The Reece Malcolm List – Amy Spalding

Title: The Reece Malcolm List
Author: Amy Spalding
Published: Entangled Publishing, February 2013
Source: received a copy from publisher
Links: [goodreads][amazon.com]

Things I know about Reece Malcolm:

1. 1. She graduated from New York University.
   2. She lives in or near Los Angeles.
   3. Since her first novel was released, she’s been on the New York Times bestseller list every week.
   4. She likes strong coffee and bourbon.
   5. She’s my mother.

Devan knows very little about Reece Malcolm, until the day her father dies and she’s shipped off to live with the mother she’s never met. All she has is a list of notebook entries that doesn’t add up to much.

L.A. offers a whole new world to Devan — a performing arts school allows her to pursue her passion for show choir and musicals, a new circle of friends helps to draw her out of her shell, and an intriguing boy opens up possibilities for her first love.

But then the Reece Malcolm list gets a surprising new entry. Now that Devan is so close to having it all, can she handle the possibility of losing everything?

Could you possibly understand love when you’ve never experienced it?

Devan has never felt loved in her life.  Her dad is dead and she’s going to live with her biological mother.  The problem?  She has never met her mother.  Reece Malcolm has never been in Devan’s life.  The only thing that she did was gave birth to Devan.  Not even once has she contacted Devan and if Devan’s dad didn’t die, Devan suspects Reece would never have reached out to connect with her.  Living with Reece seems weird as Reece keeps pampering her with material stuff.  Everything feels kind-of-a-little-too-good-to-be-true and Devan struggles to learn her position as a daughter in the family.  She feels extremely insecure as she doesn’t know whether or not the good times are going to last.  When Devan finds out Reece has been hiding secrets from her, she doesn’t know what to do.  Will it be for her own good to start thinking for the worst or is there something she can do to help to prevent anything bad from happening?

At first, I wasn’t sure if I could understand Devan.  She seemed smart, polite and kind but I couldn’t tell if she had a warm personality or not.  No one really knew what she was thinking or how she was really feeling and she didn’t seem open enough to share much about herself with anyone.  And while she seemed observant enough to find flaws in others, she sometimes behaved in ways that made me wonder if she could see the flaws in herself.  I wasn’t happy about the way she behaved when she was around her mother but as I got to learn more about her past, I began to understand her.  While I still wouldn’t say I’d agree with her, I learned that she was just doing what she believed she could to help to make her safe.

I find Reece an interesting character.  She’s a brilliant writer but her people skill was  really not that great.  Because words often came out of her mouth before she could stop them, she had her share of saying not-so-nice things when she was around Devan.  Reece wasn’t someone who was good at communicating her love but through her action, I could see how much she genuinely loved and cared about Devan.  It was such a relief to see them make the effort to finally sit down and have a heart-to-heart talk.  And the ending?  I like that it’s an ending that made me giggle and feel warm in all the right places.

A heartwarming story about the love between a mother and daughter, The Reece Malcolm List  is funny, charming and surprisingly moving.  If you’re pondering on reading a YA contemporary or you simply feel like wanting to lose yourself in a good story about mother and daughter, get hold of a copy of The Reece Malcolm List.  I have a good feeling that you’ll like it. 

Rating: ★★★★★

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