Nina Redmond loves books. They’re her life. She’s a librarian who spends all her time reading and matching others with their perfect book. And she’d be perfectly happy doing just that all the time. Until the library is closing and she has to reapply for her job, a rather a job, since it’s nothing like the one she had before.
She decides to use this opportunity to change her life. She moves from Birmingham to a sleepy Scottish village mostly on a whim, but also because that’s where the van is. The van that she’s going to turn into a bookshop of her dreams.
Along the way she falls for a charming train conductor and battles with her gruff landlord, as well as helping a young local girl meet her potential.
This is a fairly bog standard romance, a quick read that didn’t really move me that much. Nina is mostly a nice main character to be around for the duration, although it would be nice if she stood up for herself a bit more. And she does have terrible taste in men. Marek – the train driver – delivers a bit of romance and they share a love of books but he’s from Estonia and left a life behind. Or not quite as it turns out. Then there’s the landlord farmer, Lennox, whose entire personality seems to be ‘pissed off grump’, until she gets to know him a bit better of course. But even then he didn’t have that many redeeming features for me, except he was hot and good in bed, apparently.
The build up to her moving was quite drawn out – I didn’t need all the details of moving boxes of books and parking permit issues – and then the last bit with the real romance felt rushed.
I’m still searching for a lovely quick read with a bit more heart to it. Might just go re-read Rainbow Rowell and be happy.
