A mother who blames herself for her child’s disease, ghosts from the past, a divorce, a missing child . . . these are all subjects (among others) that play an important role in What I had Before I Had You. Although many tough situations could have bogged this story down, the author did a good job of keeping the story interesting and upbeat.

This novel tells the story of a middle-aged mother who is newly divorced and fighting demons that have lingered from her childhood. I had the impression that she was so scarred by a difficult childhood that she tried to be a supermom to her own children so they wouldn’t have to experience any of the pain she had. I felt like the story started out strong, but lost a bit of its momentum about a third of the way through. A lot happened in the first few chapters, and it was almost as if after that, a thread began to unravel and the author was scrambling to tie up the loose ends. This made for a story that was at times hard to follow, though it was engaging enough to keep me interested.

While this book was not one of the best I have read recently, I still feel like it does deserve some praise as it was well-written and had a powerful story of love and the lengths we go to when we know we must heal and forgive.

Content Analysis:

Profanity/Language:  9 religious exclamations; 11 mild obscenities; 3 derogatory names; 4 anatomical terms; 21 F-word derivatives

Violence/Gore:  A woman has a miscarriage, some blood and gore is mentioned with graphic detail; a group of teens break and enter into an abandoned building; two girls get in a physically violent fight; a young child goes missing; two animals get in a fight and some blood is involved.

Sex/Nudity:  A teenager “accuses” another of being a virgin; a teen boy is mentioned to lose his virginity; a teen girl describes what sex feels like; two minors have sex in one brief scene; one brief scene of a minor having sex with some nudity; teens kiss multiple times; adults kiss; adults are mentioned to have had sex, with no detail; a mother and daughter have a mature discussion regarding sex; two girls kiss each other in what one of them interprets to be a sexual way.

Mature Subject Matter:

Divorce, ghosts, psychic ability, teen partying, child abandonment.

Alcohol / Drug Use:

Minors drink; minors smoke; use of marijuana by minors is mentioned; a teen boy is mentioned to be selling marijuana; a teen girl is mentioned to be drunk; teen girls illegally procure prescription medicine.