The Wedding that Changed Everything

Emily met Alice in Uni, and they’ve been friends ever since, despite their very different views on Happy Ever After. And now, with Alice all loved up: she’s decided that Emily needs to find the romance in her own life. With a wedding at the old ‘family castle’ coming for Alice’s sister, involving a week of “wedding activities’ and avoiding her stepmother in her own complicated family, Alice has decided that Emily will be her ‘plus one’ and she’ll (Alice) make sure that Emily meets several available potential Prince Charmings. But, what Emily only shares with a few people is the reason she’s not believed in fairy tales or happy ever afters since she was seven. A sad cycle with her mother’s mental illness and addictions, a revolving parade of ‘men du jour’ after her father’s decision to leave the family, and an increasing frustration with her mother’s inability to keep trying to find a man to save and define her: Emily is closed off and removed from the whole ‘searching for love’ train that Alice is driving. Escape to a wedding week full of games, friendships, pitfalls and a series of reveals that allow you to understand the players, laugh at the antics, and see as Emily, often lost and wandering around trying to find ‘the next event’ actually finds herself and answers to questions (and fears) that she has held onto for years, wielding them as a suit of armor against vulnerability. The stumbling and stuttering, miscommunication and snap judgments are frustrating, yet wholly understandable as years after she’d decided she was grown, independent and content, Emily finds that not everything has to be a reflection of her childhood. I received an eArc copy of the title from the publisher via NetGalley for purpose of honest review. I was not compensated for this review: all conclusions are my own responsibility.

Emily has always been reluctant to "let people in" and the death of her mother has exacerbated the condition. She pushed away her long term boyfriend, Edward, and her flatmate Alice is determined to find her the right man. When Alice wangles Emily an invitation to a family wedding at Durban Castle Emily agrees to let her matchmake for the week of the festivities and then let it drop. Cue a series of misunderstandings about men and a revelation of a secret. Pretty much standard fare really. Either I read too much of this kind of thing or there really are no shocks here with everything being flagged up well before it happens. The characters are okay. Maybe the best one is the incorrigable Archie who does manage to confuse both on the page and off as he very much works to his own agenda. There is a stab at genuine depth with both Emily and Tom but it never really comes off and I was pretty much apathetic to the both of them. Everyone else is really just filler and fluff with Alice, Carolyn and Francelia being extremely one dimensional stereotypes. However, the fact I can remember their names a couple of days after finishing the book does mean that they are memorable in their lack of complexity and as I sometimes struggle to remember main protagonist names on the day of finishing that means there must be something right about them. The plot trots along on it's merry way with the setting being more interesting than the machinations of the various people involved. The options for misunderstanding and revelations about the past are flagged up in almost neon lights so it doesn't really have a page turning factor to it. You do want to keep reading though as it is quite tender and life affirming in it's cliches. Not a book to set the world on fire but a perfect holiday read that will leave you feeling quite content and not feeling as though you have wasted your time reading it.

Three and a half stars. Emily Atkinson is dragged to her best friend Alice's big sister Carolyn's wedding as her plus one. Emily and Alice are total opposites, Alice is a true romantic whereas Emily's mother's revolving door of men after her father left has made Emily cynical about men and relationships. Her mother's death two years ago hurt Emily irreparably, she dumped her long-term boyfriend and has refused to enter into any more relationships. Since then Alice has been forcing her to date guys but Emily finds a reason to dump every one of them after only one or two dates - although to be fair most of the reasons seemed pretty good to me! Carolyn's wedding is a week-long affair at Durban Castle, which is owned by an uncle and where Alice and Carolyn spent many glorious holidays as children with their cousin Archie and Tom, the gardener's son. Until it all went wrong. Now Alice is estranged from her absentee father, loathes her step-mother Francelia, and is hiding her boyfriend Kevin from all of them. Alice is determined that Emily will find her Prince Charming at the wedding and extracts a promise that Emily will seriously consider all the single male guests, in return if she doesn't find anyone Alice will stop forcing her to go on dates when they get home. Unfortunately Alice's rose coloured spectacles are so thick that she couldn't identify a 'normal' guy if she tried and Emily is forced to fend off married lechers, cravat-wearing art bores and men who wear shoes without socks. But Alice's cousin Archie is handsome and charming, if a little over-eager, it wouldn't hurt to pretend she likes him, would it? The one man she can't stand is Tom. Now the gardener at the castle, his grumpy demeanour and refusal to reconnect to his childhood friends irritates Emily beyond reason. AND he keeps rescuing her when she gets lost in the grounds. Odious, sneering man. But as the group activities organised by Carolyn, including karaoke, lawn games, treasure hunt and quiz take place Emily discovers things are not always as they seem, maybe she can tell someone about her miserable childhood and maybe, just maybe, she could fall in love? This was a slow burner for me. Alice fell into that category of friends that I cannot stand, the clueless friend who thinks they know best but then set you up with the dregs of society, men who have no personality, no manners, no social skills. Also Emily's inability to find her way anywhere and constantly getting lost was also a bit tiresome. But then some of the events of the past that led to the childhood friendships falling apart start to emerge and the plot got interesting. By the end I was sorry it had ended! Overall, an enjoyable romance set in the English countryside at a fancy Castle wedding. I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in return for an honest review.