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Review

“It’s always been you … There has never been anyone else for me but you.”

4 second chance stars

I’m a sucker for a second chance romance, and this one is an absolutely beautiful story, full of all of the swoony moments that I love. It’s a very short read and I feel like it needed more build up to become truly amazing, but it’s still a great story, and I really enjoyed it.

Lea and Austin were childhood sweethearts. Completely absorbed in each other and blissfully happy, they dreamed of graduating high school, getting married and living their HEA together. Then Lea’s life was turned upside down by the death of her beloved father. Overcome by grief and suddenly terrified by the possibility of more devastation in her future, she runs away, leaving Austin and the rest of her life behind her.

She goes to College, makes a life for herself and tries to move on, even getting married. And now, fifteen years later and with her broken marriage behind her, she returns to her small home town to care for her ailing mother and is very quickly confronted with the man that she was never able to get over.

Austin was destroyed when Lea left him. He spent years searching for her with no success. He has tried to move in the meantime, but nobody has ever meant anything to him like she did. At first he is fuming with rage at her return, but as secrets from the past are revealed, and with each encounter making it more and more obvious that they are still incredibly drawn to each other, he realises that this is his chance to finally claim the future he’s always wanted.

“I wanted her fifteen years ago, and I still fucking want her now. There isn’t a single part of me that doesn’t know she’s my future, but we have a lot of shit to deal with before we even think about heading down that path, because once we start, there will be no turning back.”

Lea and Austin’s reunion is beautiful. He’s a total alpha, and is incredibly driven to get his girl back, but Lea doesn’t exactly need a lot of convincing. They have issues they need to deal with, which they do, and their coming together is sweet, functional, swoony, and incredibly passionate.

His eyes go soft and he takes a step toward me, touching my cheek. “I remember everything, Lea, every conversation, every touch, every kiss, every single thing about you, about us. I remember it all.”

“We’re inevitable, Lea, and I know you feel it too. I’m drawn to you in a way that even if fifty years passed, I would still crave you on a primal level.”

But as much as I loved it, it just felt too rushed. The book is only 174 pages, and as keen as I was to get to the good stuff, I would have liked more build up. The story seems to jump from meaningful scene to meaningful scene with none of that in that ‘middle stuff’ that creates the wonderful sense of emotion and anticipation that I love in a good romance. Reynolds has given us a truly beautiful story, but because it moves so quickly I didn’t get as drawn into it as I would have liked, and sadly I think a really good opportunity has been missed.

But having said that, I did really enjoy this book. The writing is gorgeous (despite the fast pace), I really liked the characters, and the love story was absolutely beautiful with a nice amount of drama that never overtakes the story or feels disingenuous to the characters. There’s even an epilogue which finishes everything off perfectly. If it was a bit slower moving and more detailed, it would have totally been a 5 star book.

Still a great read – 4 stars.

The Shooting Stars series