Love Walked In

By: Marisa de los Santos

Narrated by: Jennifer Ikeda

Length: 11 hrs and 40 mins

Publisher's Summary

Award-winning poet Marisa de los Santos crafts an irresistibly touching debut novel. Love Walked In is a contemporary tale, steeped in nostalgic, cinematic charm, of love in all its forms.

Unapologetically idealistic about love, Cornelia Brown appears to catch the break of a lifetime when the dashing Martin Grace, her own personal Cary Grant, comes strolling into her life. But it is Martin's connection to 11-year-old Clare Hobbes that touches Cornelia's heart in ways she never imagined.

©2005 Marisa de los Santos (P)2006 Recorded Books, LLC

Witty and Heart Warming

Jennifer Ikeda IS Cornelia Brown, one of the novel's main characters. Even reading the sequel in print, I could hear Ikeda's rendition of Cornelia speaking in my head. Her bubbly voice perfectly fits Cornelia, who is witty, a hopeless romantic, and such a relatable, likeable character that I almost jumped for joy. Claire, the other protagonist, a bright, serious, and lonely 11 year old who strives for order, is another well-rounded, well-written female character who instantly found her way into my heart. The dramas in this novel, which are for the most part the ordinary dramas of lives colliding, are given to us in such lovely, goofy, (mostly) believable packaging. I found that even when characters were driving me CRAZY or clearly doing the wrong thing, I could totally understand where they were coming from, which is a rare gift in storytelling. There isn't much about this story that's challenging. It's a good book to curl up in bed with and nurse a cup of tea.
#charming #wittyromance #charmingchicklit #tagsgiving #sweepstakes

Glad I had the paper book as well

Enjoyable story, but I was hoping for more focus on Clare. I did not enjoy the background noises, shuffling, laughing and swallowing of saliva. Also I imagined Dr B kinder than she interpreted it. Clare was read beautifully

Better when read instead of listened to

What disappointed you about Love Walked In?

"Belong to Me" is one of my favorite books, so I thought another one by the same author would be a no-brainer. After listening for a couple chapters, I realized I had read this book sometime in the past. I don't think I finished the book either.

If you’ve listened to books by Marisa de los Santos before, how does this one compare?

I've only read books by her before.

What didn’t you like about Jennifer Ikeda’s performance?

The voice she used for Martin made me nuts every time I heard it! It totally didn't fit with his "movie star" gorgeous persona.

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

Disappointment.

Any additional comments?

I love Claire's character, but the rest are too "dreamy" to be believable.

maudlin

Tiresome. Trite. Dimestore philosophy and literary references that add nothing to story. A few cute scenes and characters wrapped around sentimental cliche.

Dreadful audio quality

While the story was lovely and the characters engaging the whole book was ruined by poor audio quality. There were constant "breakthrough" laughs and chatter. Bad form for an expensive book.

REALLY good!!

After the other reviews I was hesitant to get this but I REALLY liked it! The narrators both capture the characters, the thoughts, the emotions, the tone. Cornelia is at first surprisng, and yet once you get to know her, the narrator sounds just like you think Cornelia should. And Claire's narrator,not a child at all, portrays the thoughts and feeling perfectly. There are some very poignant thoughts and the narrators really do bring to life the main characters. The interepretation of the male voices was not as great (especially Tao) but they're passable. The story is simple and yes, predictable, but the thoughts and the observations throughout are interesting, sweet, and touching and, I thought, worth the experience.

Had potential

The story itself is interesting. I enjoyed the Cornelia in the beginning but her ‘verbosity’ wore. She was difficult to like at times. I think some of the characters were not well developed- Martin - for example- his character makes no sense- I think his relationship with Claire was more complicated than is shown or it makes no sense. Claire is more mature than Cornelia. I could live with all this but at one point the author just went too far with Cornelia’s raving for me. It concerns her father’s reaction to Ollie’s announcement. He says Jesus’ name as an exclamation. I am a Christian and I would let that go. That name is very precious to me. However the author allows Cornelia to explain how this was so out of character for her dad. The problem is she uses the F word in relation to Jesus name.. several times. To me that is very offensive. There was no need to go there- it added no relevant knowledge of her dad. It could have been said so many other ways. The overall story started well but in the end evolved in kind of unrealistic ways.

Background noise

This is regarding the quality of the audio portion. There was background noise with dishes, people talking and laughter. Maybe it was recorded in a restaurant or coffee shop? The background noise occurred during the reading of Clare’s portion. It was distracting and something that I have never experienced before with audible.

Disappointing

One of the worst books ever! I kept waiting for an improvement none came . The content was absurd , the plot poor and the ending laughable. The initial story line was intriguing but not developed . This is one of the few books that I had to force myself to finish .

sweet story

This was a sweet story, and one of those books you pick up and read right through. The story was a bit predictable, and the background noise on the recording of Clare's narration was at times distracting.