Book Review – The Hummingbird And The Bear

by Nicholas Hogg (Corsair) ISBN 9781849016476

‘I never understood why men went to war, why men would die in the corner of a muddy field…until I saw her at the wedding.’

Sam Taylor has escaped a childhood hell by the grace of his intelligence, his sporting ability and his capacity to love. Kicked out of his mother’s house by his stepfather at 16, he could have become a dropout. Instead, he escapes the haze of drugs, and the women who love him into the perfect life.

He is a high-flyer. A London banker who dismantles banks in the financial meltdown before the last US presidential elections. He is engaged to the perfect woman, Jenni. Beautiful, blonde and intelligent. A woman with the family he wished he could have had. Jenni’s parents welcome him into their lives and into their home.

Then Sam meets Kay, an American woman, married to ruthless New York businessman, Chris, at a country wedding in England. In a moment, in a second, a heartbeat he knows he has met the one who completes him. Sam drives Kay to Heathrow the next day and they fall into each other. There can be no other. Kay is as damaged as Sam, with a past to rival his. They are so perfectly imperfect for each other. She is the hummingbird to the bear in his dreams.

Sam can’t stop thinking about her and leaves London two months later for New York.

Their love is the reason for breathing, for their hearts beating. Kay leaves Chris, telling him she is going shopping and meets Sam at the airport. They fly to New Orleans, drive to Texas, heading for Mexico as her crazy husband pursues them. Jealousy kills. But even death doesn’t kill love.

‘I feel so close to her that I can barely see her. Because she is in me, part of who I was, who I am. That I can’t escape.’

And if you think you know what happens, after reading that, you don’t. I read this book in a day. I fell into it. You may fall into it too – if you have ever found the one who completes you.

Amanda Patterson
5/5