I hadn’t read a romance novel for a long time and when I saw this book on NetGalley I instantly requested for it because of its cover and the synopsis looked good too. But I have to say I was little disappointed. The story could have been turned out better.

The main protagonists of the story are Ted Spencer and Olivia de la Vega. The story follows their lives over decades of time, narrated by Ted. Ted is a violinist and wants to pursue his career in this. He met Olivia in his senior year of High School in the 1960s and instantly fell in love with her. Ted was from a wealthy background while Olivia was the daughter of a cleaning lady at the school. Despite their background differences, they planned to spend their lives together. But the fate was not with them and they got separated because of the family issues and Ted’s compassion for music.

The time forwards and they meet again after decades when both are doing good in their careers. They realize that after so many years their love for each other is still alive. But this time they were not able to get together because of their family commitments and career ambitions.

Will they meet again? Will they ever be got together? Why they got separated in the first place? And the second time?

The story was little weak for me in terms of character development. I never got to understand what was the main thing that attracted both Ted and Olivia towards each other. I guess the writer never explained properly what was the point of affection there. Being said that, it was good to see a story being told from a man’s PoV. This was really Ted’s story, his life, his relationships, and we got to learn about Olivia only through their interactions.

One of the major things to appreciate here is the use of music as the main theme. Besides love being the theme, there was a little suspense too for this missing Violin which was revealed in the last pages. I wished though that the Violin should have made a bigger part of the story.

This book started out slow for me but was fast paced later on. The story is not divided nicely into the present and the past. It was confusing many times and it took me seconds to realizes that the story has shifted from one time to another. The writing was simple. It doesn’t bore you or make the story tough to understand.

I generally love the romances, but with this, I felt that the basic plot of the story was repetitive – boy meets the girl with a different background, they fell in love but their families won’t approve and they got separated, they meet later on but still love each other. Like many other reviewers, I too believe that it could be made into a good movie. I think that a movie can do a proper justice to the story.

It was a light and quick read and somewhat enjoyable too. There is this belief in this story that the true love can live long after the circumstances have separated two people. I believe that this notion alone will touch the hearts of many. This sort of book is best suitable when you just want to read without thinking too much and just want to simply enjoy the story during your break or on vacation.

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