Stella and Samuel met nine years ago, fell apart, and now find themselves face-to-face again at their best friends’ wedding in the Italian countryside. There’s plenty of unfinished business between them, and the story unfolds in dual timelines—then and now—slowly revealing what went wrong and whether a second chance is even possible.
At first, Stella is hard to love. She hides from her own happiness, shaped by anxiety and a past event that still lingers. Samuel, on the other hand, wants more than Stella has been able—or willing—to offer. Their emotional push and pull feels very real.
The setting is a dream. Ali Rosen paints the Italian countryside in lush, sun-drenched detail, and the food descriptions are so vivid you’ll be craving pasta and wine before you’re halfway through. I also loved the way Stella is surrounded by loyal friends, even if she’s kept parts of her life walled off from them.
A thoughtful, easy read for romance lovers
Some lines that really stayed with me:
But I have never understood until this moment that leaving things unsaid doesn’t make them go away.
I am nothing if not a dependable person who can ignore her own anxiety to get shit done. For other people.
I’d always known deep down that I was too complicated for him, but he deliberately didn’t see it. Until one day he did.
Anna Bushi 