Destiny by Cindy Ray Hale - Book Review

How’s it going everyone! Today, I’ll be reviewing Destiny by Cindy Ray Hale.  I found this book back when the author had followed me on Twitter, which was around early March, if I remember correctly.  When I saw this book, it really piqued my interest.  I thought that it would be a great new book to read because it was different than the normal books that I had seen in the past.  The idea of the book being a Romeo and Juliet retelling really interested me and I knew I had to give it a try.

About the Book:

Title: Destiny

Author: Cindy Ray Hale

Release Date: November 19, 2013

Series: The Destiny Trilogy #1

Genre: Religious
Pages: 318

My Rating: 4.5/5 ⭐️

Summary:

Destiny Clark, a young Mormon girl living in Tennessee, is wildly infatuated with Isaac Robinson, the headmaster's son at her Baptist high school. When they're cast together in the school's production of Les Misérables, Destiny is horrified to find that she has to be publicly humiliated by acting out her true feelings of rejection onstage.

As their rehearsals begin, Destiny realizes the unimaginable: Isaac has developed deep feelings for her despite their religious differences and the fact that he has a girlfriend.

But will they be able to find their place amongst the backbiters of their ultra-conservative world?

Weaving around Destiny and Isaac's alternating viewpoints, Destiny is the first book in a series inspired by the characters of Les Misérables and explores heartbreak, self-discovery, intolerance, and love.

My Thoughts:

There might be some spoilers at the end of this review since I had to go into a little bit of detail on purpose, so read at your own risk!

I really like the idea of the story.  It was very entertaining and engaging.  It was hard to put this book down once I picked it up.  One thing that I liked was how this story was a clean romance and free of foul language, which was a very nice change from some of the other stories that I had previously read.  I liked the chemistry between Isaac and Destiny.  It wasn't forced like some other stories, it was slow in the beginning and then continued to grow as the story went on.  This was nice change since they were able to get closer because of the roles that they were playing in the play, instead of having them automatically falling in love with each other at first sight.  Destiny was a very relatable character.  She's smart, kind, and a good friend who will always be there for you.  I feel like Destiny was the character that you would root for and hope she has a happy ending.  Isaac, was a little bit of a jerk in the beginning of the story, but as time went on, Isaac began to grow on me as I started to understand him and the struggles he faced as the story went on.

I have to mention this because I was extremely confused when I got to this part of the story, which is why I ended up docking a point off in my review.  I don't know if this was an error in the electronic copy that I purchased, but when I was reading the chapter, Waking Up, I noticed after Isaac's perspective it switched back to Destiny's perspective in the middle of a scene.  After Isaac's mother mentioned him having a guardian angel, it jumps back to the previous chapter, Bad News, when Olivia is consoling Destiny after she finds out about Isaac's car accident.  Looking back in the story, I realized that this was a small error in the chapter.  Don't let that small error push you away from reading this book.  This was a great story and I think everyone will love it, hopefully as much as I did or more.

If you're interested in checking out Cindy's pages, the links are below along with places you can get the book.

Website | Facebook | Twitter | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Thank you guys so much for reading this, I hope you enjoyed this review/suggestion.  Until next time!