When I Was Your Girlfriend by Nikki Harmon

Publisher/Date:  Mt. Airy Girl Press; Jan. 2016
Genre:  Romance
Pages: 214
Website:  http://mtairygirlpress.weebly.com/

Rating: ★★★★½ 

How can you be sure that your first love wasn’t your true love? Dee Armstrong leads a seemingly charmed life. She has a successful midwifery practice, a supportive family, and an exciting romantic life. But when Dee mistakenly believes she will have to confront her first love and first heartbreak, Candace, it sends her tumbling back into her memories to re-live the terrifying and exhilarating joy of being a teenager in love … with another girl. Suddenly convinced that Candace was her one true love, Dee sets off on a tumultuous cross country journey to find her in hopes of renewing their relationship. Her quest leads to some serious soul searching and the realization that maybe love wasn’t the only thing that she lost all those years ago.

WHEN I WAS YOUR GIRLFRIEND by Nikki Harmon is a rich romance tinged with nostalgia, a refreshing story about a woman looking for her first love.

Dee Armstrong recognizes the good things in her life: a rewarding career as a midwife in a thriving Philadelphia practice; co-workers and clients she adores; family and friends who provide support and pull no punches when it comes to advice.

The only thing to give Dee pause is her girlfriend, Pepper. While Pepper is primed to take their relationship to the next level after six months, Dee is not sure this is where she wants to be. This hesitancy gives way to thinking about all the women she’s been with, and the only one woman that she could ever say she was in love with: her high school sweetheart, Candace.

For 31-year-old Dee, high school was a while ago. Thoughts about a woman whom you haven’t talked to since breaking up in your senior year would be just that: notions about where she is now, whether she’s married or single, or has children; if she ever thinks about you after all this time. Yet Dee takes this to a new level and tries to track down the one who got away. Interspersed with this journey to the past that includes a road trip, cross-country flights and internet detective work, Dee is reliving the rise and fall of her young love with Candace, a dimension that adds depth to the story.

I really enjoyed this jaunt Harmon took me on with Dee because she’s a likable character, even when she’s being a little selfish and a tad presumptuous in her love scavenger hunt. Ultimately, she has a great heart, and her friends, Viv especially, made this book so easy to fall into. I also loved the inside look Harmon offers in Dee’s occupation as a midwife, how passionate she is about her patients and the new lives she facilitates into the world.

The biggest part of this story – the mystery of Candace – is what I gravitated toward. I mean, there are times when I was cautious about what she would find, but I had to know, just like Dee, what happened to her former love.

Harmon’s writing is well done; her descriptions of Philadelphia (or wherever else Dee landed), made me feel as if I were there. However, I feel the pacing of the novel could be better; at times there are big jumps from days to weeks that seemed a little incongruent. There was also one plotline involving one of her clients that could have been left out because it added nothing to the story. As far as the ending, all I can say is I’m happy, but I wonder what will happen next.

When I Was Your Girlfriend is a romance I indulged myself in over a weekend because who doesn’t want to know where her first love is? Read this story, and it just might make you look her up on Facebook. Just maybe.

Reviewed April 2016

Read the Sistahs Pick Interview with Nikki Harmon

Books 2 Check Out – April 2016

Looking for something new to read? Here’s a round-up of a few novels you should check out (the titles are linked to Amazon, but most are available for purchase at Barnes & Noble, as well):

The Beast of Callaire: A Young Adult Fantasy (The Legend Mirror Book 1) by Saruuh Kelsey
Young Adult/Fantasy

Discover a world of magic and monsters in this fantasy series.

Yasmin is the daughter of a God and a mythical creature. A Legendary, she has power and the ability to change forms every full moon.

When a voice cries out to Yasmin – in her head – and she’s drawn into dreams that aren’t her own, she is led to Fray, a girl who once saved Yasmin from hunters. Fray has memories that suggest she has power no human should have – Legendary power. As Yasmin and Fray grow close, they find themselves caught up in a war of Gods and Creatures.

Craving Comfort by Monique Thomas
Romance

For the love of sweets in the form of cupcakes and brown thighs.

Keiko is finally getting back on track and the last thing she needs is distractions. Even if the distraction is a well dressed, sexy business owner named Zora.

The Gloaming by Antares DaVinci and Essence Renata
Prose/Poetry

The Gloaming is an intricate web of science fiction and the erotic that spans beautifully spun tales from two sets of hands. The stories are bedded in a series of collected poems that leave you with the same milky clarity that twilight whispers.

In Search of Happiness by Sonwabiso Ngcowa
Romance

Nana is fifteen when she travels from her village in the Eastern Cape to the city. She is overjoyed to be reunited with her family, even if they are living in a tiny shack. But she struggles to fit in at her new school, and she is shocked at the violence shown to Chino and Agnes, her Zimbabwean neighbors. When she and Agnes become close friends, and find love in unexpected places, Nana learns firsthand just how brutal ignorance can be and how hard it is to hold on to happiness.

Irresistible Desires by J L Dillard
Erotica

A FIRST KISS
When she travels to Miami to spend a long weekend with her sister, Hope Donovan-Sinclair has no intention of starting a hot affair. While her marriage wasn’t perfect, infidelity was not the answer to her problem. But a one chance meeting with a beautiful stranger changes her mind completely.
LEADS TO MORE THAN AN AFFAIR
After a heated argument, Hope gives into her desires and discovers her one-night stand opened doors she’ll never be able closed. Now her secret looms overhead, forcing her into a world she despises until an unexpected turn of events wreaks havoc and backs her against the wall.
AND SHOWS NO SIGNS OF SLOWING DOWN
J L Dillard, the new kid on the block, delivers a riveting novel about love, passion and revenge that’ll leave you wanting more. This twisted tale filled with surprises and consequences will have you on the edge of your seat until the very end.

Loving You Wasn’t Enough by Fatima Warsame
Romance

Ebyan Jama has always led a life of clarity. She knows who she is and is committed to her Islamic faith. She has one passion in life. Music. Gifted with a beautiful voice, she can make it big in the music industry. When she is offered the opportunity to sign with a major record label on condition she takes off her hijab, Ebyan walks away. With her dream crushed and her best friend Tiffany by her side, she heads off to UC Berkeley. It is during her freshmen year at Berkeley that she meets Noreen, a sophomore and an aspiring filmmaker. The unexpected, but electric attraction Ebyan develops for Noreen makes her question everything she thought she knew about herself. As Ebyan and Noreen get to know each other, a deep love blossoms between them. Ebyan fights hard to put out her passion for

Noreen, but finds it impossible. Noreen is perfect for Ebyan, her soul mate, but their love is forbidden by faith and tradition. How will Ebyan face her moral dilemma?

From Fatima Warsame, a new voice in contemporary fiction, comes a unique and powerful story on an unexpected love between two young Muslim women.

Meeting Her by Lee Loveless
Romance

Is it possible to fall in love in the rebound? That is the question that Jordan asked herself as she begins to have strong feelings for the famous choreographer Vivian Taylor. A chance meeting put these two women together and created a connection hard to ignore. Will these two be able to move away from the ties of their immediate past to satisfy a mutual attraction?

Tommy Boys, Lesbian Men, and Ancestral Wives: Female Same-Sex Practices in Africa by Ruth Morgan and Saskia Wieringa
Non-Fiction

This unique book documents same sexuality in East and southern Africa. Eight of the chapters have been co-authored by women activists spanning six different countries. They have collected personal narratives on a range of issues related to sex and secrecy. This is an incredibly difficult area to research as many African leaders declare it taboo on the basis that these practices are alien to African culture and an import from the depraved west.

The book demonstrates that there are silenced, traditional, institutionalized ways in which African women contracted same-sex relations. Second, it proclaims the right of African women engaged in same-sex practices or relations to their identities as Africans, as several interviewees state: we, lesbian women, are born here in Africa, we belong here. Who can say we are un-African? Third it gives a vivid portrait of the lives of African women engaged in same-sex relations and practices, portraying the joys of having found love as well as the pains of betrayal and the hatred encountered in their communities, as well as the many shades of emotions in between. This book eloquently testifies that although silence isolates and protects these women, some are beginning to speak out.

The TurnOut Queens: With Just One Taste…They’ll Have You Sprung (Volume 1) by Fabiola Joseph, Christiana Harrell, Renee Wallace, Raynesha Pittman, Ben Burgess Jr., N’Tyse (Foreword)
Romance/Erotica

Sodom and Gomorrah is Washington, D.C.’s premier gay and lesbian nightclub. Beyond the music, bottles, flyers, cages, and V.I.P sections, are the workers who keep the party going on and off the dance floor. Find out what happens once the last records are spun, and the drama follows them home. Sex, betrayal, lies, lust, and love, is never too far behind once these sexy employees clock out. Enter Gomorrah, and sit on the throne with the TurnOut queens.