You always come back to your first love…
Nora hasn’t looked back. Not since she left home, and her broken heart, far behind her. But now tragedy calls her back, where she must finally come face to face with ex-boyfriend Charlie, and best friend Sophie. Only now will she be able to confront her past—and reconcile her future.
Sophie seems to have everything. Married to Charlie, with a wonderful daughter and a successful career. Yet underneath that perfection lies an explosive secret. A secret that ripped through their town and destroyed her friendship with Nora. So when Sophie finds out that Nora has returned, she hopes Nora’s stay is short. The life she has built depends on it.
But first love doesn’t fade easily. Memories come to light, passion ignites and old feelings resurface. As the forces that once tore them apart begin to re-emerge, both Nora and Sophie must accept that true love is something worth fighting for.
Melissa Lenhardt is a Women’s fiction, mystery, and historical fiction author. Her debut mystery, STILLWATER, was a finalist for the 2014 Whidbey Writers’ MFA Alumni Emerging Writers Contest, and SAWBONES, her historical fiction debut, was hailed as a “thoroughly original, smart and satisfying hybrid, perhaps a new sub-genre: the feminist Western” by Lone Star Literary Life. The New York Times called her sixth novel, HERESY, “An all-out women-driven, queer, transgender, multiracial takeover of the Old West”. When Melissa isn’t writing, she’s thinking, “I really should be writing.” A lifelong Texan, she lives in the Dallas area.
I really loved this book! Not at all what I was expecting, but it has lots of movement throughout, and you are unsure exactly what will happen next, but it had a great plot.
This is about reconnecting with friends, and more importantly, with your first love. It demonstrates the impact of that first love and how those feelings stay with you long after, especially when things are left unresolved. There are plenty of misunderstandings, lots of heartfelt conversations and confessions.
This is well written and not sappy like it could have been. The feelings and situations of the characters are long-standing and complex. Still, they have just the right amount of information, not too much but not too little. There is a fair amount of political and religious context. This doesn’t distract too much but provides more context, in my opinion.
There is a lot of homophobic attitude in their little town, where everyone knows everyone, which adds to the plot. Still, it feels deplorable to think that there is so much negativity around this in this day and age. This also links with a young teen who is also confused about her sexuality. She is feeling drowned out by the attitudes of those around her, feeling that it would never feel safe for her to come out.
This has a good plot on the face of it. Two best friends were clearly in love with one another when they were at school and broke their hearts before finding each other again later in life. This delves well into their thoughts and feelings about their situation. In addition, it examines the lives of others around them and the difficulties faced in similar situations.
The characters are well developed, which I think was shown most by feeling that the two main characters had disregarded other people’s feelings. The relationships inside are unhealthy and dysfunctional, which isn’t immediately apparent. While some are repaired to some, extend a lot aren’t even thought about. These are essentially flawed people, but Melissa Lenhardt doesn’t try to hide that. It almost makes them more real.
Overall, I really enjoyed this and would recommend it to others.
Thanks to the Author, Publisher and Netgalley for an Advanced Review Copy (ARC) in exchange for an honest review.
| Title | The Secret Of You and Me |
| Author | Melissa Lenhardt |
| Series | N/A |
| Format | eARC |
| Page Count | 305 Pages |
| Genre | Family Life Fiction |
| Publisher | Mills and Boon |
| Release Date | 4th August 2020 |
Click The Cover To Read Amazon’s Sample Today!