The premise of this book is great, but the execution fell short for me. For one, it took way too long to get to the meat of the book, and the journey to get to that central story wasn't that enticing. I felt like a collection of good ideas that didn't quite come through because the details weren't spot on. For example, the final straw for leaving her job is that she feels threatened by the player she is doing PR for because he is accused of asexual abuse. When she lets her boss know this is why she's leaving, he's fine with it, but just a few pages before he was telling the player he wouldn't get away with abusing his position. It didn't make sense that the same character would have these opposing reactions. Then in the US, it just felt like situations were contrived. There's an implausible mixup when she requests tea and gets iced tea instead because she didn't specifically ask for "hot" tea. Then there's the time she notices a difference in work culture, where her new American co-workers don't work late. In sum, the writing itself was good, the premise was promising, but the details didn't feel genuine and distracted from the story.

I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

A romance about reinventing yourself in a completely different place. The move here is from London to Salt Lake City, which is quite a shift. One of the best parts of the book is the sense of place. Arches National Parl makes a couple of appearances, and you get the sense of what living in SLC is like. The female friends are also lovely.
The biggest downside to the book is that the hero is completely forgettable. I finished the book and couldn’t remember any character traits besides him being sporty.
All in all, feels like a lesser entry in the genre of British women reinventing themselves and finding love.
I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Abbie was a divorced single woman who currently hated her job. A little nudge from here and there, she finally decided to change the way she was living now. So when she got a job to Utah, she accepted it even though it meant moving halfway across the world from London. Her job was going so good. She loved the place. Had some new friends and finally had a perfect new boyfriend, Kyle after her ex-husband. Everything was going pretty smoothly until it wasn't. Her world fell apart so out of the blue that she didn't really have quite the time to grasp what's happening. She had to deal with the secret she had been holding onto since forever. But then, when she found the source of her downfall and messed up life, she confronted the person. Had her life back like the way it should've been.

Overall, it was an okay read. It had potential to be much better though!

*thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an advanced reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review*
Half the World Away – the furthest you can get from home (on earth anyways). Abby, the main character, is currently coping with her divorce and dealing with some issues at her current job. Preparing for a fresh start, she decides to move across the world to Salt Lake City. This is a story packed with a new city, new food, new adventures! Need I say more?
This story was such a cute read! So, refreshing to read a realistic and unique romance book. It was nice to see a main character with so much confidence and independence! Abby takes on a new start in not only a new city but a new country, so she shows a great deal of courage by deciding to do this all on her own. Her character was one of my favorite things about this book.
Something that I felt like the author did such a good job with was describing the city and the American atmosphere. I have never been to Salt Lake City but with the authors writing I felt like I was right there with Abby.
One thing I didn’t like about the story was the miscommunication trope. This is more of a personal thing because I just get so frustrated with this and want to yell at the characters to just talk to each other for once. I personally feel that miscommunication is a bit overused in romance books, but none the less it was a fun read.
I highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a fun romance read! Definitely worth checking out this author’s debut book!

This was just okay. I loved the idea of the storyline, and the initial reactions between the two main characters but the story just fell flat for me. I didn’t feel any sort of connection build around them at all.

Themes: Guilt, Past, Starting Over, Lies
Half the World Away follows Abby Potter, divorced and keeping a heart breaking secret, works as a publicist at a London Football Club. Tired and over her job, she gets a job offer in America. At first, Abby is not ready to leave her family and friends but when she receives some news she decides to start all over and needs a fresh start. Everything goes well for her, a beautiful apartment, loves her new job and even meets a new guy that intrigues her.

This story was very well written, the pacing was good in the beginning, towards the middle it started slowing down but picked up very well at the end. The plot was very predictable but the descriptions were amazing. I loved how the author described the settings that the characters went to, the bars, hiking places and restaurants. I love bands, bars and music so this was perfect for me, i found myself more intrigued on those parts.

I didn't love this book but i enjoyed reading about starting over, meeting new people, places, trying new food and getting help from a very difficult past.

I am so impressed by Rebecca Banks’s debut Half the World Away! I did not realize this was a debut until reading the acknowledgments!

HtWA follows our main character Abbie, an English PR rep for the London Town Football Club (aka big deal soccer in the UK). Her experience with the Premier team is not all good though, and when a team member gets away with a slap on the wrist after sexually assaulting a minor, Abbie has had enough. She packs her bags and travels *cough cough* half the world away to beautiful Salt Lake City, Utah to start over.

Once there, the love interest is introduced pretty quickly with a meet-cute although their relationship is somewhat slow to form. Kyle seems like the perfect man to be honest, besides jumping to conclusions later on in the story. For the majority of the book, he is so perfect that I question whether he was a realistic love interest but I had fun along the way!

For all the romance readers out there (myself included), know that this a closed door romance that is very tastefully done. I prefer a bit more *spice* in my romance but that is somewhat hard to find in traditionally published romances. I think that often times a relationship is strengthened by the physical aspect and it is an important step for our characters to experience, but I also want to see the emotional growth on the page during those intimate scenes.

One of the things I most enjoyed about this story was Abbie herself! She was such a lovely protagonist to follow and has several moments where I completely connected with her pretty early on in the book.

First she called me out on bad spending habits -“What was it about airports that made it seem like you had monopoly money in your purse and you weren’t spending real cash?”

Then she reacted like a real human to being given extremely privileged circumstances that were outside of her norm- “‘Holy shit.’ After a moment of stillness she screamed, ran and launched herself into the middle of the bed. This whole thing had to be a dream. There was no way she could be living here. She’d find out it was all a horrible mistake later on and they’d move her to a studio flat above a kebab shop or something.”

And finally, my personal favorite quote of this entire book, she captures what it is to have the travel bug- “She’d never seen anything quite like it. Standing by the water she felt like she’d made one of the biggest discoveries in humankind, yet this was something that the people who lived here must see every day. She felt like a very lucky girl at that moment. She wasn’t sure why the gods were shining down on her”


Now for a few things I didn’t think were all that great... (SPOILERS AHEAD)

Trigger warnings for this novel include sexual assault of a minor (off page), sudden family illness, and abortion/abortion guilt.

The first issue I had with this book was how the sexual assault case was handled. There was definite questioning of validity of claims made by the minor in this situation. It is pointed out that this is a “he said, she said” case with no solid proof, but as a woman in 2021 I would hope that the author would have made her stance (and Abbie’s stance) a bit clearer. The minor is not responsible in this situation. It is not her fault she was sexually assaulted by a man with an over inflated ego and sense of self worth. The minor’s claims of assault should have been accepted as truth, not questioned whether she had “asked for it” or perpetuated the situation. He was an adult taking advantage of his position of power (as a professional athlete/as a white man in high social standing) to sexually assault a minor.

If this had been the only hard topic touched on, I may have forgiven Banks a bit more, but later on in the story abortion is talked about pretty extensively. Again, another high profile issue that I do not think was handled in the best way. I almost DNF’ed at around the 85% mark because of this. This is issue is very quickly resolved in the next couple chapters and basically once everyone around Abbie tells her she should not be guilty and feel as though she doesn’t deserve to be happy, she just accepts them at their word, goes to counseling for a week or two, and then is all better. I don’t think that after years of gaslighting herself this would have been so easy- this emotional forgiveness/growth should have been worked on throughout the novel in my opinion.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for letting me read this book in exchange for an honest review.

To start off, I wholeheartedly believe that for an authors debut.. this was not terrible. Though it was dreadful to finish, there were some aspects I did enjoy, but majority of the book I felt as if the deadline for this book was the day it was written. Their chemistry was dull and it felt a bit rushed. Throughout the book their lack of communication frustrated me. It’s so easy to talk things out!

TW/ Sexual Assault
I did find it very uncomfortable that the writing made it seem like covering up sexual allegations was an everyday thing and taking it so lightly. Not sure if that’s just my interpretation of the situation, but that did not sit well with me (imo).

Overall, it was very interesting to see the MC (Abby) go through different types of scenery and enjoying her fresh start.

this was a pretty good book for a debut. i loved pretty much all of the aspects of this book! i gave it an overall 3/5. if you’re looking for a cute rom-com about starting your life again, this is it. i throughly enjoyed Abbie’s journey and discovering who she really is and wants to be. the only problem i had is the trope i dislike most miscommunication!! i feel like most of their problems could’ve been solved by just talking with each other. it was so simple to fix.

What a fun ride!! The story of Abbie moving from the UK to the US to escape some past memories made me laugh and my heart heavy. I think that while this was a predictable book, it was a good story. Sometimes you need to read something that has boy + girl, with some drama and than a happily ever after. As an emotional person I thought Abbie was relatable and she wasn’t an annoying protagonist. I enjoyed this book and will be recommending.

Half the World Away

Rating: 4/5🌟

⚽️ Calling all football fans ⚽️

Abbie Potter is divorced and working a dead end job in London when the opportunity of a lifetime comes calling - all the way in America.

Her first day in her new home, she runs head first into Kyle Miller. He’s confident, gorgeous - and her co-worker.

As things start to fall into place for Abbie in a foreign land, she finds herself trying to figure out if living a happy and fulfilling life is really as easy as it seems.

I really enjoyed this! It was such a cute and quick romp with all the characteristics of a good romance novel - fun meet cute, a terrible plot twist, and a happy ending.

A great beach read for the summer! Thanks to Net Galley, Literally PR, the publisher and Rebecca Banks for the ARC!

Read if you like:
+ David Beckham 😉
+ Strong female friendships
+ Bend It Like Beckham ⚽️

Half the World Away is a light and enjoyable rom-com journey about new beginnings and self-reflection. It is very easy to tell that the author had a clear picture and lots of love for her characters. I found myself looking forward to each next scene and rooting for most of the characters as they grew and became closer to one another. This is definitely a romance and not a ‘smut’ book and I liked that the author chose to skip the detailed steam scenes. One of the main stars of the book is truly the setting, the detail and exploration of the nature of Utah became one of my favorite parts of the book. This is a nice easy read and a good choice for sitting by the pool or on the beach.

Thank you to NetGalley, Literally PR, and Rebecca Banks for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This book was a total miss for me.

I found the story to be very predictable. You can see what's coming and who the antagonist is immediately, although it's supposed to be a surprise twist.

The characters are all very one dimensional. The good guy. The tattooed lesbian best friend. The mean girl pretending to be nice. The leads had no chemistry at all. I didn't feel their connection was genuine.

And, the hardest part of reading this book for me, personally, was the serious lack of research or knowledge of how American's speak. This book is set primarily in the U.S. Literally every single time an American has dialog in this book there are glaring errors. It's clear this author must be British. I find it surprising that an author wouldn't have an awareness of these speech differences. Americans don't say "Brilliant" in the same context that Brits do. They don't use the term "fit" when describing someone who is attractive (unless they were specifically talking about their fitness level and even then it would be very rare). They don't ever say, "You didn't see the best bit". Nor do they know the term "Dungarees". I could go on and on. This book is SO OVERRUN with these cultural speech mistakes that it's completely distracting.

Also, and this may seem nit-picky, but I live in Salt Lake City, Utah where this book is set and I was left curious as to whether the author has actually visited here. There is an all day date written into the book in which the male lead picks up the female lead at 3:30 am and drive from Salt Lake City to Arches National Park to watch the sunrise. Besides me just knowing this from experience, a 15 second google map search shows it takes 4 hours to drive that. No way is the sunrise as late as 7:30 a.m. I mention this because this entire book feels like a hastily written first draft that never had a Beta Reader, was never checked for accuracy, and was poorly researched.

It's also very important to state that there is a storyline surrounding Abortion in this book that I personally felt was not handled well at all. It felt to me as if the author wasn't quite sure how to approach and explore this topic.

Overall I think this book needed an editor, some research, some beta readers, and a few more drafts to write a story that felt genuine and complete. There are a lot of good ideas here, but none of them felt realized.

I enjoyed this book for lots of reasons. I liked the character of Abbie, and respected her yet felt sorry for her from the beginning. In a book like this, developing a connection with the main character is so important. I immediately wanted her to find happiness.

This book has a slower pace than what I’m used to but I think the character development was spot on and I thought Abbie came across as not only a likeable character, but a courageous and respectable one.

However, knowing Abbie as I felt I did after a few chapters, I really felt the slower build up of the romance suited the book. Kyle comes across as an average sort of lad, who enjoys the banter and the thrill of the chase a little bit too.

I loved the fact that this book me to a different setting and this definitely added to the romantic and escapist feel. The fact that we went to a part of the world I’ve driven past but never been to, and certainly never read about in a book before, felt really original. I would recommend this book to fans of romance books and books that focus on starting over. I would recommend it to fans of Zoe May, Olivia Spring and Paige Toon.

A good debut. As a wannabe Brit, I loved watching Abbie come to America, discover the beauty of the mountains, find a job she feels passionate about, and of course the hot and sweet guy.

I wish this book had much more dialogue. So many scenes felt superficial, lacking substance, due to the lack of feeling connected to the characters in that way.

A romcom, this rates 1 out of 5 on the steaminess scale.

Half the World Away is a fun, yet heartfelt dive into the life of Abbie, a woman struggling to overcome a few challenges. Taking a chance, Abbie leaves the UK to begin a job in the US. With the excitement of a new job, new friends, and perhaps a new love, she begins to feel at home in Salt Lake City. When a jealous co-worker has other plans, Abbie must decide where and who, home really is. I enjoyed (and admired) Abbie’s wit, spirit, and ultimate lack of fear.

Half the World away had so much promise but it was just not for me! My biggest issue with the book is that it is just so stereotypical and bland. I personally want a romcom to be unexpected, funny, fast paced and fun. This did not deliver any for me as I found the writing style to be diary like, more of an account of the day than a story.
I hope the book finds its audience and thank upu Netgalley for the ARC

This was an enjoyable story about starting over, and the protagonist, Abbie, is really someone to root for. I think lots of romantic fiction readers will swoon over her colleague, Kyle, too! Abbie is really down on her luck when suddenly an amazing opportunity to start over falls into her lap. But is her new life too good to be true? Perfect for fans of Paige Toon and Miranda Dickinson - in fact, this reminded me of ‘Johnny Be Good’ in some ways. For me, some of the details were a little too neat BUT it was a great comfort read.

I am thankful to the publisher and the author for giving me the advance reading copy of the book and I have given my honest opinion
This book was so so good
A great book to pick up to have a good reading time
The main protogonist is such an inspiration

This was just the story I hoped it would be! A romance with good chemistry. Good friendships and some fun humor. Abbie is about as far from her home as she can get, starting over in a new job. She's smart and successful, but not confident in her relationships. I would recommend this sweet, if predictable, story to anyone who enjoys romance.