Reviews with content warning for Miscarriage - The Bookshop of Second Chances

I suspect that I’m too American and/or too young to truly enjoy this book. Maybe I got the wrong impression from the blurb on the back but I was expecting a somewhat cutesy grumpy/sunshine bookshop romance with Thea learning a lot about herself as she navigates her sudden independence and that’s really not what this is.

The book is very dialogue heavy so we have to make a lot of inferences about how characters are feeling which was frustrating at times. To me, Thea comes across as a very passive person. She’s way too chill about discovering her husband’s infidelity. I was expecting some feminine rage about it but she really gave us nothing. It would be way too dramatic for this setting to see the cheating husband get some comeuppance for his rotten behavior but it would have been nice. It’s also super weird to me how Thea’s friends stay friends with the cheater and the other woman. I would have felt betrayed if I was her but she didn’t really have any feelings about it and if I was one of the friends, I couldn’t have excused their behavior. Infidelity and disloyalty is a wild trait to be okay with, especially when it means you’re going to dinner parties at the house he used to share with Thea that the other woman has moved into.

Edward is also pretty unlikeable. Not moving on at all from a humiliating experience and then spending several decades on a revenge quest to sleep with every woman his brother had slept with is super weird and more than a little unhinged. That’s a pretty big red flag.

Maybe I’ll revisit this in a decade or so when I’m closer to Thea’s age and see if my feelings have changed but for now I’ll settle with declaring that it’s just not my cup of tea.

Content Warnings

alisonreadsitall's review against another edition

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emotional funny lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

4.5 stars ⭐️
Spice: 🌶️ (more like half a pepper - mostly fade to black)

I was pleasantly surprised how much I enjoyed this one. I even got a few butterflies, but I do love the sunshine/grump trope and this was done so well! 🥰

Also- who doesn’t love a book about a bookshop? 🥹🩷

I want to be friends with Thea- she was dealt a pretty shit hand, but handled it with such grace! And her sense of humor is wonderful. 🥰 😅 She definitely came out of her grief in the end, and I wish I had that much cheeky confidence to say what’s on your mind and not care what happens!

Chris is an absolute POS. 🤬 Thea was much nicer than she needed to be, and I would not have handled it well at all.

Edward started out a bit of a shit, but definitely grew on me and I appreciated his honesty, even though many mistakes were made. 🤦🏼‍♀️

Tropes:
Grumpy/Sunshine
Love triangle
Different worlds

Definitely recommend! 🩷

Content Warnings

themoonshinegirl's review against another edition

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emotional funny lighthearted tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.5

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unikko's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes

5.0

Finally a book with a middle-aged female protagonist who doesn’t have kids! Add a bookshop, a grumpy misanthropic guy, some subcultural references and the beautiful landscape of the Scottish lowlands and I’m all in! I haven’t felt this at home in a book since forever. <3

The romance develops slowly from friendship and there are no graphic sex scenes, which is another huge plus for me. I really enjoyed following Thea as she built a new life for herself and I like that the romance is just the cherry on top, not the main reason for her newfound happiness.

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cariam's review against another edition

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emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

It was a reasonably enjoyable book. I never knew how much power a middle-aged Scotsman treating you like a wife when you’re not one would have over me. And pet names reach a new swoon height when you imagine them in an accent - darling, sweetheart, doll. 💕

I haven’t read many books where a man is doting, and Edward Maltravers was a sweetheart, if not a prickly one at first glance.

Spoiler

That lil muffin worried about her period at one point, so he’s got brownie points now too. Not to mention I was angry at him for being crass with her just a few hours earlier, so kudos to Fraser for being well rounded in her writing

Spoiler

The sass and jealousy is great! I found some scenes drags out with her chitter chatter though, and Thea seemed kinda unhinged in her self consciousness a few times. I also understood being hesitant to love again, but loved how something that developed her character wasn’t glossed over later, and especially loved her anxiousness about Edward going away and possibly cheating, but I disliked how Thea kept thinking of “generations past” and how she’d be compared to a servant.

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kbcozy22's review against another edition

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hopeful lighthearted slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

This was a slow but nice book. The setting was great and I loved imagining myself in the small town and the book store. The main character was frustrating at times and felt annoying (and slightly hypocritical) at times. Glad I read it but probably not again.

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rynicolereads's review against another edition

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emotional lighthearted slow-paced

3.5

This was a great booster weekend read. I wasn't super invested throughout the story, but I love that it was set in Scotland (one of my favorite places), and mainly took place at a cozy book shop!

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chrisljm's review

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relaxing slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

So this isn’t a bad book. Just kind of boring. Respectfully, I think this book is more suited, and might be more enjoyable, for middle aged people. Or people going through a midlife crisis.

There were a few things I didn’t particularly enjoy and one of them was the dialogue. When it comes to dialogue in books I know a lot of filler stuff that we say in real life is probably excluded so that conversation flows more seamlessly between characters, but not in this book. It was like we got to hear every word that Thea was saying as well as every thought that crossed her mind. Which is ironic because even with all that I didn’t get the feeling that she was in love with Edward because she never even let herself contemplate those emotions and when she did, she was just so unsure of what she felt. Another thing that bothered me was the emotional aspects because I was never able to sense what they were feeling and the only reason I knew they were feeling certain things was because it’s specifically stated. The way the book is written, it just feels like you’re being kept at arms length and you only know when Thea is sad or angry after it has happened, which is strange because she’s the narrator.

But what I disliked the most was every scene with Chris. Towards the end of the book there’s a meeting between Chris and Thea and I wish I didn’t read that at all. It’s not even because I hated Chris, I just hated the way they interacted with each other.

Also, Thea was made out to be super funny, at least to Edward, but um either he was super down bad or the comedy needs work. Or maybe I just don’t get Scottish humor.

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