I have been so lucky to have met lovely Paige Toon on several occasions that I am delighted today to be reviewing her latest book, Five Years From Now and I would like to thank the folk at Simon and Schuster and Books and the City for providing an advanced reader copy in return for an honest review.

I previously reviewed another of Paige Toon’s books, The Last Piece of My Heart, here.

Five Years From Now will be published on 17th May 2018 and is available for pre-order through the links here

What happens if you meet the RIGHT person at the WRONG time?

Nell and Van meet as children when their parents fall in love, but soon they are forced worlds apart.

Five years later, they find each other.  Their bond is rekindled and new feelings take hold, but once again they have to separate.

For the next two decades, fate brings Nell and Van together every five years, as life and circumstance continue to divide them. Will they ever find true happiness? And will it be together?

‘One day, maybe five years from now, you’ll look back and understand why this happened…’

Nell’s idyllic childhood summers with her father include his girlfriend Ruth and her son Van, but Van’s importance in Nell’s life will reverberate through the decades.

Oh my goodness Paige Toon. How could you? I began reading Five Years From Now on a recent long haul flight and a few hours later I had finished the book and was sobbing uncontrollably in front of several hundred strangers. I ended up looking as if I had a terrible cold as my nose was so sore from blowing it! Five Years From Now touched me very deeply – especially through Nell’s relationship with her father.

Five Years From Now is an absolute delight to read. I can honestly say I adored every syllable, never mind every word of this smashing story. Paige Toon has an effortless style that draws in the reader and envelops them in the narrative so that they feel part of the story as if it’s happening to them and to their heart. Her descriptions give such a lovely sense of place too.

The plot is so cleverly structured as events tie in both backwards and forwards in the story. Certainly, there is the obvious and overt structuring of the ‘Five Years’ of the title, but it is the attention to the smallest detail linking initially unconnected elements and providing echoes of fate and realism that I so enjoyed. Five Years From Now made me reflect on my own life, providing an extra added depth and satisfaction in reading that I hadn’t expected.

The developing relationship between Nell and Vian, or Van as he later becomes, is so beautifully and convincingly written that it is impossible not to feel every one of their emotions with them. I was desperate for them to have a happy outcome in their relationship. I’m so glad I was able to read Five Years From Now in one continuous sitting as I don’t think I could have borne not knowing how the book ended. I was so invested in their lives it was almost as if I had become them. This is a romance of the highest order written by a true maestro.

But Five Years From Now isn’t simply a love story. It’s a wonderful depiction of relationships at many levels – between parents and their children, between friends and rivals, between lovers and soul mates, between siblings and divorcees so that every reader will be able to identify with at least one of them. That said, Five Years From Now is indeed a love story of the most beautiful and heart rending kind. Anyone not shedding a tear reading this book is simply not human!

Every time I think about what I read an intense wave of feeling washes over me and I find it quite hard to hold in my emotions. Five Years From Now is utterly convincing, totally heartbreaking and a wonderfully soul-stirring story that hits the reader in the solar plexus in a way they won’t forget in a hurry.  I truly loved it.

About Paige Toon

Paige Toon was born in 1975 and grew up between England, Australia and America, following her racing driver father around the globe. A philosophy graduate, she worked at teen, film and women’s magazines, before ending up at Heat magazine as Reviews Editor.

You can find out more by following Paige on Twitter, visiting her website and finding her on Facebook.