ABOUT THE BOOK
Two men. Three decades. One decision.
Pregnant at nineteen from an affair with a married man, Leila goes against her parents’ wishes. Alone in an unfamiliar city, a fresh start is terrifying.
Leila struggles to navigate between being a single working mum, new friendships, and her bad choices in men. The heartache of past mistakes haunts her. Disillusioned, lonely, and with a fractured mother-daughter relationship, she swaps the vices of city life for the peace of the country. Yet new-found happiness is short-lived and old habits return.
Can Leila let go of her past and find true love?
MY REVIEW
Leila appears to be a confident, independent wedding planner, but she is a train wreck of irresponsible and misguided personal decisions unconcerned with the consequences. Until the accident…
Sophie grew up and somehow I never did. I was forever chasing something I couldn’t hold on to: my youth, or inappropriate men. History repeated itself so many times, and yet there’s never been anyone I love as much as Elliot.
Ms. Frost’s unusual tale is told in three decades of Leila’s life from her affair with a married man, to her life as a teenage single mother, from nights of meaningless sex with the wrong men, to her falling out and reconciliation with her daughter. Can she become the woman she is meant to be and forget her past and find true love?
Though I am not a big fan of Leila and her irresponsible choices, she is strong and raises her child on her own terms. Her bluntness is sometimes funny, sometimes inappropriate, but you can’t fault her ability to tell it like it is. Her daughter Sophie is pretty well adjusted and more mature than her mother in many ways, and Leila’s friend Robert is a saint who I would have snatched up in a minute.
Overall, this was an interesting read for me considering I’m Leila’s age and understand some of the less-than-stellar decisions she made in her earlier years. Though I normally don’t enjoy books that jump back and forth in time, Ms. Frost does a good job keeping the reader eager to find out how Leila’s story unfolds.
Thank you to Ms. Frost for giving me the opportunity review this book with no expectation of a positive review.
Butterfly Storm Series
0.5. Mine to Keep (2018)
1. The Butterfly Storm (2014)
2. The Birdsong Promise (2018)
3. The Honeysuckle Dream (2019)
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kate Frost writes character-driven women’s fiction and romances, alongside Time Shifters, an award-winning time travel adventure trilogy for 9-12 year olds. She has a MA in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University where she’s also taught lifewriting to creative writing undergraduates. She is the Director of Children’s and Teen events for Hawkesbury Upton Literature Festival, and she’s the co-founder of Storytale Festival, the first city-wide children’s book festival in Bristol.
The Honeysuckle Dream is Kate’s ninth book and the third (standalone) novel in her popular The Butterfly Storm series. She lives in Bristol with her husband, son, and Frodo, their cute Cavalier King Charles Spaniel.
Follow Kate on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Goodreads.
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