Brooke Stevens

"Kissing Your Ex is a phenomenal novel. I was intrigued from the moment I picked it up. Jack and Maddy were very much in love and the type of couple you would expect to be together forever. Through flashbacks, we piece together their history of the good and eventually the bad. After a miscarriage, Jack begins to shut down, and Maddy doesn't know how to get through to him once she's survived her own grief. By both throwing themselves into their art, they make each other miserable until they finally decide to end it. It is a gut-wrenching situation, especially since they know they love each other. Ultimately though, time apart may be their salvation.

"Ms. Stevens has written a close to the bone story that I think anyone who has ever had a great love will relate to. The silence between Jack and Maddy is at times as loud as their arguments to the reader. It is easy to feel their frustrations and their passion as well. In the end though, I simply wanted them to talk to each other and come back together. This great a love should not be extinguished. An easy story to get wrapped up in, Kissing Your Ex will help you appreciate that special love of your own, while Jack and Maddy's stay with you long after the book has closed. They certainly have had that affect on this reviewer.

"Go and buy Kissing Your Ex, an extraordinary novel of love. It has my highest of recommendations."


"...Stevens deepens what could have been a formulaic story with sharp insights into marital intimacy and independence, while a heart-pounding conclusion raises questions about how love happens and the incomplete versions of the truth."


"This is a quiet, haunting story about the fullness of first love . It's frequently told in flashbacks as Maddy contemplates the past, often fighting it, before throwing caution to the wind and agreeing to meet Jack. Their story is one of passion gone awry, of frailties not acknowledged until it's nearly too late, of how it's possible to be lonely even when sharing a bed.

"With a soft, exquisite writing style, Stevens pens a compelling story that brings Maddy and Jack to life. He chronicles their past shared dreams, realistically capturing the emotional highs and lows in flashbacks, as they shatter one by one. A thoughtful and thought-provoking novel that's an absolute gem." —Donna Carter, Romantic Times Gold Star (Phenomenal).


"...another insightful and clever novel to be added to Brooke Stevens already impressive literary resume. As well, it is an imaginative piece that lulls the reader quietly and then grips hold with a compelling force that doesn't lessen until the complete story is told."


"Kissing Your Ex unfolds with the quiet intimacy and unaffected candor of a late-night conversation over a couple of bottles of wine. Brooke Stevens's tender, scrupulous history of one love's flights, devastations, and renewals is a touching meditation on the risks and realities of dreams, on what is lost to time and damage and human fallibility, and what endures."


"A mesmerizing tale of the many ways to get it wrong on the way to getting it right, Kissing Your Ex makes you remember the perfection of your first love and regret everything you've ever done to tarnish that memory."