Sweet, steamy, angst-filled and intense, The Road to Rose Bend is the first book in Naima Simone’s Rose Bend series.
In it we meet Sydney Collins, a grant writer who, pregnant and newly divorced, finds herself leaving North Carolina to return to her hometown. Despite swearing she would never return having left Rose Bend eight years ago, Sydney is looking for a safe place, and community in which to raise her unborn child. This means grappling with some inner demons around the strained relationship with her parents and some of the other Rose Bend residents.
Who should she first run in to but the amber-eyed, widowed mayor – Coltrane “Cole” Dennison – the “…man she’d hopelessly crushed on so many years ago”. This sweet reunion is tinged with sadness, as we learn that their chance meeting behind the town’s oldest church, is because Cole is in fact visiting the graves of his wife and son.
You could be fooled by the cover into thinking this is your typical contemporary romance but there’s so much more! With themes of grief, friendship, family, and healing there is a distinct Nicholas Sparks meets the Gilmore Girls vibe to this book.
I liked that so much happened in the very first chapter to quickly build the tension and highlight the dilemmas faced by the book’s central characters. You immediately get a sense of what’s troubling them – Sydney is bold but on the cusp of motherhood is in need of love, reassurance, security, someone to put her first. Cole, hiding behind his work, broken from the loss he has suffered and locked in a prism of grief and pain, and a friend to let go of the memory of his wife and child. Both of them need to heal old wounds and work at moving forward, and you’re immediately drawn in to how they are going to cope with facing up to these challenges.
I really loved the strong sense of place Naima Simone has created in Rose Bend, through the dialogue and interaction between residents. She paints a clear visual of Rose Bend and the people living there. It’s in the ice cream shop, the inn that Cole has always called home, the rental cottages, and of course the white, two-storey, Victoria house on the corner that is so pivotal to the turning point in the story. Another element that really worked for me was the strong sense of family and bonds beyond blood –as evidenced by the Dennison family, the relationship Cole has with his late wife’s family, and the strong friendship between Leo and Sydney. People are there for one another without question – and that for me was the key element that helped to develop Sydney and Cole’s friendship into something more.
The message about starting over, and not getting in the way of your own happiness was a really nice undercurrent running through as well. Cole spends a lot of time physically removing himself from Sydney or battling the desire to support her but avoid walking the familiar and painful path he walked with Tonia.
The one thing I’m missing is the what happened next for Sydney and Cole – without spoiling anything the key thing that we would expect to see them go through, hasn’t happened when the story ends. Seeing that this is the first book in a series, I’m hoping this is a teaser and we get to know more in book two?
Overall, this was an enjoyable feel-good read, full of Hallmark moments, that would make a really good TV series as well. Naima Simone is a new author for me, and I look forward to reading more of her books!
Thank you to the Mills and Boons team for my copy in exchange for this honest review.
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