Ghosted by Rosie Walsh, 3 Stars

Today is my 13th wedding anniversary. And we are spending it doing totally normal things, nothing crazy. And I’m totally fine with that.

I taught a class at the gym this morning while my husband took the kids to church. Now we are just hanging out and RELAXING while my kids play Nintendo (in several different forms and Hot Wheels. Because sometimes the most the amazing way to commemorate an occasion is to just chill. Am I right?

I’m sure we’ll split a nice bottle of wine later with our stuffed pizza–because Mama ain’t cooking tonight–while we watch the Chicago Bears beat the Packers on Sunday night football.

Don’t get me wrong, we did go to a very nice tapas dinner earlier in the weekend to celebrate. But as we settle into marriage and life, it’s just not that romantic anymore, most of the time. Can you imagine maintaining that level of excitement and anxiety about the state of the relationship? It is too exhausting for everyday.

But sometimes, I do want to read a romantic story. Boy meets girl, he sweeps her off her feet, you know the drill. Sometimes I want to watch The Notebook or La La Land and fall in love with Ryan Gosling all over again. Besides my husband, he’s kind of my favorite.

So today, I’m reviewing a love story of sorts–Ghosted by Rosie Walsh, my Book of the Month selection for August.

From the Publisher:

Seven perfect days. Then he disappeared. A love story with a secret at its heart.

When Sarah meets Eddie, they connect instantly and fall in love. To Sarah, it seems as though her life has finally begun. And it’s mutual: It’s as though Eddie has been waiting for her, too. Sarah has never been so certain of anything. So when Eddie leaves for a long-booked vacation and promises to call from the airport, she has no cause to doubt him. But he doesn’t call.

Sarah’s friends tell her to forget about him, but she can’t. She knows something’s happened–there must be an explanation.

Minutes, days, weeks go by as Sarah becomes increasingly worried. But then she discovers she’s right. There is a reason for Eddie’s disappearance, and it’s the one thing they didn’t share with each other: the truth.

My Review:

I love the idea of falling in love. Who doesn’t? And the premise for this book really appealed to me. What would you do if you had just spent the most amazing week of your life with the most amazing partner, only to have them disappear off the face of the earth?

Sarah is on the rebound. She has just broken up with her husband of 17-years, Reuben, who she still runs a successful non-profit with. And he has a new girlfriend that he wants for Sarah to get to know–considering they are still business partners. So she takes a much-needed trip home to England to just catch her breath and chill. And that’s where she meets Eddie.

I get the feeling her hometown is a small one. So for me, the first discrepancy in the story is how she somehow has never met Eddie or his family before despite the fact that he lives a mile down the road from her parent’s house in the countryside. That is strange to me from the get-go.

It also took me a little bit of time to get into the book. I would have enjoyed maybe falling a bit in love with Eddie too and learning more about what they shared. Instead, I kind of just had to take Sarah’s word for it. So she falls deeply in love with Eddie, has every reason to believe it’s mutual, he leaves for a trip he planned a long time ago and bam, he’s gone.

This is the part of the story where I want to say, “Sorry, Sarah. He’s just not that into you.” Because sometimes it seems like everything is so right and it’s just not. Sometimes one person pretends to be more into the other person for whatever reason or they really are but then something happens that just changes their mind. It happens.

I don’t want to say too much because the story goes on some twists and turns from here and it is a nice story in general. I just feel like some short-cuts were taken to make it all “fit” nicely into the story. Like I’ve said, I didn’t understand why Sarah had never met or heard of Eddie before. And there were a lot more things that just didn’t add up for me. Sorry to be so vague, but I try to avoid spoilers.

But if you are a sucker for a love story, you might want to check this one out.  I can think of one friend who I believe will treasure my copy of Ghosted.

This one is available now–get yours!

Indiebound