When you read a Paige Toon book you know you’re going to get a gut wrenching romance that’ll most likely leave you sobbing - and this one didn’t disappoint!

Ellie and Ash meet whilst travelling and spend three incredible days together, agreeing to meet up in Madrid at a later date.

6 years later Ellie gets a job working as a gardener for a Viscount and Viscountess, but the job turns out to be full of surprises.

I don’t want to give away too much about the plot but you can probably guess what happens, but the predictability didn’t take away from my enjoyment.

This was definitely less traumatisingly sad in comparison to other Paige Toon books i’ve read. It was definitely emotional but it was nowhere near as heartbreaking as Only Love Can Hurt Like This.

I raced through it and loved Ellie and Ash and the supporting cast of characters. I don’t agree with the One Day meets Bridgerton comparisons as I think that’s a bit of a stretch, but it’s still a lovely emotional romantic read nonetheless.

9/10!

This book was everything I thought it would be and more.
It took me a few chapter sto get well into the story, but once I did I was hooked and only wanted to finish it.
The story talks about growing up and is satisfying in so many ways - to see the characters fight for their own right to be themselves, but also for each other.

*spoiler alert*
It was also so satisfying that it did not end in one of the two blaming the other, but in an adult conversation about all the other factors that were at play throughout the times that the two main characters met.

Thank you so much for the ARC!

• What If I never get over you
By Paige Toon •
☆☆☆☆
°May contain spoilers°


I was lucky enough to be able to read an early ARC in exchange for an honest review.


• Part one follows Ellie and Ash, two young people who both have reasons for wanting to escape the pressure of home life and see the world.

Ellie and Ash spend 3 amazing days together and promise to meet in Madrid in a week.

Ellie finally stands up to her parents and goes to Madrid to be reunited with Ash, but he is nowhere to be seen.

Heartbroken, Ellie returns home.

Years later and Ellie spots Ash across a crowded event and her heart sinks, but has time healed all wounds?

• My thoughts •

The first part of this story was so engaging and captured me, knowing there would be heartbreak and that everything would not go to plan.

Once we got to second part I did struggle slightly as it felt rushed along in parts and at times predictable.

There where a lot of times jumps and at times they felt to long and rushed.

What a rollercoaster of a story!

Paige Toon really likes to keep you reading and guessing what happens next in her books. Sadly for me, this one just felt slightly too predictable.

I really like the complexity of each main character and the terrible past they both had. Bonding over similar experiences may have made them trauma bond in some sense.

I enjoyed this book to some extent, but an a non-lover of Insta-love, it just wasn't my favourite. Even with good enough reasons, I don't think I could ever forgive someone for losing something so sentimental or not showing up when you put everything on the line for them.

I think it would have been more heart-wrenching if we knew more about their time apart, but that just felt a bit rush.

I am glad they got the HEA as it is what they deserved after having such awful lives having awful parents.

The book started so strong and I was hooked from the moment Ellie and Ash met each other. They had an instant connection and i was excited to see where the story went. However Ash time and Time again failed to make Ellie a priority and I found this incredibly frustrating especially as Ellie still continued to lust after him. I will say Paige Too is an incredibly good writer when it comes to putting feelings onto paper, the grief was depicted so well. Overall I enjoyed it, there were things I enjoyed but also some things really frustrated me. I think this book might just not have been for me.

This is my first book by this author and I thoroughly enjoyed it. “What if I Never Get Over You” is an emotional love story which transpires to be an enjoyable and engrossing read. Be prepared to get lost in Ellie’s life as we follow her over the course of nearly 10 years as she tries to get over her Summer romance with the delectable Ash.
When Elly meets Ash on an inter rail trip when they are both only 21 there is an immediate connection. Over the course of 3 days in Lisbon they gradually fall in love and when Ellie leaves to holiday with her parents they agree to meet up again in Madrid the following week to continue their blossoming relationship.
It doesn’t happen, Ellie arrives at the agreed spot having not heard from Ash at all and he does not turn up.
Completely devastated she returns home and begins work doing a job she hates but dreaming of her lost love and wondering what went wrong.
After a career change and a new job in Wales, Ellie hopes that she can get her life back on track but then something unexpected happens which leads her in a new direction. However everything does not run smoothly and throughout this book the reader is just hoping against hope that Ellie will find what she is looking for and have a happy life.
This is a romance containing two beautiful characters who both have difficult relationships with their families, something which acts as a bond between them, even if they don’t realise it at the time.
I really liked the gardening aspect of the story, when Ellie changes career and how this love of plants and flowers helps her in her personal life too, even leading her in the right direction.
This would be the perfect book to read on the beach or on holiday as it is entertaining and you can so easily get lost in it- time passes very quickly.
I definitely recommend this to readers who enjoy a good will they, won’t they romance with well rounded characters. I’d certainly like to bump into Ash whilst inter railing but alas it’s very unlikely as I’m well past the requisite age for a young person’s ticket!
Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for my advance copy.

Once again Paige toon has managed to write a deeply emotional book about two people, Ellie and Ash, who love each other deeply but through extenuating circumstances keep breaking each other’s hearts. My heart was smashed and then put back together again multiple times reading this story but I absolutely loved every second of it.

This is a nice romantic story which has lots of ups and downs and dramatic moments within a relationship. It shows us the various things you need to consider if you're thinking of marrying someone from a different background and how you can compromise and be happy with the decisions you make...

The love story is at the heart and it's a nice easy read, not too much to have to follow, it's fairly light-hearted and there's a nice sense of friendship too.

I did find some parts a bit flat, I didn't know anything about her past that seemed to just come out of the blue to explain some things but it hadn't been hinted at which was a shame. It didn't have a great amount of depth but it did have an easy-to-follow story which was lovely. I really liked the descriptions of various parts of Wales and the solar system too.

The blurb:
Three days to fall in love. Six years to try to forget.

Ellie didn’t expect to fall in love while travelling in Europe. But she also didn’t expect to meet a man like Ash.

Three blistering days in Lisbon is all it takes to form an unforgettable connection – deep enough for them to plan to meet again in Madrid. But Ellie arrives late, and Ash is nowhere to be found.

Six years later, the memory of Ash and their time together still burns deeply in Ellie’s heart. She hopes that her dream job as a gardener on a grand estate in Wales will bring the fresh start she desperately needs.

But when Ash unexpectedly crashes back into her life, Ellie is forced to question if the universe has other plans...

My thoughts:

This book was packed full of feeling.

Ash and Ellie were incredibly cute and proved that there is such a thing as love at first sight.

Was their relationship going to be plain sailing? Of course not… there were a few missed opportunities for Ash and Ellie, mixed feelings and miscommunication/mis understanding between them.

Ash and Ellie shared so many things in common. I loved Ash’s simple lifestyle, the love of astronomy and Ellie’s love of gardening.

Another beautifully written story from Paige Toon 4.5⭐️. Thank you Netgalley and Penguin Random House for the advance copy. Opinions shared are my own.

Loved this story from the get go and knew it would be characters that I fell in love with. Paige's books never fail to disappoint me, always brings out all the emotions!

3.5 ★ I’m quite conflicted with this book as there were things I enjoyed but then also some things I didn’t. I really liked the story, it was such as easy read and the setting, seeing them meet and explore a bit of Europe and then the Welsh countryside and gardening, that was all so descriptive. now for someone who doesn’t like the insta love trope, this one actually made sense. However as the book went on, I felt disconnected to the main characters, I didn’t love nor hate them but they both frustrated me at time and I really didn’t like part two with the slight love triangle thing that was going on. although the ending did feel quite rushed to me, it was sweet and very long awaited. I think this is a perfect spring into summer read and whilst not my favourite, I’d still recommend.

Thank you to NetGalley for the eARC!

I really enjoyed this book so much that I started it one night and finished it the next day. It was just so good and I just loved all the characters as well. I just love Paige Toon books and this was just another amazing read.

I would highly recommend reading this book if you love a heartwarming read.

I would like to thank Penguin and NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read and review this book early.

What If I Never Get Over You by Paige Toon

This book started off really promisingly, but the further we went on the more confused I got.

I really liked the beginning. I loved the scene where Ellie and Ash first meet and enjoyed hearing about their experiences travelling around Lisbon. The author did a great job at making the places immersive so you feel as if you’re walking through the streets alongside the characters. I felt the connection between the two main characters, especially when they are chatting at the beach and was looking forward to seeing the connection deepen throughout the book.

However, things started to go downhill for me when Ash does not appear in Madrid. I was hugely confused and frustrated when Ellie began detailing how she spent almost 6 years disassociating, refusing to take any joy from life simply because a boy she met for 3 days had ghosted her. Perhaps it is just my outlook on life, but I found this to be really annoying and I lost all respect for her as a character. I felt if they’d have had longer together travelling and we’d have had longer to watch their bond grow, I may have understood it but it felt too superficial to warrant this level of grief over the relationship. I’m not someone who feeds into the insta-love ideology, so that is likely where my opinions are coming from more than anything else.

Then, when they meet again at the manor house, I thought hmm maybe I can get back onboard with this story, but nope. Ash time and time again refused to make Ellie a priority and yet there she was still fawning over him. It just made me even more put-off by her character and I found myself wanting to reach into the pages to give her a good shake and tell her to snap out of it. I think Ellie on a whole had a lot of potential as a character but she just came across as a boy obsessed lady who would sacrifice herself for the bare minimum treatment from an attractive man. I liked Ash as a character, but couldn’t understand why Ellie was so obsessed with him because I just didn’t feel the really powerful connection between them that the author was trying to get us to feel. He definitely warmed on me more towards the end, but when we see him during Ellie’s time working at his family’s house he just came across as a bit of an idiot what with him constantly trying to appease Beca.

I also wasn’t necessarily sure that the stories about Ellie and Ash’s childhood friends who died added much to the story other than it initially being something they could bond over. I understand perhaps more Taran’s involvement as I liked his final words and saw how these added to Ash’s decision to change his life, sell the family home etc but Stella not so much.

Overall I was just a bit disappointed with the way this book turned out. I found myself rushing through the parts based at Ash’s family home as it just wasn’t as engaging as the beginning when they are interrailing. I did, however, enjoy the author’s writing, their lovely descriptions of places like the gardens, the murmuration at the end etc and the almost lyrical way in which she wrote. I rated this a 2.5 (rounded up to 3) stars. Thank you to Netgalley and Paige Toon for the ARC.

Ellie is travelling alone, when she meets Welshman Ash. They instantly connect, and Ellie decides she is not going to go home, she will travel on with Ash. When he doesn't appear at their designated meeting place, Ellie is heartbroken. Years later their pair are unexpectedly reunited - are they truly soulmates?

A bumpy romance story with a predictable ending, but with lots of twists, turns and mixed messages along the way. Paige Toon has a wonderful style of writing, that is very easy to read, and describes scenery beautifully. The book is full of great characters, and she is a definite must read author for me.

Paige Toon is one of my auto-read authors and so I was thrilled to receive this as an ARC.

This book and the connection between Ash and Ellie was everything and somehow very nostalgic. It was very ‘insta love’ which some may find jarring but I’m actually quite a sucker for when done well, which this was. You really did get sucked straight in and the connection and chemistry between the two were palpable. You could tell from the start this wasn’t just a holiday fling and so the ‘insta love’ felt justified.

The start and end were by far my favourite parts, it lost me at times in the middle and I felt a bit of a disconnect after the time jump and felt a bit uninterested. I also couldn’t get over some of the stupid decisions and events that took place and I also found there to be a lot of ‘recapping’ of situations or emotions that didn’t actually need to be there.

However, i’ll put that aside because of how much I love these two characters, Paige really is the best at writing relatable and real FMC which just absolutely adds to how much you are gunning for them and a happy ending. I also loved both the settings of Lisbon and Wales.

I don’t think I will ever get over the experience of seven summers and so maybe that’s why I felt slightly short changed with this one. If I had have read this before, I probably would have loved it rather than liked it.

This is a sweet romance that spans several years from a chance encounter whilst travelling to becoming "the one that got away".
I enjoyed the settings in Lisbon and in Wales and how the rhythms of nature and space are woven into the storyline.
There were a few too many miscommunications and obstacles for me to fully enjoy the story as it just felt quite frustrating at times, which was a shame as it felt like the story had huge potential to be really engrossing.

Paige Toon is an auto buy author for me, I trust in her writing so much that she is one of only a few authors whose books I don't read the synopsis before I start as I know I am in safe hands and like to go in with no clue what is going to lay ahead for me.

With the title of this book What If I Never Get Over You and having read many of Paige's books that have made me sob uncontrollably I did expect to need the tissues to hand and yet for me they were not needed this time although the storyline has some emotive moments in this book I didn't find this book a tear jerker so you are safe to read this one in public!

This book follows Ellie and Ash who meet whilst travelling alone and spend three amazing days together exploring Lisbon where they have found a special connection. As they have to part and promise to reunite shortly in their travels Ellie arrives but Ash never appears. The story then follows the pair through their lives as they are unexpectedly reunited but are they truly soul mates or are their lives worlds apart?

This was a bumpy romance story that explores the effects of outsiders opinions and expectations has on a relationship, a couple can be perfect for each other and even they know and feel that too but the thoughts and feelings of others can way so heavily on couple that it influences the relationship and Paige Toon has delved into this in depth including class and toxic family relationships.

I really enjoyed this book, selfishly I would have loved to have spent more time exploring Lisbon with Ellie and Ash and getting to know them together more there as this was the more exciting care free part of the book but I appreciate what the author was doing keeping this part short as it was meant to be a whirlwind romance discovering a strong bond.

I love how Paige always writes the perfect romance but whilst including raw and relatable hiccups along the way rather than a fairytale romance and this one definitely didn't disappoint.

Well this was just perfect! Even though it was agonising at times, I enjoyed reading about Ellie and Ash so much. The sparks flight right away when they meet on their travels in Lisbon. I definitely didn't see where the story was going when Ellie shows up to her new job in Wales.

There were many more levels to the story than I was expecting. A gorgeous love story but also grief, class, family relationships. The conundrum when the people around you have a different idea about what's good for you. And at the centre of it all, a magentic force between these two people.

I wanted to bang my head against the wall in frustration at times. They're two good people who mess up without meaning to but their love for each other and their friends is a force. Just loved it, like everything Paige Toon writes.

Will Paige Toon ever write a bad novel? I somehow doubt it! This was a complete rollercoaster of ALL the emotions. I loved both Ellie and Ash, and all the gardening, posh houses and country living hit the perfect note. As beautifully romantic as ever, and with just the right amount of plot twists - utter perfection (again)!

I was fortunate enough to receive an early ARC of this book from Netgalley.
Paige Toon is one of my favorite authors, and I always enjoy her books.
This novel tells the of Ash and Ellie, who meet whilst traveling in Lisbon. They quickly fall in love, but events interfere. Years later life throws them both back together.
As always Paige's books make me want to visit the places mentioned in the story.