Published By: Lake Union
Pages: 320
Released On: 17/09/2024
A happily married woman wakes up to an astonishingly different life in a funny, emotional, and twisty romantic comedy in reverse by the author of Three More Months.
It’s Riley Ricci-Chase’s first wedding anniversary, and she’s living a perfect life in London with her utterly devoted husband, Tristan. So what if his parents and insufferable cousin Milo work Riley’s last nerve? She has Tristan.
The next morning Riley wakes up exactly one year later. No wedding ring. It’s Milo by her side. And Tristan is a happy new father—with another woman. None of this is surprising to anyone. Except Riley. Where does she go from here? With every new tomorrow, she’s moving backward through time to face a year she’s already lived, one she’s completely unprepared for.
Unless this is some cosmic prank, Riley is on a journey with a lot of questions. What went wrong with Tristan? How in this mind-blowing flip side could it have gone right with Milo? And where do her future and true love lie? To find out, Riley will have to wait and see what yesterday brings.
*****
Thanks to NetGalley and Lake Union for the advanced copy of this title in return for an honest review.
I really enjoyed Sarah’s previous book, What We Remember; I even gave it five stars, and so I was really looking forward to reading this newest offering. But sadly it did not live up to it.
It was a complete diversion from her previous book. I try not to compare books, especially when they’re so different, but I couldn’t help it as I loved What We Remember so much. This did take me quite a while to get lost in the story, I needed the fantasy elements to come in earlier.
There’s three main characters to focus on:
Firstly, our main female character Riley. She’s happy but she is frequently put down by her husband’s family just because she’s not rich, white, and high-class, and was a former lingerie model. And so I did try to like her because she is so unapologetically herself. Then we have her husband Tristan, who we don’t know much about to begin with, but seems like a good guy. And finally we have Milo, Tristan’s cousin and Riley’s surprise future partner.
Sadly, none of these characters worked, they felt a bit 2D, like cardboard cut-outs, no progression, and I didn’t like them enough to really care how it ended. I felt for the most part, Riley didn’t really seem fussed by what was happening. To begin with she was confused, but then she quickly just sort of accepted it, which didn’t sit completely right with me. Surely, you would find yourself more confused and distressed that you were suddenly dating your husband’s cousin 1 year into the future. But she was quickly acting like all this time travel was normal which jarred with me.
It felt very disjointed at times, like Sarah had created this timeslip novel but then wasn’t 100% sure how to handle it. So it wasn’t the smoothest of reads. It was interesting, but didn’t live up to what it promised.
You really have to suspend belief to get through it. I know it’s fantasy and sci-fi etc, but I’m fine with that, but even fantasy worlds have to make sense in context, and I struggled here. I agree with some other reviews in that it was an interesting and promising plot, but was let down by less-than-stellar writing. I had to almost make myself get to the end because I wanted to know how it resolved itself but I didn’t really want to read the rest of it to get there. And when I did get there, it felt a bit unfinished, like a cop-out.
Overall, this sadly did not live up to my expectations. Her previous book was fabulous but this one just fell short for me. But it won’t stop me checking out what she writes next.
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