Jackie Fraser | Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: The Beginning of Everything
Author: Jackie Fraser
Publisher: Dell
Publication date: September 26, 2023
Length: 352 pages
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

An irresistible friends-to-lovers novel of resilience, hope, and new beginnings from the author of The Bookshop of Second Chances

After escaping a bad relationship, Jess Cavendish is running and leaving it all behind, carrying just a few treasured belongings in her knapsack. She needs to start over, but that means sleeping where she can and making the most of her slim savings. Luckily, she comes across a recently sold, unoccupied house. It couldn’t hurt to stay there while she saves up enough to get her own place, right?

Gethin Thomas is also looking to move on after the end of a long-term relationship. He’s returned to his hometown, anxious to renovate the fixer-upper he bought and move out of his sister’s cramped guest room. When he walks through the door one morning, he finds Jess, who’s ready to run again, and surprises them both by offering to let her stay. It feels like the right thing to do, but Jess doesn’t want a handout. They strike a deal: Jess will help with the restoration, furnishing, and decorating in exchange for room and board.

While they peel wallpaper and shop for new furniture, an unexpected friendship develops as they bond over music and food, and slowly open up to each other about their pasts. When it’s time for Gethin to move in, he convinces Jess to be his official housemate and she agrees—so long as he lets her pay rent. The connection between them soon shifts to an attraction that seems both inevitable and overwhelming, and Jess must decide what she wants. With so much hurt in her past, can she risk loving again? She was brave enough to reach for a new life—and now a future she hadn’t even dreamed possible could be just within her grasp.

If you’ve read the synopsis for The Beginning of Everything, you have a pretty good idea of the entire book. Jess is in her mid-40s, on the run from an abusive relationship, and decides somewhat randomly to hide out in a small town in Wales, where she hopes to figure out how to start over again.

After living in a tent for a few weeks, she discovers an unoccupied home that seems like a possible temporary shelter and — after picking the locks — settles in as a secret squatter. Her relative safety is interrupted when the new owner, Gethin, arrives suddenly and startles Jess into running again.

Rather than changing the locks, throwing away her possessions, and calling the police, Gethin instead exhibits remarkable kindness and leaves a note asking her to talk to him. When she return to the house to gather the items she’s left behind, Gethin makes an unexpected offer: She can remain as a lodger in his home while it’s under renovation, and in exchange, if she’s willing, she can help with the various repair and improvement projects.

Jess is extremely cautious and mistrustful at first, but soon realizes that Gethin is a rare person who is truly as kind and respectful as he appears to be. With time, Jess eases into a friendship with Gethin, and eventually, she becomes his partner in turning his new house into a true home.

Given Jess’s past, however, she’s skittish when it comes to truly trusting a man or feeling at ease with being close with someone, and when feelings beyond friendship emerge, her sense of belonging and ability to remain with Gethin are threatened.

The Beginning of Everything is a nice, pleasant read, but lacks any true drama. It’s enjoyable to see Jess settle into a new life, although I could have done with fewer descriptions of their decorating process. Gethin is lovely, and possibly verges too far into “too good to be true” territory. Would any person really act this compassionately toward a homeless stranger sleeping in their newly purchased property? It’s hard to understand why Gethin would welcome Jess into his home or support her the way does, so we just have to accept that he’s just that nice and move on.

I expected some sort of dramatic encounter with Jess’s ex, and was relieved that that’s not where the plot goes. The focus is on Jess’s emotional and mental state, her healing process, and her uneven journey toward feeling safety with other people. It can be moving, but I wish it had had more depth, and certain of Jess’s decisions feel illogical, which undermines some of the impact.

The writing, particularly the dialogue, gets annoying in places. Jess and Gethin are both so incredibly tentative when they talk to each other that it made me want to interrupt and tell them to speak in complete sentences! For example:

“No, I … no, I’m just surprised.”

“Good surprised or bad surprised?

“I … good surprised? Of course? It’s … unexpected but…”

“You don’t want to,” he says. “That’s okay. I just thought — “

“No, it’s not — “

“Or do you want to?”

And also…

“Painful.”

“Yes, very.”

“Did — “

“Did I want to talk about it? Nope.”

“You don’t think — “

“No.”

“I only — “

Et cetera…

As I said, this is a perfectly pleasant read. It lacks an element of true excitement or surprise, and the basic premise can be a bit tough to believe. Still, Jess and Gethin are both sympathetic characters, and I enjoyed seeing the developing relationship between the two.

Title: The Bookshop of Second Chances
Author: Jackie Fraser
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Publication date: May 4, 2021
Length: 431 pages
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

A woman desperate to turn a new page heads to the Scottish coast and finds herself locked in a battle of wills with an infuriatingly handsome bookseller in this utterly heartwarming debut, perfect for readers of Evvie Drake Starts Over.
Thea Mottram is having a bad month. Her husband of nearly twenty years has just left her for one of her friends, and she is let go from her office job–on Valentine’s Day, of all days. Bewildered and completely lost, Thea doesn’t know what to do. But when she learns that a distant great uncle in Scotland has passed away, leaving her his home and a hefty antique book collection, she decides to leave Sussex for a few weeks. Escaping to a small coastal town where no one knows her seems to be exactly what she needs.
Almost instantly, Thea becomes enamored with the quaint cottage, comforted by its cozy rooms and shaggy, tulip-covered lawn. The locals in nearby Baldochrie are just as warm, quirky, and inviting. The only person she can’t seem to win over is bookshop owner Edward Maltravers, to whom she hopes to sell her uncle’s antique novel collection. His gruff attitude–fueled by an infamous, long-standing feud with his brother, a local lord–tests Thea’s patience. But bickering with Edward proves oddly refreshing and exciting, leading Thea to develop feelings she hasn’t felt in a long time. As she follows a thrilling yet terrifying impulse to stay in Scotland indefinitely, Thea realizes that her new life may quickly become just as complicated as the one she was running from.

When Thea discovers that her husband has been cheating on her with her close friend, her carefully ordered life falls apart. And when said husband and said friend declare their intention to start a life together, Thea moves out of her house, packs her belongings, and has to figure out what’s next.

Answers are provided by the news that a distant relative, a great-uncle she barely knew, has left his Scottish home to her, along with a nice sum of money to go with it. At loose ends, Thea heads to Scotland to see the property and decide what to do with it, intending to spend at most a few weeks assessing the place and making plans to sell it.

She doesn’t count on how lovely the place is, or how charming the small village nearby. Uncle Andrew left behind an impressive book collection, including many rare and valuable editions, so Thea contacts the local bookseller, a grumpy man named Edward, to arrange to sell some of the books. Edward is indeed grumpy, but he’s also quite engaging and very attractive, not to mention being the estranged brother of the lord whose estate borders Thea’s new home. All in all, Thea finds him fascinating, and they develop an easy rapport, only enhanced once she takes on a job working in Edward’s bookstore.

As the months pass, Thea finds herself falling into a comfortable rhythm in her new home, but she’s still not over the betrayal of her marriage and the sense of self-doubt it’s left her with. Still, as she gets to know Edward, she eventually realizes that life may have a few surprises left for her… even the possibility of a new romance.

It’s refreshing to read a book about love between mature adults, and also a nice change to have a lead character be a woman in her mid-40s. Thea is lovely, but she’s experienced and not naive, and feels that the romantic part of her life is over with, now that her husband has left her. She doesn’t expect to find new opportunities or to have a dashing local find her attractive, and she certainly doesn’t expect that this little town in Scotland may turn out to be a place where she’ll find happiness.

The Bookshop of Second Chances is a lovely, engaging read. The dialogue is often quite funny, and Thea herself is a delightfully practical, blunt-speaking, and intelligent character to spend time with. The dynamics between Edward and his brother Charles are fraught, silly, and often humorous, but there are also some real issues there to navigate, and it was interesting to see those play out.

The main romantic storyline between Thea and Edward is well-paced, as she spends a great deal of the book not looking for more than friendship while she heals from the pain of her marriage and learns to trust and be optimistic again.

All in all, this is a sweet, entertaining, and thoughtful take on finding new purpose and new love in middle age. I really enjoyed it, and recommend it heartily!

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