Reading Challenge Series: January

Being the fifth challenge of the reading series is not the only special part about this article, as it is also the first reading challenge of this year; if you read on, there is a lovely book recommendation for our next challenge throughout this month in celebration of the new year, so make sure you read until the end!

If you have not come across this series before, then do not worry, you can join in whenever you want or can. All we do is review the previous book we read in the past month, then choose another book to read in the next month; alternatively, if readers prefer to find their own book, I assign a specific genre or a theme to help you start somewhere when choosing which book you could be reading next with everyone else.

If you are interested in the reading challenge series from inception, then click HERE, and if you would like to check out the previous month’s reading challenge, then click HERE.

One Day in December by Josie Silver

Reminder of the plot:

“Laurie is pretty sure love at first sight doesn’t exist anywhere but the movies. But then, through a misted-up bus window one snowy December day, she sees a man who she knows instantly is the one. Their eyes meet, there’s a moment of pure magic… and then her bus drives away. Certain they’re fated to find each other again; Laurie spends a year scanning every bus stop and cafe in London for him. But she doesn’t find him, not when it matters anyway. Instead, they ‘reunite’ at a Christmas party, when her best friend Sarah giddily introduces her new boyfriend to Laurie. It’s Jack, the man from the bus. It would be. What follows for Laurie, Sarah, and Jack is ten years of friendship, heartbreak, missed opportunities, roads not taken, and destinies reconsidered. One Day in December is a joyous, heart-warming, and immensely moving love story to escape into, and a reminder that fate takes inexplicable turns along the route to happiness.”

This book is a number one New York Times Bestseller published by Random House Publishing Group in 2018; and as a romance novel, there is a lot to take in for readers who love to get lost in Josie Silver’s characters and the whirlwind romance. The first meeting between Laurie and Jack is so charming and real that you begin to visualise the moment right away when you use the bus, or even walk past the bus stop.

However, as much as I enjoyed the beginning of the book, I cannot say I completely enjoyed the rest of the read. The plot moved very slowly and it was dragging on for too long, making the drama between their romance very uninteresting. Furthermore, the theme on cheating can be played with in many ways, so I felt Josie Silver could have done so much more with that than make it a very typical cheating game with no in-depth look into the protagonist’s psyche. Readers do not feel like they should be supporting the lead girl and therefore, develop feelings of dislike towards her.

For the rest of January, I will purchase and read The Distance Between Us by Maggie O’Farrell, which I will link below for you if that is also your choice; otherwise, your theme for this month is escapism. Choose your book soon and begin reading!