You’re Not Alone by Stacy Eaton

Narrated by Maria Marquis

Trigger Warning: Domestic violence

I read an article recently about a domestic violence survivor who had married one of the first responders who helped save her life after she was stabbed 32 times by an ex-boyfriend (note: there are pictures in the linked article which may be disturbing to some AudioGals readers). The article was linked in a post which suggested that it sounded like a romance novel plot. Afterward, I happened to see You’re Not Alone at Audible so I requested it for review.

You’re Not Alone is similar to the true story mentioned above only in that the romantic pairing in the book is with a survivor of domestic violence and the police officer who arrested her then-husband and thus saved her life.

Trinity Morris used to be married to a police lieutenant who abused her terribly. One night she was being strangled by him and police officer Gavin Brooksfield burst into their home with his patrol partner, arresting the husband and carrying Trinity to the waiting ambulance. 10 years have passed since that night. Her ex-husband is serving a lengthy jail sentence back in Tennessee. Trinity moved to live closer to her parents and start a new life in the tri-state area. She now runs a not-for-profit organisation for domestic abuse victims with a friend and colleague, operating a number of shelters over the city. Trinity also conducts seminars about domestic abuse for law enforcement and corporations.

At one such seminar, she comes face to face once again with the police officer she only knew before as “the Rookie”.

Gavin had met Trinity before the night he saved her life. He has had a crush on her ever since. As a child of an abusive father, he is familiar with the signs of domestic violence and pegged Trinity as being an abuse victim from that first meeting. However, he was unable to take any action to help until the night Trinity’s husband was caught in the act of attempting to murder her.

In some ways, Trinity, despite running a shelter for women and families escaping domestic violence, hasn’t moved on much no matter how many years have passed. She hasn’t dated at all and is still skittish around men in social settings. She is capable and confident in her professional environment but her personal life is stilted.

I was a little surprised when Trinity confessed to Gavin that she’d never had an orgasm and believed herself to be anorgasmic. Gavin proves that hypothesis wrong (this occurs off page) fairly soon, but I wondered why Trinity had not explored her own body herself?

Given that Trinity had not had any kind of relationship with a man since the abusive one with her ex-husband, the speed of her relationship development with Gavin was unrealistic to say the least. They are exchanging “I love you” after only two weeks. Even with someone without Trinity’s background, that’s too fast for me.

To the story’s credit, they did have an explicit conversation about whether or not Gavin had a hero complex rather than true feelings for Trinity. Still, the whole romance arc was too quick for me to be completely comfortable with it.

The author tells the story from the dual first person POV of both main characters, in alternating chapters. Unfortunately, much (but not all) of the time, the same scene is recapped from the other person’s perspective. It had the effect of halting the narrative tension and I found myself a little bored. I already knew what happened, after all.

Maria Marquis was a capable narrator. It seemed to me to be an odd choice to go with one narrator with a dual narration book. Most commonly, the parts from the hero’s perspective would be read by a male narrator and the heroine’s by a female narrator. However, Ms. Marquis performed both roles here. The advantage was that the characterisation was consistent across the listen, as were the voices, but I still found it a somewhat unusual experience.

Ms. Marquis had a slightly deeper voice for Gavin but I can’t say it was credibly “male”. I was able to go with it and she did a good job of consistently differentiating the characters – there were swaths of story from Gavin’s POV and she had long stretches of time using his tone.

A lot of Gavin’s exposition was a bit too sickly sweet for my liking. I didn’t always feel that a guy would say or think any of the things he said or felt in the story.

There was quite a bit of story involving Trinity’s work as a trainer of law enforcement in domestic abuse. Those sections felt authentic. The author’s note at the end indicates that she has extensive law enforcement experience and a special interest in domestic violence so I think she knows what she’s talking about there.

The story would have been more successful for me if the couple had taken more time to fall in love and perhaps if I felt more confident that Trinity had taken back her sexuality before she started falling for Gavin. I’m not sure if that’s unfair.

Of course, something happens at the end which threatens Trinity’s life and the HEA – that’s the nature of romance novels. Even though I was expecting it (I read the blurb after all) I didn’t feel the story itself had believably set up how it all panned out.

Also, I really want to know what happened to the dog.

It’s hard to know how much of my opinion of the narration came from the story and the device of recapping previously expounded action. I think I’d be happy to listen to Ms. Marquis again. She certainly didn’t have any audible breath sounds or any other annoying tics. My reactions to the saccharine nature of some of the dialogue was more about the story than her performance. I don’t think she overplayed the emotion of the text.

The material is pretty confronting so this book won’t be for all listeners in any event. Unfortunately, there were issues with the story which made You’re Not Alone a not entirely successful listen for me.

Kaetrin