Rating: 89% | ★★★★
Synopsis (from NetGalley) A newly single girl. A tall dark handsome stranger. What could go wrong? It’s 7am on a Monday morning and Abby Reynolds isn’t where she wants to be. She wants to be in her beautiful loft apartment in Manhattan, drinking a coffee with her fiancé. Instead, she’s heading back to the childhood home in rural Ireland she swore she’d never return to, with some big old secrets. Namely that she’s suddenly found herself unemployed, homeless and absolutely 100% single. She’s feeling all out of luck. Until the first person she meets after she touches down is an absurdly hot guy called Luke, who offers her a lift home. Gazing deep into his sparkling emerald-green eyes, Abby knows instantly that he’s exactly what she needs to take her mind off everything. The perfect rebound. It’s a flawless plan. Until the next day, when Abby realises who he actually is. Not just a stranger. He is, in fact, Luke Bailey, aka the boy next door. Luke Bailey who—so help her God—she’s pretty sure she once shared baths with, back when they were kids. Not that she can allow herself to imagine him in a bath now, not without blushing from head to foot. And judging by the smirk on his face, the same Luke Bailey who’s known exactly who she was the whole time… And who, like everyone in the village, still thinks she’s a high-flying New Yorker… who’s getting married next year. Abby is certain getting under Luke will get her over her ex. But the truth is stopping her. Can she admit to everyone back home that she’s single and has lost everything? Because, if she wants the boy next door, she may just have to… Non-Spoiler Review: The past few weeks, I’ve followed Catherine Walsh’s book two updates on Instagram and settled in for what I was sure would turn out to be a long promotional period before the book’s actual release. And then she dropped the fact that ARCs of The Rebound is on NetGalley and I dropped my phone in a mad digital dash to request one. What I love most about The Rebound—and about all of Walsh's writing, actually—is its depictions of Ireland. Walsh tells Abby's story through an indulgently annoyed lens on Ireland, rejecting the typical tourist perceptions of the county and introducing some more interesting ones. There's a fierce love of Ireland in Walsh's writing, one that endears even if the reader hasn't the faintest clue how to discern between the west and east coasts of the country. (Of course I've seen maps, leave me alone.) The Rebound has a hilarious secondary cast, from Abby's high-strung older sister to Abby's ex-boyfriend's current wife, who is an absolute delight in her scenes. And, of course, Tomasz is fantastic character and deserves his own novel. A more-developed secondary cast of characters is exactly what I wanted from One Night Only (review here) and I'm thrilled that it was a main aspect of this novel. Walsh also writes deftly when it comes to her characters' young age. Life passes quickly around Abby and Luke, and being stuck in their hometown doesn't help. There's a sense of millennial ennui in Walsh's writing that always manages to ground the novel and insist on the novel's deeper relevancy. As always with Walsh's protagonists, Abby is a wonderfully three-dimensional character who is a lovable, much-too-good person. (I highlighted a quote at one point and annotated, "Ugh omg she's such a good personnnnnnn.") However, I wish her romance with Luke had been more developed—I felt that the pacing of the novel veered off track a little towards the end of the story. The constant back-and-forth between the two of them is just a bit over-played in the final act. That being said, The Rebound is a perfect novel with which you can curl up during Valentine's Day, no matter if you're coupled or in a committed relationship with your own box of Ghiradelli. I am always eager to read Walsh's writing—just as any contemporary romance fan should be. Thank you to Bookouture and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review. The Rebound is out February 14, 2022.
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