“I’m in love with a dream, with a man who isn’t real, and there isn’t any coming back from it.”
Living a dream life in dreams or dreaming a real life i
“I’m in love with a dream, with a man who isn’t real, and there isn’t any coming back from it.”
Living a dream life in dreams or dreaming a real life in dreams?
This book in simple words is magical and breathtaking. This is my first Sarah Ready novel and my very first book that has magical realism as one of its main settting, and it is a masterpiece in this genre. The story is a unique combination of dream and real life that left me with feelings like warmth, happiness and nostalgia.
Sarah Ready is an incredible writer, with her unique story-telling and incisive and profound narrative, she weaved a story of a woman learning to dream and then falling in love with the man of her dreams in her dream life. It's incredibly complex yet intriguing with every passing chapter, you will find yourself reading it without stopping because the story has a quiet hypnotic rhythm to it, with its tropical paradise setting in dreams, and cozy and comforting vibes of Geneva, Switzerland, you will get sucked right into the pages of this book.
“You forget everything you experienced, everything you knew in the dream world. Sometimes you’ll remember a flash. Sometimes you’ll remember a feeling. But mostly, you forget everything. You forget your dreams. You don’t take them with you into real life.”
The plot twists are perfectly executed with no plot hole galores. The anticipation of finding the truth behind those dreams Fiona is dreaming and to know what had led her to dream about that tropical island and Aaron left me with thrilling excitement. The story stirred a spectrum of perplexing emotions inside me from nostalgia to adoration to agonising emotions. There is also drama and comedy involve, brought in by nuanced side-characters. The scenery also has all the summery and cozy atmospheric vibes that are brought to life by Sarah's vivid details in her story-telling.
➸ Fiona Abry is a heiress of a Swiss watchmaker. Fiona is an intelligent and confident woman, an incredible single mother. But she forgot what it truly felt like to dream, to trust and to fall in love. This is where a mysterious and magical watch enters, a classic and family heirloom that lets her live her greatest desires of real life in her dreams. But what happens when said dreams feels like reality, when Fiona starts irrevocably falling for the man of her dreams in her dreams, a man who is just a figment of her desires and need but feels real. Fiona has everything she wants in her dream life, kids and a husband, Aaron McCormick who loves her beyond everything, but will she ever stop dreaming about the people she came to love in her dreams?
“I’d like to feel alive,” I admit, and then, “I think I can. With you.”
➸ Aaron McCormick is a man one can so easily fall in love with. He's got the gentleness, a charming persona, an easy-going nature, an incredible man, father and a husband. Aaron loves deeply and wholeheartedly. If he's in you cannot change his mind ever. I am enamored by his character and how he shows his vulnerability to Fiona, his thoughts on life, how he loves his people and how many hardships he had been through yet still he is most compassionate and down to earth man. To simply say, I am in love and you will be too if you just read this book once.
“McCormick.” “What does it mean?” “Some say it means an almost, a never-was, a dream that didn’t happen, but I say it means an always, a dream that still goes on.”
: ̗̀➛ Aaron and Fiona
The romance was breathtaking. I fell in love with Aaron and Fiona's beautiful and whimsical love story. Fiona and Aaron are soulmates in truest meaning, finding each other even in dreams because they were fated to be together. The way Fiona fell in love in her dreams, and how she started imagining her dream people in real life, how she cared for the people she met only at night in her own magical world created by her deepest desires, everything was perfect. Every dream, every conversation between Aaron and Fiona, every little date orchestrated their newfound love and trust for each other that later turned to this fated love story. How they truly showed their vulnerable and broken parts only for the other to heal them. The found family arc that is the heart of this story was constructed perfectly and with so much elegance and comfort. It was simply so beautiful, uplifting and endearing.
“I see evidence of him everywhere. He’s invaded my world. Even when he’s not real, not here, I still feel him next to me.”
The ending was perfect and you guys are in a roller coaster ride with how the last chapters were written. I tried my best to write this review without spoiling it for you because it's better if you experience the beauty of this novel by reading it and living it with these lovely characters.
Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an advance reader copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.