DNF

This made me cringe and not just because I felt like I'd picked up straight up Taylor Swift fanfiction, not a novel "inspired" by. I might have tried to continue on a little longer but my file was weird and the text was a really similar shade to the background so it was hard to read but I doubt my decision to DNF would have changed the more I read nor my rating (actually, I fear my rating may have ended up lower so you're welcome, I guess)

I love a second chance romance as much as the next person. And the main character being a pop star and giving Taylor Swift energy? I'm sat!

Unfortunately though, this book was a massive disappointment for me. I feel like I've been having that problem with a lot of this author duo's adult romance books and I keep holding out hope that they will get better but I'm probably going to have to take a step back from now on.

I did not like the main character. At all. And the way the fmc treated the mmc just made me annoyed and uncomfortable. Overall I feel like the book was just trying too hard.

Emily Wibberley and Austin Siegemund-Broka's "The Breakup Tour" is a heartfelt and engaging contemporary romance that captures the journey of self-discovery and healing after heartbreak. The novel follows the protagonist, who embarks on a cross-country music tour as a way to mend her broken heart and find new beginnings. Wibberley and Siegemund-Broka’s vibrant writing brings to life the highs and lows of the tour, intertwining music, romance, and personal growth.

The authors excel in creating relatable characters whose emotional journeys resonate deeply with readers. The story’s exploration of relationships, both romantic and platonic, adds layers of depth and authenticity. "The Breakup Tour" is a refreshing take on love and life’s unexpected turns, making it a must-read for fans of contemporary romance seeking stories about resilience and the power of new experiences.

This book drew me in because it’ is supposed to be a “love letter to Taylor Swift” and I am a HUGE Swiftie… But I didn’t enjoy it at all and I am so sad that I didn’t. Within 25% i wanted to DNF. :(

This just felt very gimmicky and invasive to me, it felt like the authors had put their heads together and thought “oh, she’s the most famous person in the word right now, we’ll sell a lot of books based on her”, read one article about her life and thought “good enough”.

I don’t know, I just don’t feel like this was the right move… it felt very disrespectful.

Feel like this read as a taylor swift fan fiction and i did not enjoy. It was very hyped up for me through promotion and it just seemed to dissapoint.

This book was so different and unique as I’ve never read a book in a tour setting before. It was so I intriguing!! Second chance is one of my favourite tropes so I really enjoyed this. Max and Riley were likeable characters and i loved reading about their love blossoming throughout. It was fun, packed with so many Easter eggs, and perfect for romance and Taylor Swift fans!

2.5 stars
I had high hopes for this story, as the blurb sounded right up my street. But this didn't simply take inspiration from Taylor Swift, it's essentially just Taylor Swift fan-fiction.
The writing itself isn't bad and I don't think it being written by co-authors caused any issues either. However, nothing really happened and I didn't feel any chemistry or true connection between Riley and Max.
They both felt really one dimensional too.
It also dragged on for me, sadly.
Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Amazing book!
I was thoroughly engaged throughout this book and I didn't want to put it down! The author captured my attention from the get go! Five stars from me :)

I had a lot of expectations of this book... and I think that that tampered my enjoyment when it didn't live up to all of them. This is a second chance romance, which is a trope I enjoy a lot, but I didn't think we knew enough about Riley and Max's past relationship to understand why they should be together in present day. I also really struggled to feel the chemistry between Riley and Max - I wasn't going to be mad if they ended up together, but I didn't really feel why they should. Max was utterly bland and devoid of any real personality traits. Even Riley's only personality trait was that she writes songs. Like that is literally it. We were constantly told how the characters feel about each other, instead of actually being shown it in any way, and I was just bored the whole time.

I also felt that it was great to be inspired by Taylor Swift - but it felt like this book was written purely to capitalise on HER success and not out of any real love for her. In all honesty, it felt like it was written by people who actively do NOT like Taylor Swift, and who think of her as just being a woman who writes breakup songs... there was none of the magic or sparkle or love that I was expecting from a book supposedly for Swifties. I just think that were some different, far more interesting ways to approach this, especially if you are SPECIFICALLY marketing it as being inspired by Taylor Swift. It all just felt incredibly uncomfortable.

The Breakup Tour was advertised to me as a Taylor Swift inspired romance story following a world-famous pop star whose ex-husband is claiming that her newest hit breakup song was about him. To stop his clout-chasing arse, Riley Wynn reunites on tour with her college ex-boyfriend, and the boy she actually wrote the song about.

I had high hopes for this book, I love a famous-person romance, especially where one is a singer, and I'm a big fan of Taylor Swift. Unfortunately, I didn't enjoy this book.

Considering the fact that the entire plot is based around Riley wanting everybody to know the song is about Max ... she doesn't do much to let people in on this fact. Sure she brings him out onto stage to perform this one song with her, but that's it. There's no fake-dating aspect, no interviews or photo-shoots that could land them in awkward for them but entertaining for us scenarios. At one point I forgot this was even something Riley was trying to accomplish. I feel like this entire set up of having Riley and Max reunite could have happened in a less confusing way. Have him just randomly show up to audition as her tour pianist or something - at least that would help give Max some agency.

I found Riley and Max to be quite boring and one dimensional characters. It's like they were both given one specific personality trait/interest and weren't allowed to be anything more than that. Riley's entire character, personality, backstory was built around her previous breakups. Her character is as imaginative as titling an album of break up songs as "The Breakup Record". Even her life as a pop star is confined to tour bus, recording studio and stage, totally erasing moments of glitz-and-glam that could have served for fun scenes or opportunities to put Riley and Max in scenarios outside their comfort zone.

Max was just ... a bit meh. I struggled to remember his name literally while I was reading the book. Where Riley lives, sleeps and breathes music, in contrast Max feels like he's going through a midlife crisis and is trying his old performing hat back on for size. If these feelings of identity had been explored a bit more, that could have been fun, but everything with Max felt very surface level.

Because Riley and Max weren't very well developed, this meant their romance was seriously lacking. The two had zero chemistry and no compatibility. I bought into them as college sweethearts - I could believe that Riley once felt so strongly for Max that she wrote this song about him so many years later, but I did not for one second buy into this second attempt at a romance. In my defence, the characters didn't believe in it either!! The entire book feels like the two of them doubting the others feelings and doubting their own feelings. I mean there's scene after scene of Riley going into detail on how they're not hitting the right notes (metaphorically speaking) when performing together on stage - how am I not supposed to read that as a metaphor for their relationship?

In my mind, for these two to work out as a couple, Riley - whose entire character revolves around performing, writing her feelings into song, baring her soul to her fans, living to write and writing to live etc - would have to change so many aspects of her life which I'm of course not going to root for.

Absolute perfection!!!
Honestly I love the Taylor Swift vibes, and it’s the whole reason I was interested in this book - it doesn’t disappoint.
A duel POV romance is always fun as well as I LOVE getting the story from two sides!

Interesting concept, realistic characters and plot. Would definitely recommend. A second chance romance book that definitely delivered. I expected angst given the title and I was not disappointed. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me an arc of this book in exchange for my honest opinion/review.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for a copy of this book. All opinions are 100% my own.

For a romance book, there was very little romance included. This is a cheap and distasteful copy of Taylor Swift’s life.

There was no relationship/storyline development. Things just happened in this book with no buildup.

This book was so poorly written that I don’t remember a single thing that happened so this review can’t be any longer.

3.5 stars

As a T-Swift girly I had very very high expectations for this book- The Taylor references throughout are wonderful for a swiftie!

A nice easy read and under 400 pages too! There were however two third act breakups which i can just about get on board with one let alone two (I'm a sucker for a happy happy couple you know - my love life is a mess enough)

I found it easy to root for the couple and I did want them to end up together and to work out so that's a bonus!

I would reccommend this if you want an easy cheesy read with some sappy romance!

The set up of this novel had the makings of greatness. I liked the direction the plot was heading. Unfortunately, it took the scenic route and never quite got there. The writing was laboured and self-indulgent. It made the novel exhaustingly melodramatic; a book about a pop singer and her college sweetheart just did not need to be that. I liked the idea of the songwriting and the other musical elements, especially as the music was a pivotal plot device, so I wished there was a way to listen to it.

The story flipped between Riley and Max’s points of view. It was very introspective, which made the story drag in places. Max’s perspective was basically just his musings about Riley. He lacked personality and dimension. At least Riley had her career and ex-husband Wesley to worry about as well. Speaking of Welsey, I wished I got to know more about Riley’s relationship with him, so that I could properly understand her motivations for using Max to squash the rumours. As a result, I wasn’t impressed by her frequently manipulative and insensitive behaviour.

Riley and Max’s romantic history was described in a very tell rather than show way. This meant the foundation for all their pent-up angst wasn’t as solid as I wished it’d be. In present day, I sometimes felt the former couple’s longing, but I wasn’t always sure whether I was rooting for them. Frankly, it often seemed that Riley and Max were both using each other for their own gain, whether it was to save his business or to have a dig at Wesley. They wanted the other to fit into their own dreams, unwilling to compromise or adapt. Riley was the main culprit – she seemed to blame Max for wanting something different from her. This made me wonder whether the couple were just ill-suited. Therefore, I wasn’t the biggest fan of either their romance, or the book as a whole.

Despite wanting to fall for this second chance love story, I was not enamoured by its melodramatic writing style, nor its largely unsympathetic characters.

Riley Wynn went from a promising singer-songwriter to a star overnight thanks to her breakup song concept album and its lead single. When her ex husband claimed the hit song was about him, she called on her college boyfriend from ten years before, Max Harcourt, the real inspiration for the song. Max couldn't help wondering whether music was what he was destined for instead of only playing for the home's patrons. Riley wanted him to go public as her muse and he agreed if he could also join her band on tour.

Life on tour was quite the rollercoaster. They didn't immediately have the stage chemistry that was needed to make fans focus on Max and not Riley's ex husband. They both had walls they'd built up and so singing the one song that told their love story had them resisting past feelings and hurts.

Riley lived life to write truthful songs. Max didn't want their second chance at love to have a predetermined end in another album. He wanted her to realize she was worthy of love that lasts a lifetime. I felt all the angst and feelings in this book as chapter after chapter had me rooting for while feeling the pain these two had to endure.

This is my first book from this author duo, and I cannot wait to read more. Thank you to Netgalley and Publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This title was... okay. It wasn't anything to write hone about unfortunately, though I had high hopes going into it so it's a shame. To me it felt like there wasn't any character development and I didn't really get to know the characters enough.

As well as that, the story didn't particularly draw me in or leave me wanting more, it just felt a bit dull.

I cannot argue against the penmanship of this author duo, they sure know how to write. However, the issue lies in how they execute their stories. For a book about a pop star in the lime light this was incredibly boring. I was left underwhelmed at the lack of her celebrity status getting in the way especially considering how the book presents her as a big deal in the pop world.

The two love interests have no personality or interests beyond beinf musicians. How is it possible for people in their thirties to have nothing else to talk about beyond the music making process? I don't believe in the chemistry alleged between these two because I didn't witness any of it. For a romance there was a very obvious lack of time spent together between our couple.

Where were the heartfelt moments? The conversations that lead to will they or won't they moments? These two never had a significant conversation either about their past breakup or their current situationship. Instead of miscommunication we got no communication at all which doesn't work when you're trying to convince me that this couple works.

The was zero tension in the story which left me baffled when they'd have arguments because what exactly was the to disagree on? I have too many questions about this story thus I couldn't enjoy it more which is a huge disappointment because I wanted to love this so much.

The pieces were there to make this into a fantastic story packed with the drama of the music industry but none of those were utilized as they should have been. In the end I kept asking myself where the chemistry to justify this couple was and found none, so, in that regard it completely failed as a romance.

Just finished this book and somehow I’m not sure these two like each other even though they claim to be in love? I feel like I barely know anything about them other than they used to date and apparently she dates people to break up with them and write songs about it? I’m not a swiftie so I wasn’t particularly offended by some of the takes in this book but I can’t deny they were weird.

Anyway, my issue with this book pretty much comes down to that. I’ve read this author duo’s previous books and though they seem to be quite liked in the community, I didn’t love them and had a hard time getting through them. Although this one wasn’t as bad, the lack of chemistry (and even emotional connection) and the way I couldn’t connect with either of the main characters because I barely knew anything about them made it impossible to enjoy it.

Unfortunately, this book wasn’t for me. I’m gonna have to make myself stop requesting/buying books by these authors no matter how good they sound (that’s what always gets me - the ideas are amazing but then the books fall flat).

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review.

Unfortunately, I didn't like this book.... I REALLY wanted to! This felt like a really weird invasive recap of Taylor's life instead of something inspired by her.

I didn't like how the two reconnected, as it felt like she just waltzed back into his life like no time has passed but then she's mad at him? It didn't make sense.

The time jumps felt like just a way to push the story towards the end, and it made the book feel rushed when I just wanted to see the characters learning about each other and falling in love with each other again.

I REALLY wanted to love this but it was just disappointing for me.