harriet evans |

I REMEMBER YOU – HARRIET EVANS

For Tess Tennant, spring brings the promise of a fresh start. She’s moving back to her picture-perfect home town to take up a teaching job. Langford is a place of pretty stone cottages, friendly locals in oak-beamed pubs and of course Adam, her best friend since childhood. But Adam is preoccupied with a new girlfriend, and the past – which Tess thought she’d put behind her – is looming large again. So by the time she has to take her class on a trip to Rome, Tess is feeling reckless. She is swept off her feet by a mysterious stranger, and finds herself falling in love. But her magical Roman Holiday is about to turn into a nightmare! Back in Langford Adam is gone and everything has changed.Tess has to decide, once and for all, where she belongs and with whom.

When I was shopping for my summer reads, I picked this one up as I loved the jacket and while I hadn’t read any books by her before, I had heard good things, in particular about GOING HOME, so I thought I would give her a try. I’ll be honest with you, the book didn’t grab me. It was enjoyable enough, but I wasn’t gribbed to the page, nor did I particularly care about the characters. The plot ambled along, much like the country life in Langford did, with little titbits of information leaking out onto the otherwise quite mundane pages.

I didn’t become attached to any of the characters, including Tess, which is always a big, giant warning sign when I’m reading books as if I don’t like the main character why on Earth am I reading the book?

On a positive note, the descriptions of both London and Rome were fantastic, and the flashback element of the novel was good, as I liked how the author held back on the character’s past and then staggered the flashbacks to reveal what had happened between Tess and Adam in the past. I won’t spoil you here, but it definitely made me like Tess a little more and Adam a little less! However, this wasn’t enough to turn the book around for me and found myself rushing the last few pages of the book so that I could move onto the next book in my TBR pile.

Too slow, and too long. I don’t think that this is the right author for me.

2 Stars