Meet Me at the Lake by Carley Fortune @CarleyFortune @AJBridel @librofm @PRHAudio

the setup…
Fern Brookbanks was at a crossroad ten years ago when she was finishing her studies in Toronto. She loved the city, wanted to stay there but knew her mother Maggie was counting on her to return home and help run their lakeside resort. But a chance encounter with Will Baxter, a handsome, talented artist with whom she spends the next 24 hours, gives her the courage to follow her own heart. Though it breaks her mother’s heart, Fern stays in Toronto, agreeing to meet Will one year later at the lake. She showed up…he didn’t. Now, ten years later, Fern has to return to the lake and run the resort, which is in sad shape. In walks Will who her mother had hired to help turn this around.

the heart of the story…
The story is told from Fern’s point of view, transitioning between the present and ten years earlier with segments from her mother’s journal from the year before Fern was born. Sometimes it could be confusing but for the most part, the transitions were woven nicely. Fern’s relationship with Will was more than complicated, primarily because he wasn’t an open book. It took quite a bit of time to learn why he didn’t meet Fern at the lake nine years earlier as agreed, which I found frustrating but later made absolute sense. Both were intriguing characters, she with lots of flaws and a rocky history during her teens and he an enigma with lots of shadows.

the narration…
I enjoyed the narrator as she managed a large cast effectively and with distinctive voices. Though Fern sounded younger than I’d imagined, she captured her personality nicely.

the bottom line…
Fern and Will were extremely complex characters and I enjoyed learning of their journey to the present day. Her’s seemed to be a delayed coming of age as she came to terms with her past. His was a bit more fuzzy because of his penchant for compartmentalizing his life and feelings. I had a vested interest in learning where they would land, which kept me in the story. It was original and nothing about it felt predictable.

Book Info

• Release Date: May 2, 2023
• Narrator: A. J. Bridel
• Audio Length: 9 hours, 56 minutes
• Publisher: Penguin Audio

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(Thanks to Libro.fm and the publisher for my complimentary copy. All opinions are my own.)