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Without Merit

By: Colleen Hoover
Narrated by: Candace Thaxton
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Publisher's summary

From Colleen Hoover, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Ends With Us, comes a moving and haunting novel of family, love, and the power of the truth.

Not every mistake deserves a consequence. Sometimes the only thing it deserves is forgiveness.

The Voss family is anything but normal. They live in a repurposed church, newly baptized Dollar Voss. The once cancer-stricken mother lives in the basement, the father is married to the mother’s former nurse, the little half-brother isn’t allowed to do or eat anything fun, and the eldest siblings are irritatingly perfect. Then, there’s Merit.

Merit Voss collects trophies she hasn’t earned and secrets her family forces her to keep. While browsing the local antiques shop for her next trophy, she finds Sagan. His wit and unapologetic idealism disarm and spark renewed life into her—until she discovers that he’s completely unavailable. Merit retreats deeper into herself, watching her family from the sidelines, when she learns a secret that no trophy in the world can fix.

Fed up with the lies, Merit decides to shatter the happy family illusion that she’s never been a part of before leaving them behind for good. When her escape plan fails, Merit is forced to deal with the staggering consequences of telling the truth and losing the one boy she loves.

Poignant and powerful, Without Merit explores the layers of lies that tie a family together and the power of love and truth.

©2017 Colleen Hoover (P)2017 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.
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About the Creator - Colleen Hoover

About the Creator

Colleen Hoover is the #1 New York Times, USA Today, and Amazon bestselling author of more than 23 novels, including It Ends with Us, All Your Perfects, Ugly Love, and Verity. In 2015, Colleen and her family founded a nonprofit called The Bookworm Box, a bookstore and monthly book subscription service that has donated over $1,000,000 to various charities to date. Colleen lives in Texas with her husband and their three boys. For more information, please visit ColleenHoover.com.
Photographed by Chad Griffith

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What listeners say about Without Merit

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

This Book Will Not Disappoint!

This was my first Colleen Hoover read and I was blown away! I listened to it and literally did not want to stop to do life because I wanted to know what was going to happen to these magical characters I fell in love with! And the narrator was PERFECT! Merit has an unusual family life. She lives in an old church with her father and step-mother, as well as her mother who lives in the basement and will not come out. Other characters include Merit's twin sister, her older brother, a younger brother, an uncle by marriage who comes along unexpectedly, and Merit's love interest, whom she believes to be her twin's boyfriend. Merit finds herself in the throes of depression and the story comes to a head when she writes a heartfelt letter after which she attempts to remove herself from her reality. Each character is so deliciously developed that you will feel that they are your personal friends. The reader will quickly become invested in the story which has a superb ending. I cannot wait to read more by Colleen Hoover, and luckily I discovered there is quite a collection to choose from!

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19 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

MEH

First, Colleen is one of my favorite romance authors. I love her books. This one was just okay though. I am curious to know if there will be a sequel - it felt like there was more to the story that needs to be told. AND you must know that his narrator is Shayna Thibodeaux. I literally hate her voice and narration. I avoid all books narrated by her which is sad because there are quite a few authors I enjo----, but stopped mid series because this chick was hired to narrate. Is that why she is going by a different name? Because I can't be the only one that hates her.

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8 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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Candace Thaxtons narrating

I can't even finish this book...I will have to buy it and read it myself because I cannot listen to her read any longer. it is the most annoying voice and just nothing like all the other audio books I have ever listened to. I have never had to stop listening to an audiobook before...but I just cannot listen any longer. I will avoid buying any and all audiobooks read by her.

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2 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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Loved Merit!

This was a serious book that made me laugh out loud at times! Merit was such an interesting character - at times I wanted to crawl into her brain and just enjoy the workings. This book is so witty. I didn't even mind the sappy parts!

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1 person found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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just ok,,,,,,,

I felt this book to be a lil too teen-ish for my taste. but the overall storyline of the family dynamics kept me listening.

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    5 out of 5 stars
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With(out)

What did you love best about Without Merit?

With(out) merit made me cry, made me happy, made me feel all kinds of things . This book has A LOT going on. It was a good book, talked about touchy subjects, but it was still written well. I cried a lot too.

Have you listened to any of Candace Thaxton’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

I have not.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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Mind blown

Excellent depiction of depression and family secrets. Equal to Colleen Hoover’s other great novels. Will probably win Goodread’s best romance of the year.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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This book is even better in audio!!!

Still one of my all time favorite beginnings of a story ever!!! This book is even better in audio!!!

I don’t know how Colleen does it?! I don’t know how she starts these books with these seriously off the wall, near impossible beginnings that snatch you out of your chair and in to whatever crazy world she has created but she does and she does it every single time!

Without Merit does it. You’re wondering how in the world someone can collect trophies they did not win and why on earth they would save up money to buy one and then BAM she hits you with Merit covering for a young boy who broke a piggy bank and your heart is won over and you feel a connection for this character you just met!

And yet Colleen tells us she is not an emotional person?! How?! All of her characters come to life and make you FEEL, feel everything! Merit is no exception and her first encounter with Sagan is the thing of fairy tales. A lot of this story is the thing of nightmares but the truth is terrifying! But that right there is life folks, even if it is fictional life.

Merit is filled with so many realities, but ultimately it is filled with lies. The lies we tell ourselves, the lies we tell others, the lies that we must keep to ourselves and finally the lies we must overcome. “Maybe that’s the root of a lot of family issues. It isn’t actually the issues people are hung up about for so long. It’s that no one has the courage to take the first step in talking about the issues.”

Colleen had courage to write this book because it hits on a ton of touchy subjects that a lot of people do not want to talk about but it also has laughs, love, craziness that you must read to believe and then honestly you still won’t believe it, and coming to terms with the fact that people are not perfect, they make mistakes, they screw things up, they hurt people and that you will continue to hurt until you face it, all of it, the good, the bad and the ugly and then maybe, just maybe you can heal.

A very powerful book! And let me tell you, I need With Merit as soon as possible!!! This cannot be the end of Sagan & Merit! I need MORE and I need it NOW!!!

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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Poor narration

The story line was good but I couldn’t get past the narrators voice. I understand what she was trying to accomplish with most of the narrative taking place inside of Merits head, but the rest of the story was read much in the same way. I love Colleen Hoover but this book is my least favorite due to not being able to really get into the story.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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it was ...okay

out of all of Colleen Hoover books, this was my least favorite. it isn't that it was hard to finish or even not a good read, it just didn't feel up to par with all the others I've read by her. I liked the issues it covered, depression, suicidal thoughts and tendencies, but it was just okay and when it comes to this author...that's kinda disappointing. doesn't help when I wasn't a fan of the narrator.

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