Ratings2
Average rating4.5
A Goodreads Most Anticipated Romance A heartwarming novel about hope after loss as a young widow receives mysterious messages of love from the “must-buy author” (Jodi Picoult) of Eight Perfect Hours. Sparkly and charming Natalie Fincher has it all—a handsome new husband, a fixer-upper cottage of her dreams, and the opportunity to tour with the musical she’s spent years writing. But when her husband suddenly dies, all her hopes and dreams instantly disappear. Two and a half years later, Natalie is still lost. She works, sleeps (well, as much as the sexually frustrated village foxes will allow), and sees friends just often enough to allay their worries, but her life is empty. And she can only bring herself to play music at a London train station’s public piano where she can be anonymous. She’s lost motivation, faith in love, in happiness…in everything. But when someone begins to mysteriously leave the sheet music for her husband’s favorite songs at the station’s piano, Natalie begins to feel a sense of hope and excitement for the first time. As she investigates just who could be doing this, Natalie finds herself on an unexpected journey toward newfound love for herself, for life, and maybe, for a special someone.
Reviews with the most likes.
This book is everything I hoped it would be. Introspective, devastating, laugh out loud funny, and heartwarming. I loved the depictions of friendship, love, grief, and acceptance. It was perfect. I will think about it for a long time.
A beautifully written story of grief and learning how to move on.
Two and a half years ago, Natalie suddenly lost her husband, and she has been overwhelmed with grief since. Despite her friends meaning well, they constantly try to set her up with men and rush her to moving on. On one of these nights out, Natalie runs into Tom, a cheeky photographer who is sweet and charismatic.
There is also an underlying mystery to figure out who is leaving her sheet music in the piano bench where she plays.
I found the characters and their development so well done. The writing was witty and fun while also focusing on the hard topic of grief and moving on after a loss. Writing about this topic is not easy but I felt it was captured well in this novel. However, I did not love the romance aspect of it. I was not sold on the relationship and that they felt anything more than friendly. I was almost rooting for the other man in the story... whoops. Overall, it was very well done but I just wish the relationship was drawn out a bit more to show that they shared stronger feelings of love.
***I received a free eARC of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.