Review: Welcome to Ferry Lane Market (Ferry Lane Market #1)

Author: Nicola May

Started reading: June 9th 2022

Finished the book: July 8th 2022

Pages: 384 / 8:53:00

Genres: Romance, Fiction

Published: July 22nd 2021

Source: Storytel Audiobook

Goodreads score: 4.11

My score:

Synopsis

Although thirty-three year old Kara Moon loves her hometown of Hartmouth in Cornwall, she has always wondered if she should have followed her dream of leaving to study floristry. But she couldn't bring herself to leave her emotionally delicate single father, and has worked on Ferry Lane Market's flower stall ever since leaving school.

When her good-for-nothing boyfriend cheats on her and steals her life savings, she finally dumps him and rents out her spare room as an Airbnb. Gossip flies around the town as Kara welcomes a series of foreign guests to her flat overlooking the estuary.

Then an anonymous postcard arrives, along with a plane ticket to New York. And there begins the first of three trips of a lifetime, during which she will learn important lessons about herself, her life and what she wants from it - and perhaps find love along the way.

My thoughts

I've tried so hard to like this book. I think Nicola May is so sweet, but this book was a miss for me. I started listening to it in Dutch, well I HATED that copy. Can't say it any other way. Then I switched back to English and decided to start over to give it a good shot, but the damage was done. I did feel like the translation to Dutch wasn't done very well, especially when I listened to the English version. In my opinion the accents in the English Audiobook were overdone and totally unnecessary.

Pros

• Setting: The setting with the ferry, the market, the flowers and all that was really cute and fun! Hartmouth is definitely a cute fictional place that I would love to visit now!
• Ending: The ending was really cute and wholesome and at least left me with a good feeling. I'm not continuing this series, so I feel like I got a nice ending for myself.

Cons

• 30 years old: Kara did not feel like a 30-something person to me but much more like a teenager. She's all over the place and does things that are totally out of character for her. I also couldn't connect with her because I felt like there were very little emotions in this book; there was more factual writing. Kara does get tears in her eyes 2190 times, but that didn't do it for me.
• Kara: Kara keeps talking in such a bad way about herself that it literally made me so done with her. This book tells you 193 times that she has thick thighs and a round bottom and everybody thinks she's so gorgeous and amazing but she won't believe it. I also don't like how she's a self-saboteur. I've been screaming from the first 10% TAKE THE GOOD GUY. She keeps whining that no one wants her, but there is this 1 guy that's so sweet, takes care of her and she doesn't want him for whatever reason. Made me annoyed.
• Traveling: The traveling in this book is only the final 25%? In my opinion it didn't even feel like I was in the cities that Kara goes to. There was so much of this trip skipped that I felt like it really was a missed chance.

Overall

Tried really hard to love this book, by even switching languages in the Audiobook but it didn't do it for me. I just didn't connect with the main character and was actually annoyed by her most of the time. The setting is amazing in this book and I can totally understand people diving in the other 2 books, because Hartmouth is such a cute place! I'm leaving this series behind with this book. So many good books, so little time!

Other opinions on this book

"Delightful and witty with a heroine you'll be rooting for. Joyful escapism."

- Milly Johnson

"Spirited, adventurous and full of heart!"

- Heidi Swain

Thanks for reading!

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