An emotional novel about Della, a woman who chose to given her daughter up for adoption, moved away from her small town, and built a life but who has come back because the girl is missing, Set in three time lines, beginning in 1979, it hits topical issues. Thanks to netgalley for the ARC.

The Fortune Teller's Promise
by Kelly Heard is my first read by this author.
You can really feel the brokenness of our main character, Della. She feels like a squared peg in a round hole. Her father has been taking pills for years for an old injury, her mother is beautiful, goes within herself and tells her she was the "difficult child", her brother is overprotective.
A broken family, what is she to do, she finds solace in a boyfriend, Mason but then she gets pregnant. She wants to keep her baby; her mother convinces her to give it to the "good church ladies."
She can't stay put, she's a runner. The only thing that can bring her back is the thought of saving her child.

Pub Date 30 Oct 2019
I was given a complimentary copy of this book.
All opinions expressed are my own.

A Mother's bond with her daughter is meant to be unbreakable, but what happens when it doesn't work out that way?
Dell has always had a complicated relationship with her family, She knows her former beauty queen mother regrets having her, she's cold and emotionally unavailable. One day she packs up and leaves, leaving Dell to look after her father who is struggling with addiction. Lost and feeling unloved she tries her best to heal her families wounds as well as her own and she meets Mason. Young and in love Dell believes she's found the perfect partner to have a new family with, but a year later she finds herself alone with a newborn daughter, the only person she has to turn to is her Mother. But will she abandon them like before?

This book left me with really mixed feelings, I loved the way Kelly Heard explores the relationship between Mother and Daughter but I struggled to form a connection with Dell right until the very end. I felt her character was undeveloped, she's been through a lot of trauma but it was a case of tell rather than show. I just wanted more. The thing that made me love this book was Mason tbh. I felt more empathy for him as a character, not without trauma himself I really adored his patience and how respectful he was towards everybody else. I liked the small town vibes this gave and I love dual timelines so that worked well. I also really liked the ending. Overall this isn't a bad book and I enjoyed it enough but It's not a new favourite.

What a lovely women's fiction book this is. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and it kept me engrossed, as I travelled Dell's journey with her. Dell has to give up her daughter when she is younger, and now she is living alone in her psychic shop when her Mother comes to visit to tell her that her daughter has gone missing. She has to go back to her childhood town to try to find her daughter, and she goes on a journey of discovery, which is emotional, heartwarming, heartbreaking and touching. I enjoyed reading about Dell's life in her past, and in her present, and overall, I found this a really great book, which I highly recommend.

Many thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I have never read anything by Kelly Heard before, but this book has ascertained that I will search her work out in the future.

The writing was eloquent and I enjoyed the imagery. “The bruise on her temple didn’t look like an injury so much as some inner rottenness that had finally crept to her surface, like a soft spot on an apple.”

The Virginian Blue Ridge Mountains setting set the mood and the tone for the novel. The sometimes cloying aspect of small town America is evident – with all the pluses and minuses that that entails.

“People only wrote in ink with their lives here, and people talked before the ink dried.”

The protagonist, Dell, was a solitary, heartbroken, and heartbreaking woman who had received little maternal love in her life and therefore thought she couldn’t provide that love to her own child. The reader (and those characters she comes into contact with) can’t help but feel for her, even though she tries her darndest to remain aloof and self-sufficient.

This book reminds us that family and love comes in all shapes and sizes. That is is okay to need other people, and that motherhood is an inherent skill that most come by naturally. That loneliness, when chosen, can be a penance too great to pay.

I highly recommend this novel to all those who enjoy women’s fiction that expounds on family and motherhood, while telling a love story that is neither saccharine nor unrealistic.

4.5 stars rounded up

The synopsis of the book was quite intriguing and this promoted me to pick it up. The story follows Dell, a fortune teller as she navigates her way through her present while trying to run from her past. Dell has moved away from Blyth, away from family and friends and away from her new born baby.

The author introduces us to a variety of characters as the story progresses. However, as the plot develops, there is little to no development on the fact that Dell is a fortune teller. This just seems to be a minor reference which exists until Dell goes back to Blyth. Dell races against time to try to find her daughter and spend time with her mother who is now in a coma and may be the only person who knows where her daughter is. The plot itself becomes quite predictable as the story progresses, and even though this story does bring out the importance of forgiveness and love, it becomes difficult to follow after a point. The characters are nice but unremarkable, and not very easy to relate to. The story plows ahead with no major twists or turns and is easy to follow.

The book did not engage me as much as I had hoped, but it is still a decent read! Fans of romance will enjoy this book!

I enjoyed this page turning book. It was well written. Glad that I read it. Will be checking other books by this author.

I was on an emotional roller coaster while reading this book. It is well written and sure to grip you from page one.
Many thanks to Bookouture and to NetGalley for providing me with a galley in exchange for my honest opinion.

I liked the cover. one word confused. That is what the story did to me so I didn't enjoy it that well! Maybe I wasn"t 100% into it. I might reread it later and concentrate on the story and will change my review.
I want to thank Net Galley, Bookouture and Kelly Heard for this early copy in exchange of an honest review.

Kelly Heard wrote a beautiful emotional story with The Fortune Teller’s Promise. I was hooked by the very beginning and glued to my kindle until the end. The Fortune Teller’s Promise is a must read but make sure you have your tissues. It’s a doozie that will stick with you after the last page.

Dell Shaw has a beautiful but resentful mother and a kind but drug addicted father. On one visit to her mother, she is groped by a ‘friend’ of Anita’s, but finds no support from either her mother or the man’s wife. Instead they blame her for inciting his attentions.
Years later, she falls in love with his son Mason who has no idea about this incident. They are happy together until she discovers her father has died of an overdose, medicine prescribed by Mason’s father. At the funeral she realises she is pregnant and asks Mason to choose between his parents or her and their child. He hesitates and she leaves…
Dell has the baby adopted and is rebuilding her life when her mother visits to tell her the baby is in danger. Minutes later, Anita is injured in a car crash and despite her heartbreaking childhood and teens, Dell wait by her bedside, hoping for recovery to find out more about her child.
There is a gravitas to this style of narrative, and I was reminded of some of the older Margaret Atwood books. The descriptions and tone are vivid and of high literary quality, which is very impressive considering this is author Kelly Heard’s debut novel.
The plot is delivered in a non linear way, with chapters set in 1979 when Dell was young, 1990 when she became pregnant and then 1991 which is the present day. This allows us to see how Dell’s attitude to becoming a mother has been defined by her own unhappy relationship with Anita.
The Fortune Teller’s Promise is very emotional book. I became so angry with Anita and her selfish behaviour, and frustrated by the way Dell is let down by people but also keeps secrets which lead to further sorrow. I could understand Dell’s lack of trust in her lover and her own ability as a mum but she has built up protective walls and makes the wrong choices in an attempt to save herself from further heartbreak.

The Fortune Teller's Promise by Kelly Heard was just a beautifully written Book. Kelly wrote this book with so much love and passion throughout. It's very emotionally in parts so be aware you will need tissues. I was hooked from the very first few pages and I just loved it.
This book I highly recommend The words just flows through this book ..............it took my breathe away.
Just beautiful.

Big Thank You to NetGalley, Bookouture and the author Kelly Heard for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Dell finds herself pregnant and not knowing what to do, gives her
baby to the church to find someone to adopt her. Dell leaves town vowing
never to return. But when the baby turns up missing does she return?

Beautifully written, emotional story. Hard to believe this is the author's debut
novel. Can't wait to see what else comes from this author!!!!

The Fortune Teller's Promise by Kelly Heard did not seem to match the blurb in that it did not contain much fortune-telling or magical realism. Instead it was an unpredictable love story where the heroine, Adella, or Dell, walks out on the handsome hero, Mason, without giving him the benefit of an explanation. One reason given was her dysfunctional upbringing from which she still carries the scars. There is also Mason’s seeming allegiance to his misogynistic father who petted Dell when she was a teen, and his mother who is co-dependent with her husband.

Dell’s flawed trait of being unable to communicate when distressed but fleeing, is given again and again as her defence. The novel would have been more worthwhile if Dell had shown character development and had learnt to overcome this flaw by her late twenties. Instead there were multiple descriptive tracts.

The novel provides the sense that Dell considers herself to be a no better mother than her own who walked out on her, her brother, Scott, and her father.

The romance is slight, the protagonist’s flaws mentioned above, making it hard for this reader to empathise with Dell or to enjoy the romantic elements. The story would have been helped by knowing Dell’s positive character traits, e.g. how she helped people ‘heal’ from their hurts when they sought her out as a fortune teller, the qualities Mason loved in her, etc. The clairvoyant element was slight. It was a novel more about dysfunctional families, abandonment by a mother and small-town gossip than fortune-telling or even the traits of the latter such as empathy.

Some examples of the stilted prose are as follows.
‘“You didn’t read it,” Dell laughed. Stopped laughing. “Did you?”’
‘“Well?” she hummed, her voice sounding far away and strange.’
She hummed? People don’t laugh or hum words instead of speaking them.

The views were described as follows, which some readers found lyrical, ‘The mountainside beyond Dell’s bedroom window was the soft gray-violet of bark, dotted with an occasional evergreen.’
I was more interested in a page-turning aspect to the plot.

This review also appears in Netgalley and https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3032326765 and https://thereadersvault.blogspot.com/2019/10/the-fortune-tellers-promise-by-kelly.html and https://www.amazon.com/Fortune-Tellers-Promise-emotional-heartbreaking-ebook/dp/B07W6P1K7H/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8

I would like to thank NetGalley, Bookouture and the author Kelly Heard for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

If your favoured reading material is a compelling tale with a good sprinkling of drama, heartbreak and romance, then The Fortune Teller’s Promise by Kelly Heard is a must-read for you!

From the get-go there was so much happening in this wonderful drama-suspense-romance story! Adella, known as Dell, was an interesting character and it was a journey to get to know her. I got to see that sometimes life got so overwhelming and lonely for her. There was lovely depth and poignancy to Kelly Heard’s writing which kept me hooked throughout.

The author really worked wonders with most of the characters in this fabulous story and even the less personable ones still had very good parts to play and did not dampen my enthusiasm for this fascinating tale.

I totally appreciated this fantastic début and its realistic, touching portrayal of a young woman and her relationship with her parents and the father of her child. The plot was great and moved along at a really comfortable pace and I was very happy with the author’s general writing-style. There were many issues highlighted such as menace, narcissism, loss, grief and hope for the future.

I thoroughly enjoyed this exciting story and I think this book is a bit of a hidden gem.

I received a complimentary digital copy of this novel, at my request, from Bookouture via NetGalley. This review is my own unbiased opinion.

Oh my this was a beautifully written, emotion story which is hard to believe is the author’s debut novel.

The story switches from a pregnant Dell who is struggling with being abandoned by her boyfriend and mother , to Dell returning to her home town to try to find her missing daughter. As a mum I think I’m much more affected by stories about forced adoption then others may be as I can’t imagine having to make such a harrowing decision. I therefore really felt for Dell and the hard decision she is forced into making.

The romantic part of this story between Dell and Mason was absolutely beautiful and I loved watching it all unfold, even though I knew how it ended from the blurb. I was completely on their side from the start and wanting to keep reading to see how everything would turn out, hoping for a different ending for them.

Overall I thought this was an emotional and utterly compelling book that I found hard to put down. It’s rare for a book to actually make me cry but this one managed to and I found myself sobbing regularly. I always think it takes great skill from the author to cause such a strong reaction.

Huge thanks to Sarah Hardy for inviting me onto the blog tour and to Bookouture for my copy of this book via Netgalley.

To be a drama and not an action-packed thriller The Fortune Teller's Promise still made me hold my breath a time or too. This woman’s fiction book by Kelly Heard and me hoping for the best but dreading the worst as I read Dell’s story of her mission to find her missing baby.

Adella has little happiness in her young life even with her ability to help other’s find some in theirs. I was not sure what would happen as this book progressed. I won’t spoil it for you by telling you what she finds in the end. What I will do is tell you to read it for yourself.

Knowing the Shenandoah Valley area, being about the same age as Dell and understanding her more than I thought I would, I can this is an incredible authentic read. Even more I found it to be a beautifully written story while being heartbreaking in so many places. Still just so beautifully written. Many author have tried to capture the spirit, the culture and the people of the Appalachian Mountains, this one does.

An ARC of the book was given to me by the publisher through Net Galley which I voluntarily chose to read and reviewed. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Dell is an outsider from the beginning and struggles to connect with her dysfunctional family. Motherhood in this novel is not shown to be a soft, touchy feely, comforting state to be in. It feels hard and painful no matter who is fulfilling that role. The narrative moves back and forth in time from before Dell becomes pregnant, to a year later when she comes to search for the child she gave up for adoption. She seems a lost and lonely figure who had built a wall around her feelings in retaliation against life.

This is an evocative and emotional read. The relationship between Dell and the father of her child is central to showing how she made certain decisions. Life is hard for Dell and you are always made aware of the difference between the comfortably off and the poorer families. Some people, it seems, have choices. Others do not. Written with a distinctive narrative voice, this is an impressive debut novel.

In short: Contemporary fiction, full of atmosphere and emotion.

Thanks to Netgalley for a copy of the book.

Coming from a broken family, Dell finds herself pregnant. Not knowing what to do, she gives her baby to the Church to find someone to adopt her. Vowing never to return, Dell leaves the town setting up her own psychic business. However, when she hears her baby has gone missing, she’s forced to return in the hope of finding her.

I initially thought this book was a little bit out of my comfort zone, but was intrigued enough by the blurb to give it a try. It took me a while to get into the story, and Dell’s character definitely needed time to develop. With her story being told from the past and the present it was obviously that Dell had had a very difficult life up to that point. I did feel for her character, particularly in her younger years and liked the psychic aspect that was subtly weaved throughout the storyline.

Assuming it to be more of a thriller type of read, I was quite surprised when the book turned out to be a really emotional and romantic saga. Many women could probably relate to Dell’s story and her relationship with Mason, the father of her baby was heart-warming and heart-breaking all in one go. This was a story with so many life issues – loneliness, the struggles that people go through, mental health issues, addiction, love and loss. It sounds like a lot going on in one book, but these are all cleverly entwined with the main story of Dell’s love for Mason and her child.

A heart-warming and tender read, which will keep you turning the pages for more. A first for me by this author, but will definitely be looking out for more in the future.

Oh this book was just so beautiful! One of my favourite books of the year! So pleased to have discovered this amazing author. Hard to believe this stunning and assured tale was a debut. The writing is so beautiful that one read does not do it justice. I was highlighting almost every sentence, awed by the poetic beauty of the prose. I will be reading everything by this author and recommending this book to everyone. Brilliant! A masterpiece.