If You Could Go Anywhere by Paige Toon
| If You Could Go Anywhere by Paige Toon | |
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| Category: Women's Fiction | |
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Reviewer: Zoe Morris
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| Summary: The latest hit from Paige Toon, this has the usual ingredients of travel, romance and likeable girls in charge. | |
| Buy? Yes | Borrow? Yes |
| Pages: 432 | Date: May 2019 |
| Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK | |
| External links: Author's website | |
| ISBN: 978-1471179464 | |
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Angie is someone who always wanted to travel, but it's taken her 27 years to leave the small mining town in South Australia which has been the only home she's ever known. She doesn't do things by half though, and once she does feel able to go (following a family death) she leaves not only the town, the state and the country, but also the continent, and finds herself following in her mother's footsteps and heading to Italy.
The smells, the sounds, the handsome strangers – Italy is a world away from the sleepy outback, but with the help of some new friends, Angie starts to settle in and even finds a part-time job in a family restaurant. In fact, it's her family restaurant because it turns out Angie had family in Italy she never knew about, and they're welcoming her with open arms. Mamma mia!
The key ingredients for many a novel are delicious travelogues and romance with devilishly handsome young men, and this new book is no different. Italy is beautifully described, and Alessandro, well he's described as beautiful, with a touch of Johnny Be Good about him to boot. The book is very easy to read, and Angie a likeable heroine who you're rooting for. She's done things right, played by the rules, been the faithful daughter and friend, and now it's her turn to have something good happen. The book is awash with adventure and uncertainties: how will her father react to her arrival on his doorstep after all these years? Will she cope, far away from home, in a country where she barely speaks the language? Is now really a good time to be falling for a boy who is far from available, and harbours a darkness she cannot begin to understand?
The book happens in three parts, though these are not of equal length. The first part, we're in Australia, meeting Angie for the first time and learning about what she has lived through. Part two zooms us to Italy for the summer and this is where most of the story happens, although the twist towards the end takes us towards a third part, away from Italy again. It seemed like the third part had a very different feel to it, almost a story within a story, and at first, it jarred slightly. However, the characters were so well established, the continuation did work, and the ending brought it all back together nicely.
I'd like to thank the publishers for sending us a copy to review. As well as the whole back catalogue, we'd also recommend more foodie love stories, such as the aptly named The Food of Love by Anthony Capella. You might also enjoy Wilde Like Me by Louise Pentland and Seven Days One Summer by Kate Morris and An Italian Summer by Fanny Blake.
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You can read more book reviews or buy If You Could Go Anywhere by Paige Toon at Amazon.com.
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