Spin The Plate by Donna Anastasi (review)

Product Description

Time has done nothing to heal childhood wounds inflicted more than a dozen years ago, nor fade the memories. Now as an adult, Jo has given up on the human race, men in particular, investing her energies in tattoo artistry and animal rescue. Francis meets Jo during an altercation between Jo and another passenger on the Boston subway. Francis, the brains and speech writer for Charles Davis a Boston philanthropist and billionaire, is painfully lonely as his job requires that he maintain anonymity plus have constant exposure to the shallowness, corruption, and cruelty of humankind. From the moment he lays eyes on Jo, Francis sees beyond her rough exterior to the genuine, passionate, fearless, and beautiful person Jo is and pursues her with unwavering passion. In a compelling story on living as an incest survivor and the how-to's of love, faith, and healing, Jo discovers she is not alone in her fight to leave her past behind and move beyond sorrow into joy.
 
My take on this book:
 Spin The Plate is Donna Anastasi's first attempt at writing fiction and I must say she hit a home run with this book!

The protagonist Juliana Orsiano,who goes by the name of Jo, puts up a very tough front, she dresses in baggy bib overalls and wears hiking books to her job as a tattoo artist. Every time she leaves the house she puts on her tough guy  attitude to keep people from approaching her,men in particular. The reason she has has this tough girl exterior is simple, she was hurt badly as a child, her father started molesting her at the age of 4 and didn't stop until she turned 14, when she was sent to juvie hall for some infraction that happened at school. Being tough, and keeping herself physically and emotionally exausted, keeps her from remembering those episodes, because she remembers each, even has them numbered.

On the inside Jo has a caring heart, but she only lets her animals see it, sure she is good at her job as a tattoo artist, but she still holds herself aloof, not wanting to form any real relationships,but when she goes home she becomes the kind hearted person who lives with an assortment of animals that she has rescued, and often at night she takes her two massive dogs Rufus and Ben and walks the streets looking for abandoned animals she can rescue and re home.When she takes her dogs out at night she uses their street names Titan and Cain thinking this will further intimidate strangers.

When she meets Francis on morning on the subway she does her best to "scare him off" but he becomes intrigued with her, he had been unhappy in his work and had been having reoccurring dreams of a warrior woman who rescues him and he believes Jo is this woman. Can he convince her of that, and break down the protective wall that she has built up around her heart?

This book for me was something I couldn't put down, Jo is a very strong character, it was amazing to see her grow and develop thru the course of this story, the author does an amazing job of making Jo's character seem so real that her pain and loneliness jump off the page at you. Francis was a quirky character but honestly for all his little idiosyncrasies he truly turned out to be a knight in shining armour. The way that he approached Jo was perfect.

A profoundly touching story, that you wont be able to put down. On a scale from one to five I would give this book a six it is just that good!

Thanks to the author Donna Anastasi for providing me a copy of this book for review!