Review: All the Days After

All the Days After by Carrie Thorne
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Despite the two star rating, I didn't completely dislike Carrie Thorne's "All the Days After" or think it was a horrible book, though there were definitely aspects of it that I didn't like (in addition to a few which just had me rolling my eyes). The story had a lot of potential, but IMO it would have benefited tremendously from better editing.

First and most importantly, I liked the characters in this story, even neurotic bridezilla Pippa. The male lead character, Asher, seemed like a good guy overall. It bothered me that so many people, especially his own family members, continued to judge him based on his behavior as a teenager. He grew up a lot in the 12 years he was away from home, but no one seemed to acknowledge that at all. Asher's love interest, his sister Pippa's best friend Sophie, was well-developed and likeable too. She had a rough childhood and I was impressed by how well-adjusted she seemed in spite of it all.

That said, I was a bit annoyed by the characters' sometimes immature behavior. For example, Sophie and Pippa both "pouted" an awful lot. They were supposed to be grown women around 26 or 27 years of age, so why did they so often act like whiny children? All of Sophie's angst over her upcoming job interview was rather annoying as well. Frankly, her whole employment situation didn't make a lot of sense to me. At first it seemed like Sophie already had a job lined up with Pippa's aunt, then all of a sudden it was just an interview and she hadn't even finished putting together her resume. Why would Sophie pick up and move to Foothills if she didn't have a job lined up, and why did it take so long for the interview to actually take place? What was Sophie's backup plan if she didn't get the job with Pippa's aunt?

I was not a fan of the way the relationship between Asher and Sophie developed, either. There was a definite insta-lust vibe, with both of them being attracted to each other's pictures before they ever met in person. I had a hard time seeing much of an emotional connection between Sophie and Asher at all. Their get-to-know-you conversations all happened off the page; for example, we're told that they "visited" for several hours, but not the content of the conversation, so it's impossible to know how or if it advanced the relationship. (Sidenote: What was with all the "visiting" anyway? People who see each other frequently usually "chat," "talk," "converse," etc. To me, "visit" implies spending time with someone you don't see often so you can catch up. Is this some weird regional language quirk?) At any rate, after only a few days and apparently mostly because of their amazing chemistry, Asher and Sophie were "in love" and willing to risk the wrath of Pippa to be together (though, of course, not until after Pippa's wedding). I just didn't buy it. (The fact that Asher couldn't stop commenting on Sophie's "perfect breasts" didn't help much.)

Between all of Sophie's angst over her upcoming job interview and her repeated back and forth with Asher about how much they liked each other but couldn't tell Pippa yet, the middle of the book felt like it dragged to me. Also, the writing itself needed some work. There were a lot of words missing entirely and others that were misused repeatedly (e.g. "discrete" used instead of "discreet," "it's" vs. "its," "peak" vs. "peek"). As I mentioned earlier, a good editor would really be beneficial here.

Unfortunately, I think the bad outweighed the good for me here, and I can't recommend "All the Days After" in its current state. I'm not sure that I will continue with the series.

*ARC provided by the author via BookSirens. All opinions expressed are my own.

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