The Turning Point

It's taken me some time to work my way though The Turning Point by Freya North and as I write my review I'm still not quite sure how I feel about the book. From the reviews I'd seen I'd anticipated a really heartfelt tragic story, people had contrasted it to Jojo Moyes' amazing tearjerker ‘Me Before You' and said they'd been just as moved to tears by the story North has written of two strangers Frankie & Scott who meet by chance in London and fall in love.

Frankie is a well written heroine, living in Norfolk with her two children Sam & Annabel she's a writer and single mum who is trying to get used to living away from the hustle and bustle of the city. She's a little lonely and struggling from writers block and just hoping she can break the block before the money from her previous book runs out. When she meets Scott in a hotel in London she is immediately drawn to this gentle musician from British Columbia, Canada and they instantly begin a relationship founded on their shared experiences of raising children alone and working in creative pursuits. The long distance relationship that follows is a difficult one to forge with their different commitments as Scott's daughter Jenna who suffers from severe epilepsy and Frankie's two children take precedence over their ability to be together.

Perhaps because I'd read people talk about this book as a tear jerker I'd suspected there was something less straight forward to come and I was therefore less surprised when it did. In some ways I'd wished I hadn't known as perhaps then I'd have felt more buoyantly optimistic for Scott & Frankie throughout the rest of the book.

I've been reading North's novels for a number of years, going back to the early novels Cat & Polly and I've almost grown up with them as she's moved from tales of loveless singletons to this tale of someone looking to find a second chance at love. My thoughts on this book though were that whilst the storyline was all there there was something lacking in the substance. I never really felt I got below the surface of Frankie's feelings, she never seemed to quite let her guard down enough to let me in. Scott as a male character seemed more open and accessible than Frankie, his easy style and character made his feelings clearer, he seemed less complicated and more open.

This was a book I kept picking up and reading a little then finding a little too easy to put down again, there was not enough momentum or drama driving it forward. It was a nice tale of a couple finding love but it wasn't a stand out story for me. Much of the book meandered its way along without much momentum. I wish there had been a few more twists and turns along the way to drive me through the book. It wasn't one I'll look back on and remember above others in the similar genre with similar stories. It ticked all the boxes but I wanted more, I wanted more emotion, more drama, more twists ad turns.