My subscription to Everand has been a treasure trove this month! Cesca Major’s gem of an audiobook 𝘔𝘢𝘺𝘣𝘦 𝘕𝘦𝘹𝘵 𝘛𝘪𝘮𝘦 is now one of my favorites! I’ve seen the movie 𝘎𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘩𝘰𝘨 𝘋𝘢𝘺 probably a dozen times at least so the comparison to that movie really piqued my interest in this book.
I also love an epistolary narrative. The story centers around Emma and Dan, a couple who have a tradition of writing each other letters on the anniversary of their first meeting. Dan, the romantic, has stayed true to their annual tradition but Emma, overworked, busy and stressed, has forgotten their anniversary.
Dan writes emotional, meaning letters to Emma that provide a foundation for the main characters in this book. We get to see how their relationship developed and deepened over time. Until one evening when a horrible tragedy strikes. And then Emma wakes up the next morning to the same day, all over again.
Emma is stuck in a time loop that forces her to confront her priorities. The author did an incredible job at changing slight details of the day so that nothing was ever repetitive. I couldn’t wait to see how Emma was going to change her behavior and her reactions to certain events that kept happening over and over.
I related to Emma in certain ways and I loved that she worked in publishing. (Bookish types will love this setting!) As Emma struggles to break free from the time loop and make sense of her life, she discovers valuable lessons about love, family, and the importance of being present in the moment.
The wonderful narrator Clare Corbett was brilliant. The ending, while surprising, was incredibly poignant and filled with emotional depth. Highly recommend!
About the Book:
A REESE’S BOOK CLUB PICK
A heartwarming and emotionally poignant time-loop novel about a stressed woman who must relive the same day over and over, keeping her family and work life from imploding as she attempts to spare her husband from an unfortunate fate.
It is an ordinary Monday and harried London literary agent Emma is flying out of the door as usual. Preoccupied with work and her ever growing to-do list, she fails to notice her lovely husband Dan seems bereft, her son can barely meet her eye, and her daughter won’t go near her. Even the dog seems sad.
She is far too busy, buried deep in her phone; social media alerts pinging; clients messaging with “emergencies”; keeping track of a dozen WhatsApp groups about the kids’ sports, school, playdates, all of it. Her whole day is frantic—what else is new—and as she rushes back through the door for dinner, Dan is still upset. They fight, and he walks out, desolate, dragging their poor dog around the block. Just as she realizes it is their anniversary and she has forgotten, again, she hears the screech of brakes.
Dan is dead.
The next day Emma wakes up… and Dan is alive. And it’s Monday again.
And again.
And again.
Emma tries desperately to change the course of fate by doing different things each time she wakes up: leaving WhatsApp, telling her boss where to get off, writing to Dan, listening to her kids, reaching out to forgotten friends, getting drunk and buying out Prada. But will Emma have the chance to find herself again, remember what she likes about her job, reconnect with her children, love her husband? Will this be enough to change the fate they seem destined for?
A moving “What if” story of what it is to be a woman in the modern world—never feeling we’re getting it quite right—about learning to slow down and appreciate life that is sure to resonate with fans of women’s fiction.