When Georgina finds herself sacked from her job and cheated on by her boyfriend in the same day she realises she’s not very bothered about either. But the need for an income is a high priority, snatching up the first available job she is offered Georgina finds herself working in a cosy pub that she loves. The only slight downside is that her boss turns out to be a man she also loved and even more disappointingly, he doesn’t remember her at all! But meeting Lucas again has caused Georgina to reflect on her past, and the dark secret she has harboured all these years.
Can Lucas help to ease the painful memories, or was the strength to banish her demons in Georgina all along?
It’s almost been 4 long years since we’ve had a full-length novel from MacFarlane and I wish I could say I loved this book, but sadly it was only an echo of her previous work. Don’t get me wrong I liked it, but like is not love.
I have seen a lot of reviews that have stated this was “more com than rom”, but this isn’t a comment I can find myself getting on board with. I am used to picking up Mhairi’s books and laughing from the first page to the very last, whereas this time I barely chuckled at all. Nana Hogg was the only person who had me laughing out loud on one occasion and Devlin, Lucas’ brother did have some amusing one-liners.
There was a huge cast in this novel, some didn’t seem to have much of a part to play and then others had parts that didn’t seem to quite benefit the story in any way which I found odd. Georgina’s relationship with her Mother was a complicated one and the sub-theme with her step-dad Geoffrey seemed a strange addition.
As for the main plot, I thought this was ok. The author did touch on some tough themes such as mental abuse and harassment. As usual, with most books in this genre, there is an aspect of predictability, but I found that the main protagonists secret was blindingly obvious from the beginning. Therefore, there was no shock for me when it was finally revealed. This didn’t mean I couldn’t sympathise with Georgina; her situation was a difficult one and I can’t begin to imagine how it would influence a person’s life thereafter.
Unfortunately, this wasn’t a 5/5 hit for me but I did still enjoy the book and look forward to the next from MacFarlane. Hopefully it won’t be too long to wait!