Lurching from one comedic crisis to the next, she also navigates an overbearing mom and a Tinder-obsessed best friend who's determined to matchmake Kate with her hot new neighbor.
When an in-flight problem leaves Kate and her boss, Hugh, stranded for a weekend on the east coast of Australia, she finally has a chance, away from her son, to really process her grief and see what’s right in front of her. Can she let go of the love of her life and risk her heart a second time?
When it becomes clear that Hugh is hiding a secret, Kate turns to the trail of scribbled notes she once used to hold her life together. The first note captured her heart. Will the last note set it free?
Comment: I had this book in the pile for the past two years and I can't remember why, but it probably had something to do with it being about a widow possibly falling in love again.
Kate's husband died young of a disease that usually affects older people and she and her young son Charlie are still processing. She has counted on her best friend Darcy and boss Hugh, who have supported her in all her worst moments but she knows she needs to move on a little, at least to set up the example for her son. When a work travel goes slightly wrong, Kate and Hugh need to spend some time at a resort and this is the perfect opportunity for them to talk about some of the things they dealt with together while Kate has been mourning and, perhaps, for them to admit what they really feel about one another. Still, Hugh has a secret he doesn't want to share with Kate regarding her husband last days, but this close proximity surely will make it difficult to ignore her need to know, or will he remain silent? What about their relationship in the future?
Books on mourning are not my most desired read, that is true, and I wanted to read this one mostly for the idea of moving on and Kate falling in love with someone else, but I really should have paid attention to the "grief" label because the book is really about it and how to think of it. Yes, Kate moves on close to the end, but I just could not see it as being something accomplished, considering the ratio of pages dedicated to mourning and to moving on.
Kate's husband died and the whole thing happened in very specific circumstances, which made everything feel even worse. Kate now has a young child who misses his dad, who will not know him as he should, but she tries to give him good memories, even though the process has been devastating for her as well. This seems even worse to deal with, emotionally, since they were happy and didn't see it coming. The author also included a note at the end, sharing her personal story, and this did help me to appreciate the book a little more than I would without it.
The thing is, while the subject is heartbreaking, there is a lot of focus on the process and not as much on the healing. I would not have minded this, if the book had been a woman's fiction novel, but it is hinted at that the main character will have a new romance, and this led me to think of some expectations... which didn't really happen as I imagined, because the majority of the story is about the mourning and flashbacks to how things were in the past. I just didn't see the balance of including anew romance because if felt like an afterthought and not a really organic romantic development.
For the most part, I was sad for Kate and her son, but also sad for Hugh, the love interest, because he seemed to be a good guy, someone who went beyond what he should, professionally, in order to help Kate, and the way this story played out, I just couldn't avoid the thought he felt like second best. I cannot speak of it, of course I have not lived through such an experience, but for a novel including a romance, this was a failure to me, and I didn't feel convinced Kate and Hugh were "destined".
I also felt a little disappointed with Kate's character or, perhaps to be more specific, with the author's writing style in characterizing her. Kate was just OTT in how she was portrayed to be sweet and amazing but clumsy and all over the place. It felt as if I could not breathe properly while reading about her and her thoughts and actions, she was always doing something that required all focus on her and while I understand she is the main character, this tired me a bit. There were times I actually did dread reading about what she would do next.
Perhaps I'm being unfair, but this method of having Kate in center stage, and her POV in first person narration certainly did not help me with this feeling. Then, this also made it look as if the secondary characters were truly only that or worse, that their presence was almost superfluous and their actions redundant. I often felt that Hugh was too good to be true and his constant actions doing everything for her all the time were more imagination than real character drive.
The title alludes to love notes Kate's husband left her. Sadly, this element only had some importance at the end, when the secrets are being revealed. I think the author could have written this element better into the plot or, perhaps, written the story differently. To me, having this story in third person would change everything considerably, and this notes element might have been perceived better that way.
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