It’s been seven years since Chelsea Martin embarked on her yearlong post-college European adventure. Since then, she’s lost her mother to cancer and watched her sister marry twice, while Chelsea’s thrown herself into work, becoming one of the most talented fundraisers for the American Cancer Coalition, and with the exception of one annoyingly competent coworker, Jason Knightley, her status as most talented fundraiser is unquestioned.

When her introverted mathematician father announces he’s getting remarried, Chelsea is forced to acknowledge that her life stopped after her mother died, and that the last time she can remember being happy, in love, or enjoying her life was on her gap year. Inspired to retrace her steps–to find Colin in Ireland, Jean Claude in France, and Marcelino in Italy–Chelsea hopes that one of these three men who stole her heart so many years ago, can help her find it again.

From the start of her journey nothing goes as planned, but as Chelsea reconnects with her old self, she also finds love in the very last place she expected.

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Chelsea is in, for lack of a better term, a rut in her life. She has a stable, yet not exciting job, and doesn’t have too much of a social life outside of it. She was once adventurous, but after her mom passed away, she can’t seem to get out of her shell. That changes when her father announces he’s remarrying a woman he’s known only a short time, and soon Chelsea is off to recreate the European adventure she was on before her mother’s passing in hopes to recapture her old self.

During her trip, Chelsea goes to three major European countries – Ireland, France, and Italy – in hopes to reconnect with her former loves/flings. While she doesn’t expect them to be single, she does learn more about them than she had the first time meeting them; some for the better and some for the worst. She’s shocked though when her irritating coworker, Jason, tags under the guise of going with her to a meeting for work in Italy later in her trip. And boy, does his appearance throw her for a loop.

I loved the characters in this novel, well… the main ones anyway. One of Chelsea’s former flings turns out to be a real pig, but I won’t say which one. Chelsea was very relatable to myself, in terms of being cynical about love and just kind of living a safe life. Granted, we don’t have much of a choice nowadays, but even before 2019 I was more of a “stick to what I know” kind of person. Honestly, I probably still am. So as I always say, when I can relate to a character, I usually like them.

Jason, on the other hand, is a smug little crap that I honestly couldn’t help but love myself. I knew right away from his first interaction with Chelsea that this was going to be an ‘enemies-to-lovers’ story, and I was totally fine with that. It’s not so boring knowing how the story will turn out (i.e. Chelsea and Jason being together) but how they get to that point and what obstacles they go through along the way.

Still, as much as I loved the traveling and romance of this book, I felt that something was missing from it. Something that made me want to keep picking the book up and never put it down until I was finished. I admittedly had to force myself to pick the book up to read it. It wasn’t DNF-worthy, but it wasn’t a book I was always excited to pick up again. Though it could’ve been my mood at the time that made me reluctant to read at all. I’m not sure. But this book is most likely a one-and-done for me.

However, that aside, it was still good. I don’t want to turn anyone away from the book. And if you’re up for a little adventure and some fun enemy-to-lover romance, then I’m sure you’ll like this book.

Rating: 3.5/5 stars