The Anniversary by Hilary Boyd @HilaryBoyd @MichaelJBooks @JennyPlatt90 #blogtour #TheAnniversary

Author : Hilary Boyd
Title : The Anniversary
Pages : 403
Publisher : Michael Joseph / Penguin UK
Publication date :

Stella once thought that if she never saw Jack again, it would be too soon.

But life has other plans for her and her stubborn, handsome ex-husband.

Looking after their daughter in a time of need, Stella finds herself unwillingly reunited with the man she shared the best years of her life with – followed by the worst.

Where tragedy once tore them apart, now Stella and Jack are being drawn back together. But each of them has a new partner and a new life.

Should they fight temptation? Should the past remain the past? Or are some loves simply meant to be?

Here is something I often wonder about. A relationship fails, people move on and live their separate lives, and then one day, sometimes even decades later, they find each other again and decide to give things another go. Why? Do people change that much? What happened to the thing that made them split up in the first place? Is it no longer an issue?

Meet Jack and Stella. Once happily married, they have now been divorced for over two decades. Jack has remarried, Stella has a longtime partner and they haven’t seen each other in years. But now their daughter needs help and Jack and Stella will be bumping into each other on a regular basis, whether they like it or not.

There’s an especially devastating event that caused their marriage to hit the rocks back in the day. Neither has dealt with it particularly well. This is definitely the case for Stella, who has built a rock solid wall around her heart to protect herself. But this behaviour has had an effect on a lot of people, including her daughter. And for myself, as the reader, I found her quite hard to warm to.

The Anniversary is an emotional story about family, grief and loss with complex characters trying to navigate through complicated relationships. Any child of divorced parents knows how difficult it can be to have both parental units in the same place but in this case, there is also a massive elephant in the room and a need to somehow let go of the past.

This novel has you rooting for the characters and wishing for a happy ending. Although maybe not all that surprising with regard to the plot, it’s the characters that make this a wonderfully immersive and poignant read.

The Anniversary is available to buy!

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Hilary Boyd was a nurse, marriage counsellor and ran a small cancer charity before becoming an author. She has written eight books, including Thursdays in the Park, her debut novel which sold over half a million copies and was an international bestseller. The film rights have been acquired by Charles Dance, who will be directing and starring.

Author links : Twitter | Website