This one was Okay. Not a favorite but I enjoyed the visual tour of Italy most definitely.
Lizzy Harper has planned a 20 year anniversary trip for her and her workaholic husband in hopes to save their marriage. At the last minute he decides he doesn’t want to go because he has a new case to work on (that new case being the new junior associate he has his eye on.) Now typical Lizzy, the Lizzy he knows, would cancel the trip and call it a day. Instead, she surprises herself, her husband, and her daughter and just leaves and goes on the trip without him.
Some pity champagne and a little turbulence lands her into the lap of Ren Sawyer, a famous rock star.
Ren Sawyer is headed to Italy to be alone. He is tired of fighting the demons that he has been battling since his brothers death. He is on the verge of taking his own life when he finds himself in the company of Lizzy Harper. The two of them basically save each other and rediscover who they used to be before life overtook every moment.
“Two full days of this. In my adult life, I have never known such a luxurious expenditure of time. In fact, not since my childhood when a day knew no schedule aside from play and sleep. Certainly not in my regular life where a day is normally sectioned off by appointments and fundraising meetings and grocery shopping and all of those things that somehow manage to seal most of the best parts of our waking hours.
I wonder how it is that we go along year after year never questioning the routines we’ve set for ourselves, never wondering if it could be different. I feel as if I’ve opened a door and discovered a way of life that makes so much more sense to me. A slower pace that allows me to actually see the beauty around me. Hear the song in the sounds and feel appreciation for it all.”
What I liked about this story is that it really made you step back and think about what things in your life make you happy? What are the things that once made you happy that you no longer have in your life, and why is that? I have always marveled how they depict Italy and many other European countries as being more laid back. They slow down and enjoy themselves. It’s not like that here. We’re trapped by this fast-paced, packed schedules, need to please everyone around us but ourselves lives. It’s exhausting.
Now as Lizzy’s husband is tracking her down, all of his chapters are in the second person which was really odd. Then the daughter’s story line…I was not a fan. Too dramatic for a little Italian romance.
Other than that, it was a good read.