A year after she was dumped in her wedding dress, she’s working at her parents’ bridal salon, anxious for a happy ending that can’t come soon enough. After receiving a life-saving heart transplant, Rosie knows her health is precious and precarious. She suspects her heart donor is Daphne Thorne, the wife of local celebrity author Morgan Thorne, who she begins messaging via an anonymous service called DonorConnect, ostensibly to learn more about Daphne. But Rosie has a secret: She’s convinced that now that she has his wife’s heart, she and Morgan are meant to be together.
As she and Morgan correspond, the pretense of avoiding personal details soon disappears, even if Rosie’s keeping some cards close to her chest. But as she digs deeper into Morgan’s previous marriage, she discovers disturbing rumors about the man she’s falling for. Could Morgan have had something to do with his late wife’s death? And can Rosie’s heart sustain another break—or is she next? (Pub Date: Jan 2025)
Rosie has a crush on Morgan, a famous local author, and she's always checking what he's doing through his online posts, to a point she can almost see it happen in front of her. She's also got a heart transplant from his late wife after a domestic incident took her life, although Rosie only knows that because her friend was working at the hospital at the time. She won't believe, though, the rumors he may have been the responsible for her death. Even if in the anonymous letters they've been exchanging through DonorConnect, he falls in contradiction with what he told the police that night. Even if everyone continues to warn her.
This book is good, a 3+. But the initial half makes that a hard case to defend. I'm glad I'm not an editor because I'm not sure of how I'd fix the problem; I can see clearly why the author had to put us through the awkwardness of that half. At the same time, it's a waste if that makes people drop it before getting to the point.
Not that it's a splendid point. My personal experience was that I was very curious to know if Morgan had killed his wife or not, and of course, the reason for the whole book to exist. The questions piled up as I went on, so I wasn't among those who really thought of dropping it. You're aware they weren't the book's author being inconsistent, that Megan Collins would have an answer. Perhaps, it helped that I've read her work and knew to trust her. Nevertheless, I frowned a lot. Rosie's narration, Morgan's exchange with her, his emails to his best friend telling her of how he met Rosie. To be honest, it read like lazy writing, which I knew it couldn't be. I'm glad it all makes sense at around the middle when we crash into a plot twist.
Unfortunately, disregarding the first half's lack of awesomeness doesn't make the book stellar. It's a quick read, but only because the narration is repetitive and exaggerated, to a point you don't need to pay full attention to it to go on. It will maybe be torture to those who can't dynamic-read, I'm afraid. Also the characters are unbearable. Terrible. They're the worst. Rosie is painted to us as if she's delusional, as if Collins wanted us to think of her like the main character in The Girl on the Train, but she isn't. To be honest, she was the only character with any charisma in the story. I still don't get how could people around her accept everything she's gone through in her previous relationships. Even her family and best friend treat her like she was the one in the wrong. I don't like how the book only touched the surface of this gaslighting she suffers. And since we're talking about the characters, how is it possible someone can attract so many people of questionable personality, to say the least?
What this book lacked in reality, it flooded in entertainment while it kept me curious for a lot of it. Even if I suspected the solution to the mystery, I still wanted to know more. If you can get past what I mentioned above, you'll enjoy it as much as I did.
Honest review based on an ARC provided by Edelweiss. Many thanks to the publisher for this opportunity.
Rating: 3 out of 5.
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