I love it when an author whose books I’ve loved before releases another book, it makes me super excited. Rachel Burton’s last book The Things We Need To Say was in my top 10 of 2018, so I have high expectations…
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They say time can heal all wounds…
When Jess and Rupert parted ways, it was the end of a great love story that might have been. Now ten years later, the very different paths they have taken in life will bring them back together for a chance meeting.
But with so much left unsaid about the break up neither ever recovered from and with each keeping their own devastating secrets, will they finally be able to make the fractured pieces of their love for one another whole again?
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One of the things I love about Rachel Burton’s books is the way she manages to capture my attention from the very start. The style that she has is just so effortless and it was clear that this was a journey that I was going to really enjoy.
The story is told through three perspectives, we get the present day through Jess and Rupert and the past through some of Jess’s diary entries. I enjoyed the dual timeline it meant that you got a better sense of how much the characters meant to each other and cemented how difficult their separation was. Although I have to admit to a little niggle, the diary sounded more like a letter to Rupert rather than Jess just writing in her diary, all the same things could have been said but sometimes it just kept popping into my head who writes a diary to someone.
I am a sucker for a second chance romance and from the start there is this hint toward the tension between Jess and Rupert. It didn’t take me long before I was questioning what was it that happened between them and wondering how they will work to move past it. I loved the chemistry between them, even with the uncertainty that Jess is feeling at the beginning, you can still feel that connection and I was immediately rooting for them.
I really liked both Jess and Rupert they were both so strong and vulnerable and that worked really well as a dynamic between them. The author has a knack for writing the most beautifully flawed characters, this isn’t a fairytale romance, it’s realistic and the characters are more endearing for it.
I could empathise a lot with Rupert, his habit of keeping everything in until he can’t cope, letting his feelings get the better of him and reacting irrationally to such extreme emotion, that really spoke to me but I liked that he never took long to realise when he was in the wrong. I liked that Jess had such determination, she has an illness that has completely changed the course of her life but she doesn’t let it keep her down, she creates something new from it. I don’t think I fully appreciated the kind of impact that such an illness can have on your life, especially when it’s something that can’t be tested for, so I’m glad to have been introduced to this perspective.
There was however something that just didn’t sit entirely right with me and that was part of the reasoning behind their split, I could understand a lot of it but it was also resting on the fact that Rupert essentially cuts all ties with everyone and I don’t think I found that believable.
I also think that there was a point in the book when they were having communication problems that it started to feel a little repetitive, probably very true to life, but it did mean that my attention waned slightly. Despite that I still loved the journey these characters had to take and really wanted them to get a happy ending.
Another wonderful book from Rachel Burton, she is definitely one of my go-to authors and I excited to see what comes next.
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Rachel Burton is the author of the international ebook bestseller The Many Colours of Us.
Rachel spent most of her life between Cambridge and London but now lives in Yorkshire with her fiance and their three cats. The main loves of her life are The Beatles and very tall romantic heroes.
Find her on Twitter & Instagram as @bookish_yogi or follow her blog at rachelburtonwrites.com. She is always happy to talk books, writing, music, cats and how the weather in Yorkshire is rubbish. She is mostly dreaming of her next holiday….
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Big thanks to Rachel’s Random Resources and HQ Digital for inviting me to be part of the tour.
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Reviews of other Rachel Burton books
The Many Colours of Us | The Things We Need To Say
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