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Review

6 epic stars

OMG, this book. I don’t even know where to begin. I finished this book yesterday and I am still a jumble of emotions and I can’t stop thinking about it! Kate Stewart completely owned me with this book. Her writing is flawless, her characters are unforgettable, and her story is captivating and masterfully told. It’s such an incredible read, and I absolutely loved it!

I’m admitting upfront that I was slightly terrified diving into this book because I knew it was an angsty love triangle story, and I usually avoid those. But with the announcement of a follow-up, second-general novel, REPEAT, I knew it was time, and I just happened to be in the mood for a book like this, and God, I was so ready for it!

“Love and rock ‘n’ roll love stories aren’t for the faint of heart.”

Stella has just nailed the biggest win of her career, and she’s riding the well-deserved high when she receives a phone call with surprising news. It rocks her – big time – and she decides that rather than take her booked flight back home, she’ll drive, giving her some time to think. Over the course of Stella’s road trip, she thinks back on her life, and we see her story from when she moved to Texas as a passionate young music lover who is just starting out in her career, desperate to experience all the music that Austin has to offer, and become a music journalist.

We follow Stella over the years as she follows her dream, finds her place, and meets two amazing men who both have a huge impact on her life. We get not one, but two love stories in this book as we watch Stella experience life, love, relationships, and above all, the music that is a part of her soul. It’s heartwrenching, dramatic and emotional, but it’s also witty, sexy and so entertaining. I adored Stella, I loved her journey, I love her passion for music and, like her, I fell completely for the two men in her life.

That’s the thing about intimacy and truly knowing the person you’re with. They always know when something’s off, no matter how casually you try to sweep your unease away. They know. It’s their job, because in the song of your life, they are the ones listening. It’s when they stop that you need to worry. He’d listened to mine. He knew when a beat was missing, or a note was forgotten. He’d memorized my song, and I was his favorite.

Reid and Nate… *dreamy sigh*. Both very different men, but both right for Stella in their own ways. They love her so much, they teach her so much about herself and her relationships with both men are fun intense, passionate and full of chemistry. She, and I, fell completely for both of them, and I had no idea how it was all going to unfold, and no idea how I even <i>wanted</i> it to unfold, but it’s so clever as we experience her journey with her, not knowing until the very end how her story ends, and who she finds her happy ending with.

“You still want the fairytale, but it’s mine to give you, and I can’t give it to you if you’re with the wrong fucking prince.”

Her story is real and raw, and I felt everything along with her. I laughed, I swooned, I celebrated, I fell in love and my heart broke and I cried multiple times. It’s real life, and there are hard moments, but Stella’s journey is truly beautiful and profound, and played out exactly the way it needed to.

He was my song, my soul, my everything, and his love had propelled me forward into the woman I wanted to be.

Along the way, we get to listen to Stella’s playlist from the past, and I strongly encourage you to pause your reading and listen to some of these songs, because it adds so much to the experience. I’ve been singing ‘Drive’ in my head non-stop since I finished this book, and I don’t think I’ll ever listen to it the same way again. So. Many. Feels now attached to it, and I love how certain songs take me right back to the feelings I had while reading particular scenes in this book.

“Music is the heart’s greatest librarian. A few notes had the ability to transport me back in time, and to the most painful of places. Take any song from the Rolodex of your life, and you can pin it to a memory.”

This is truly a wonderful reading experience. It’s one of those books you wish you could read for the first time all over again just to have that sense of wonder and anticipation again. I knew from the very beginning that it was going to be something special, and it absolutely was. This book is going down as an all-time favourite, I absolutely adored it.

6 massive stars!

Note – I listened to this as an audiobook, narrated by Ava Erickson, and she does an incredible job with it. She brings Stella to life and tells the story with so much emotion, I definitely recommend listening to this one.

 

The Bittersweet Symphony Duet