like to know your name and then lose it, only living on within your memory? Is it the right thing to do to a child at an age where the child recognizes their original name is changed because the parent(s) feel more comfortable?

I love that Kat tells us what each person's Greek name means and how she views that person by that meaning.
<blockquote>"Her name was Athanasia Koutros. She was my mother. The one who gave birth to me. In Greek, her name means "the immortal one," and I find this quite ironic, because, even though I left her so many years ago, the memory of her crawls back to me, burrowing beneath my skin, cementing itself against my ribs so that I find it hard to breathe. Whenever I think of her, my breath gives way, my chest heaves with force, and words escape me, since I cannot reveal her existence."</blockquote>
Kathryn or Kit Kat as her friends calls her finds solace within the pages of Jane Eyre, she's living a life similar to the character of Charlotte Bronte and so she writes to her after almost harming herself, because of all the rage she feels inside for the way she's been treated from childhood to present day living in America after being adopted; she's haunted by a past that is filled with loathing and abuse at the hands of some those closest to her.

Charlotte Bronte becomes her most trusted friend, her confidante, her role model and she tells her everything she cannot voice to her adoptive mother or anyone else, in this way we learn about her childhood through her college years. For she fears retribution because she was forbidden to speak about her past before and paid the price. Her adoptive mother, Evangelia "Ann" a single woman, with an unimaginable cold disposition, "what a bitch". I mean what kind of mother would be hell-bent on silencing a child's voice and her memories because she wants a child with a clean slate as if that can happen with a child who already knows part of herself at that age.

Within the pages of this diary, Kat confesses her deepest and darkest secrets, she narrates in an earnest and strong voice as she tells us everything that has taken place in her life from the age of eight. There comes a time when all of us who haven't yet find our voice will do so and when that happens, we realize that in doing so we've not only helped our selves but others as well.

The subject matter within these pages are dark and complex, it's realizing the instance you've lost your voice and having the courage to find it again.

This book is about the loss of self/identity, loss of family, love and the absolute power books have in saving a life when it's needed the most.

If you haven't read this book, I highly recommend it.

I wanted to read this novel because I love Jane Eyre, so the idea of a book about a girl who also connects with the classic seemed ideal. Whatever my expectations had been about this book before I started reading it, they were exceeded in every way. Kit Kat writes letters to Jane Eyre because she feels that Jane would understand her due to some similar circumstances. I think it is important to go into this book without knowing too many details, so I will avoid those, but it is fair to say there are trigger warnings for abuse, sexual violence, and abandonment. I think that presenting those topics in a straightforward way is something that Delvecchio does extremely well. Because we are hearing the details in letters describing her past, we hear not only the events but the consequences of those experiences. The family history, and our protagonist future are revealed along the way and truly feel like a growing friendship between her and the reader. Again, I don’t want to give anything away, but the ending pleased me because it did not attempt to wrap things up in an unrealistic way or redeem characters who did nothing to grow. I look forward to more books from this author!

Thank you NetGalley for an early copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

As a lover of Jane Eyre I was instantly drawn to this book and it did not disappoint. Before reading this book I considered Jane Eyre to be about forbidden love, a byronic hero and a commentary on social class, Dear Jane has made me appreciate how different people can read the same thing very differently. ‘Kathryn’ was an interesting narrator showing both insight beyond her years as well as hints of childhood naivety that made her so engaging. This book was difficult to read at parts but the ending felt like a resolution for both the protagonist and reader. This book enlightened me to the other side of Jane Eyre and was a great way of exploring the many roles of females within society across centuries.

The ARC of this book was provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This book tells the story of a fifteen-year-old girl who tries to survive a violent childhood and a distressed adoption in New York. She finds confort in Jane Eyre, who becomes her favourite literary character and an inspirational figure.
I'm a huge fan of Charlotte Bronte's "Jane Eyre", so when I bumped in this book I was really curious to read it. Ireally liked the concept and idea behind this novel.
"Dear Jane" is not an easy book to read and some parts of it were really hard. It's awful to become aware of the fact that there are children in this world who go through what she experienced.
Despite all that, I couldn't really connect with Elektra's character. Half of the time I found her thoughts too melodramatic and exagerated. At the beginning I found very difficult to dive into this story.
If you're a fan of "Jane Eyre", then you shoul definitely give this book a try!

This was a very raw and emotional book. One gets to see all the hardships that the author went through and it's so touching to see her persevere through all the hardships. I would recommend this to anyone that enjoys reading books that will teach you life lessons. .

This book had the most amazing writing I have read in such a long time, maybe forever. It was glorious, and it just flowed so well. It just sucked me into Elektra's life, and bore me through her life of horrors in a way so well explained and detailed. It made me hurt for her, to cheer for her, to cry for her and for the childhood she had, but I love the way she connected with Jane Eyre so purely, and all the connections she was able to make between herself and not only Jane Eyre, but also Charlotte Bronte. I am so glad I requested this book, it was perfect.

A young Greek girl, born to her prostitute mother, homeless, and with a pimp as a father figure, was adopted by a stable single woman in the USA. That might have been wonderful had this woman not refused to discuss or even acknowledge the girl’s previous life. The girl turned to books for solace, fell in love with Jane Eyre, and proceeded to write letters to Jane in which she detailed the horrors of her early childhood. This was quite a difficult read and included abuse by neglect as well as sexual abuse.

I appreciated the chance to read this and admire the inventiveness the author employed in the use of letters to allow the reader get into the head of the girl.

This book was provided by NetGalley in return for an honest review.

Dear Marina,

Thank you for writing this book. It's not one that I would normally have picked out for myself, but here we are, after a roller-coaster of emotions.

It's taken me a while to get through this book. The first reason is that it is INTENSE; the narrative is chock-full of heavy themes, and had I tried reading all of this in one go I think it would have been too much for me to handle. That being said, not once did the book ever lose its ability to compel me onward - I read the second 50% of it today, just because I finally had the time and mental capacity to get on with it.

(On that note, I would advise anyone who is easily upset to perhaps give this one a miss. Trigger warnings include suicide, rape and physical/verbal abuse in amongst others.)

There are a few little things that jarred slightly as I was reading; a couple of times I thought Kit Kat was talking about one mother, then a few pages down the line it turned out to be the other one (though that's probably more of a me thing, since for the most part it was pretty clear which one she was referring to.) Another thing was that at one point a nun says "Yup."; at first this felt pretty unreal, but then I remembered that this is a diary and that Kit Kat is probably paraphrasing and putting her own words in.

The second reason it's taken me so long to read is that I've been at uni, and haven't had as much time on my hands as I do at home. This part does play into my review a little bit, and this is why: parts of that final chapter could have been written by me. I'm currently the same age as the protagonist, studying English Lit, and I'm constantly learning about myself and trying to "write my own narrative."

The whole theme of living for yourself, and not for those who you should 'owe' is especially close to me at the moment. There's a part of the book that rang especially true, to the point I highlighted it:

"As the writer of my narrative, I write my own story, my way. Just like Jane. Just like you."

Isn't that such a lovely notion? Being able to write your own way through life?

I also appreciated that this isn't a 'happily ever after' kind of book in the stereotypical sense; it does, however, revolve around the protagonist paving the way to her own 'happy ending', which I guess is left up to us to ponder.

The whole pages dedicated to literary analysis of Jane Eyre in comparison with Kit Kat's life were BRILLIANT, might I add (though I've never actually read Jane Eyre), and I can't wait to read this again at some point in the future once I've read the other, so that my understanding of this book might be illuminated.

"You didn't desert me, and, in turn, I have not deserted myself.
I have not forgotten who I am."

Yours,
Lost

I mean, this book has a lot of potential. But it's far too triggering without any warning. I felt like something were just needlessly written for shock value. I was looking forward to a great discussion on adoption, trauma and memory. Instead, this book featured constant gaslighting and abuse. Incredibly hard to read.

Amazing read! The author wrote a story that was interesting and moved at a pace that kept me engaged. The characters were easy to invest in.

Wow! This epistolary story was a really heavy read. Kit Kat or Kathryn( real name Elecktra) is a Greek girl who has been adopted by a single American woman in the 1970's. Ann, her adoptive mother feels that her child must forget about her life in Greece. As becomes clear as Kit pens letters to literary character, Jane Eyre, the traumatic events of her life in Greece are permanently fixed into her brain. We follow Kit Kat from her chaotic teenage years right into college.
So much pain and heartache makes up Kit's life and it is pure magic how Marina DelVecchio weaves Jane Eyre's experience with Kit. For the sake of being repetitive, it's a heavy read and I am left feeling a little "lost in the wilderness " in trying to sort out all my feelings about it. As it is solely from Kit Kat's p.o.v the relationship between her and Ann, the adoptive mother feels sort of stuck in a literary volcano. Because Ann doesn't want to listen and so we the readers are left to carry the weight of all the protagonist needs to unburden.
TW: Scenes of sexual nature(including one scene involving young children) and domestic violence

* I received an advanced copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own*
Actual review: 1.5
I'm going to be as nice about this as possible. This book was not good...at all. The idea/concept was a good idea, but the execution of the whole thing was just utterly terrible. With some work, this book could be something great. The authors writing style was great, but this book just didn't seem ready for publication.
The letters written to Jane by Kat just didn't seem to flow, which could be fix easily. They were in event order, but mixed up with may repetitive parts as well. I just feel that the book could have been written way better and if it had been, I could see my review being a lot better.

Dear Jane
by Marina DelVecchio
Black Rose Writing
General Fiction (Adult) , Teens & YA
Pub Date 03 Jan 2019


I am reviewing a copy of Dear Jane through Black Rose Writing and Netgalley:

Kit Kat wasn’t born in the U.S she born in Athens Greece her Mother had been a prostitution and their protector had been a pimp . Her early childhood had been marked by violence and homelessness as well as an orphanag. wWhen she is eight she is adopted by a Greek American Woman who moves her to New York but things are far from a dream, her new Mother has a way of making her feel small!


Charolette Brontw’s book Jane Eyre saved her life after trying to commit suicide when she was thirteen and at fifteen she begins writing letters to Jane Eyre.



Dear Jane is a book about one girl discovering who she is and finding the value in who she is as well as being able to put the broken pieces back together again.


I give Dear Jane five out of five stars!


Happy Reading!