Cover Image: The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley

The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley

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I'll be honest, at first, I didn't think I was going to like the book. It started off slow and I began to wonder where the story was going. However, that quickly changed as I became immersed in Loo's life - and Hawley's past. We follow Loo from the age of 12 to 17, with interspersing chapters on Hawley's past transgressions and how he acquired the different scars that mark his body. Both the past and the present were riveting and they complemented each other to allow for an understanding of the bond between this father and daughter. Their relationship was in no way perfect, but it made sense to them, and it made sense to me as a reader. This was an emotionally charged novel that showed various different aspects of a father-daughter relationship that is in itself very unique. The language was beautiful and moving, highlighting the pain and love that both Loo and Hawley feel. There was one aspect of this novel that bothered me a bit and it was the violence exhibited by Loo and her father's lack of admonishment for her violent tendencies. It made sense in the context of the story and the characters but it was the one thing I wish had been addressed. The level of aggression that Loo shows is quite high and I just wish that someone had helped her deal with that in the story. That is the only negative I had for this novel. Overall, I found this to be an intriguing and deep novel that explored an interesting family dynamic!

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Noooo! It can’t be over! The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley is one of those books that you can’t stand to see end. I want to know what happens to Loo and Sam, Marshall, and even Marshall’s pill of a mother.

There are infinitely many ways to love. Even if we secretly think our way of loving is the best and the right way, we can always be surprised by the power of a man loving a woman and his child in his own best and right way.

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AMAZING! This is the type of book that is going to have readers up until the wee hours of the morning. What I really enjoyed about this book was the relationship between Hawley and Loo. Both are extremely strong protagonists that "fill" the pages with their presence. Loo sees the scars that riddle her father's back, the way he limps, the way he fights with his fists, and deeply loves him, in spite of how difficult and complicated her own upbringing becomes. It's really a relationship that few characters in the book truly understand and it does lead to both father and daughter becoming outcasts. But there is no doubt that Hawley will stop at nothing to protect his daughter, especially, as ghosts from his past threaten to harm Loo.

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Just under 4 stars for me. First of all, I love the characters in this book. I especially fell hard for both Hawley and Loo. The Bullet chapter were riveting, scary, and nail biting. At times the bullet chapters reminded me of the stories told in "Second Hand Lions." The present day chapters sometimes were good but left me feeling anxious. At times the bullet chapters reminded me of the stories told in "Second Hand Lions." There were very sad moments, extremely touching moments, and heart-warming moments in this story. The ending left me a bit frustrated and confused. But, I'm a sucker for a happily-ever-after or at the least a solid resolution.

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Samuel Hawley has been on the run with his daughter Loo for years, packing up and relocating every year, never getting too settled, too comfortable. Loo doesn’t know why they have to live this way, but her mother is dead, her father is all she has, and she loves him. It really isn’t that bad. She doesn’t remember it being any other way.
Then one day, when Loo is 11, Hawley decides it’s a good time to settle down somewhere, and he takes Loo to her mother’s hometown of Olympus, Massachusetts to lay roots. As the years pass and Loo grows into a young woman, she learns more and more about her father’s past, including some painful truths she hadn’t expected, gets questions answered about her mother, of whom she knows very little, and starts to grasp the person that she is and the kind she wants to be.

The tone of this book reminded me a bit of All the Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood crossed with a smattering of The Wolf Road by Beth Lewis. A little gritty, but not overwhelmingly so. Perhaps it’s the survival aspect that connects them, the idea that when our lives are at stake, all bets are off. Also, that doing bad things doesn’t necessarily make us innately bad, that we are still capable of loving and being loved, that there is always room for change, always room for forgiveness, to make amends, to do better and be better.
Hawley may not be the perfect father, but damn if he doesn’t try. Loo’s upbringing is far from typical, but somehow it suits her personality, she takes it in stride, and she loves her father fiercely. Love isn’t always easy, and love between parent and child is rarely simple, but despite all the extraneous crap that gets tossed at them, their bond remains intact.
The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley is about a lot of things – redemption, sacrifice, friendship, forgiveness, family – but ultimately, it’s about love. And it’s a love story worth reading.

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I am so very conflicted by Tinti's novel, so I wanted to give it a few days to sort of "set" before I wrote anything at all about it. I felt like I was reading a mashup of John Green and Quentin Tarantino more than once. Sometimes that actually worked, which is why I continued to read. Loo has been raised on the run by her father, but when he decides they should settle down in proximity to Loo's grandmother, they both struggle to play by the rules being part of a community requires, with spotty success.

I found it, at times, gratuitously violent and maddeningly uneven, and yet I was compelled to continue. Long story short, this was like eating a steak that was almost cooked well.

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Father - daughter love

Samuel Hawley and his daughter, Loo, have had an unconventional life. Hawley has had a criminal lifestyle since he was young and he and Loo have a nomadic existence after Loo's mother dies, moving often to stay away from criminal elements in Hawley's past.

He finally decides it's time to settle down and give Loo some roots so they move to Olympus, Massachusetts where Loo's mother was from and where her grandmother still lives.

This book was totally different than anything I expected. I loved the characters - even when I didn't (if that makes sense).

The technique the author used to tell the story, giving readers a peek back at events in Hawley's past was perfect.

This is a story of a damaged man, who loved his wife completely, and who does his best to raise his daughter in a way his wife would have wanted her raised. And it's about a daughter's love for her father even knowing he's not a perfect man.

I don't know if this review makes sense to anyone but me. It is one of the harder ones I have reviewed. But just know I enjoyed it immensely and recommend it highly.

I received this book from The Dial Press/ Random House through Net Galley in exchange for my unbiased review.

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This was such a wonderful book, the fathers haunting past, the bond between family members, and the emotion in this book stays with you long after you've put it down.

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This is the second sleeper 5 star book I have read this year. I really like it and will probably still be thinking about it in several months but it never made me skip something else just to read it which is what I need for a 5 book. That being said, this is the story of Samuel and Loo Hawley. It is told over two timelines: Loo in current times as a teenage girl, and Samuel in the past through the events that eventually give him 12 shooting injuries. Through these episodes, we learn that Loo's mother died and that Hawley hasn't always been a law abiding person, how Hawley struggled with parenthood and Loo with herself as she moves from childhood to adulthood. Ms. Tinti beautifully highlights the intermost feelings of her characters, especially the internal struggles they face throughout the book. Heart warming and heart breaking all at the same time, this is a beautiful book!

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Tinti's long-awaited latest novel (after the great The Good Thief) was well worth said wait--it's one of those books you can totally rip through in one sitting, and you probably will want to. It's centered on a girl with an unconventional childhood, who, with her father, is maybe finally settling down--interspersed with tales from her father's criminal past. The two stories gradually intersect to strong results. I was not super into the daughter's love interest, who takes up way too much space in the story, but enjoyed her interest in astronomy, her dealings (and her father's) in a small town, family secrets coming to light, grand theft auto etc. Really entertaining and gorgeous writing. A/A-.

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I love a good anti-hero. Many of my favorite movies and TV shows are those that send my moral compass spinning: Is this a good guy who does bad things? Or a damaged human being who is not all bad? I enjoy that gray area a writer creates between the good and the bad, but I wasn't drawn to Samuel Hawley in the same way I was when I first met Walter White, Tommy Gavin, or Tony Soprano (three of my favorite TV anti-heroes). I found Loo to be a more compelling character in this book than Hawley. Perhaps my expectations were a bit too high for Papa Hawley before I even started reading.

What I did love about this book was the way it's structured. It's a story of Hawley raising his daughter Loo after his wife dies when Loo was an infant. The chapters alternate between Loo's coming-of-age story, and flashbacks that reveal more about Hawley's dark past as the chapters reveal his physical scars from being shot, and the emotional scars that he carries below the surface. It is very easy to envision this book as a movie, as the descriptions are very vivid. The question I keep asking myself is would the movie be as good if it wasn't structured the same? That is to say, if not for the anticipation of the flashbacks intertwined with Loo's teenage woes, does the story still stand up on its own? I'm not sure that it does, because it truly is the developmet and slow reveal of the characters that kept me interested in this book. I'm not sure how well that would translate to cinema.

Thank you to the publisher, and the author for approving my Netgalley request and providing a copy for me to read and review.

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Even though this book was tough to read at times, I loved it. The main characters of Sam Hawley and Loo are so interesting. Sam Hawley has led a tough life and the reader gets flashes of his life in the form of chapters dedicated to each of the twelve times that he was shot.

Samuel's daughter, Loo is a teenager now and she has gotten used to staying only a short period of time in one place and never really feeling like she belongs. They eventually end up in the home town of Loo's mother, who died when she was small. There is quite a bit of mystery around Sam's background that is slowly doled out in the bullet chapters and in the interactions with some of the town's residents that grew up with or knew Loo's mother. Part coming of age story, part thriller, but definitely a page turner. Once I hit around the halfway point and started seeing where this was headed, I stayed up late to finish it. I really like this author! Her first book, The Good Thief, was also excellent.

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Samuel Hawley is a thief who happened to fall in love with a beautiful young woman in a diner. The novel tells the story of their life together, mostly on the run, and what comes after with the pain of loss. The bulk of the story is set in Olympus, MA where Hawley tries to "go straight" working as a fisherman. It happens to be Lily's hometown. The real star of the story is Loo, their daughter. She depends on Hawley for shelter and safety and has lived in myriad locales, eight schools in eight years. She loves the house Hawley chooses in Olympus. Living in a house is a new thing for her. Loo can't believe how big it is and wonders how they will fill it since the bulk of their belongings are Hawley's guns. It is in Olympus where Hawley teaches Loo how to shoot. She meets her grandmother and has more adventures as well as a pseudo normal existence. This child has lived a full life that most of us could never understand.

All in all love between father and daughter can be a wondrous thing. Hawley loves Loo and tries to keep her safe. Reading this new novel will give you the answers to the many questions you might have once you start.

ARC courtesy of NetGalley and Dial Press (March 28th 2017).

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The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley is about Hawley, a former(ish) thief and killer and his daughter Loo, who knows little about her father's life and her mother, who died when she was an infant. They move together to the small fishing town of Olympus, where Loo uncovers the past as events come back to haunt them. The story alternates between Hawley's past and how he got his scars and the present from Loo's point of view.

I've seen this advertised as a thriller, but it's really not. There's not much mystery to me in how a man who kills for a living ended up with so many bullet scars. I've also seen this advertised as a coming-of-age story, which it is. If in a more violent manner than most people come of age. It took me a while to get sucked into this book because of that violence. Both Hawley and Loo solve most of their problems by fighting and have no qualms about breaking fingers and almost killing people when they're upset. There seem to be no repercussions for these decisions for Loo, and even though Hawley has bad things happen to him, he never seems to show any regret for killing people, only for the negative effects this has had. I think I was supposed to like Hawley more than I did. Even though he has an admirable love and loyalty to his daughter, I couldn't get over how he treats other people.

Tinti has a beautiful way with words, and I did love certain symbols that kept reappearing in the book, such as watches and stars, that played big roles later on. There were some scenes that were hard to read and made my heart sink, and there were some that were lovely, too. I especially liked the ending and the last few pages. I think if I could have set my morals/values aside, I would have loved this book. I just had a difficult time doing that.

Thanks to NetGalley and Dial Press for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

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Wow!  This book definitely took me on one heck of a scary and thrilling roller coaster ride!

THE TWELVE LIVES OF SAMUEL HAWLEY by HANNAH TINTI is an absolutely riveting and captivating tale of a father’s love for his daughter.  This book drew me in right from the very first chapter and throughout all of the 12 bullet wounds that Samuel Hawley endured to the very last heartfelt chapter. Loved it!

HANNAH TINTI delivers a touching, moving, heart-wrenching, impressive, and very descriptive read here which was beautifully told through two alternating timelines of the past and present.  Each bullet that Hawley takes is a way for us to explore his past and influences some part of Loo’s story in the present which links both stories together in the end.  The structure of this tale took me on an adrenaline filled ride that was exciting, fun, and fearful for an absolutely enjoyable and thrilling reading experience.

I couldn’t help but to feel a little bit scared of Samuel Hawley and love him at the same time.  I was rooting for him as I could see his goodness and the love that he had for his wife and his daughter.  The love and connection that Hawley had with his daughter outshined all the violence and flaws of this character in this adventurous story between a father and daughter.

To sum it all up it was a harrowing tale of love, hope, discovery, acceptance, and forgiveness that was entertaining, exciting, fast-paced, and a quick read with a satisfying ending. Highly recommend!!

Thank you to NetGalley, Hannah Tinti, and Random House / The Dial Press for the opportunity to read an advance copy of this book for a fair and honest review.

Review found on blog & Goodreads
Two Sisters Lost in a Coulee Reading
http://www.twogirlslostinacouleereading.wordpress.com

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I received this from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. This was a quick read for me. Cleverly written and a good coming of age story. I found myself not loving it though. Loo and her father have a very interesting relationship. I found myself fascinated about the secrets surrounding her dead Mother. There were just parts lacking and a little over the top for my taste. Still a good book and it will capture honest audience.

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I fell a little bit in love with Samuel Hawley, and I’m not usually the kind who goes for bad boys. You won’t find me on the back of anyone’s motorcycle or learning to shoot cans off a stump in the woods. My husband wooed me with an impressive vocabulary, a stable job, and a perfectly timed Hemingway pun. And, okay, yes, once by bending over to put on his shoes. I’m not a total square.

But Hawley is that very complicated kind of bad, the kind with a deeply seated sense of justice. A Clint Eastwood sense of justice that allows brutality but only when directed at the right people. He’s seen things. He’s done things. And he’s been in enough tight situations to know how to get out of them. That much is obvious—he’s been shot twelve times, and the novel is framed around the stories of each of those bullets meeting Hawley’s body. In between these flashbacks to Hawley’s checkered past is his present life with his teenage daughter, Loo. If Hawley seems like an unlikely type to be a single father, that’s because he is, and sometimes his parenting style is a bit, shall we say, unorthodox. But he loves his daughter, even if he’s not able to give her anything close to a normal life.

Hannah Tinti is clearly a writer who cares about craft. The structure of the novel is so intentional, reading the last chapters was like pulling up a well-oiled zipper. It all comes together so beautifully. I don’t mean all the details are neatly wrapped up and everything is perfect. It’s just that Tinti seems to have thought a lot about the reader’s experience. I’ll be very surprised if this doesn’t end up on my short list for favorite books of the year.

With regards to Dial Press and NetGalley for the advance copy. On sale March 28!

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For some reason, this book didn't hold my interest. I only read about half of it before abandoning it all together.

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