While You Were Reading by Ali Berg & Michelle Kalus – Blog Tour & ARC Review

My Rating ~ Four stars

RELEASED: 1 July 2019

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Australia

Format: Paperback

Pages: 400

 

Blurb

Words are messy. Love is messier.
A hilarious, insightful new novel from the creators of Books on the Rail

Meet Beatrix Babbage – 29-year-old dog-earer of books and accidental destroyer of weddings.

After ruining her best friend’s nuptials, Bea relocates to the other side of the country in search of a fresh start, including meeting new people, living life to the fullest and finally pulling off balayage.

But after a few months, life is more stagnant than ever. Bea’s job is dead-end. Her romantic life? Non-existent. And her only friends are her books, her barista and her cleaning lady.

​Then Bea stumbles across a second-hand novel, inscribed with notes. Besotted with the poetic inscriptions, Bea is determined to find the author … and finds herself entangled in one hell of a love quadrangle.

Funny, poignant and insightful, While You Were Reading reveals that there’s no such thing as perfection, the value of true friendship and, most importantly, the power of not living in fiction, but still reading it … Often.

A love story for book lovers that celebrates much more than romance.

 

Review

Thankyou to Simon & Schuster for providing me with a copy of While you were Reading, and having me one tour!

After putting her foot in it and accidentally ruining her best friend’s life, Bea escapes from Perth to Melbourne to start a new life.  Not that she won’t forever try and get her best friend to forgive her from the safety of several states away.  When she by chance comes across an old book in a second hand bookstore, with intriguing and beautiful annotations, Bea decides to find the owner of the book, even if she has to move heaven and earth to do it.

This was such a cute and fun read.  The story and characters were relatable, sometimes heartbreaking and often had me cringing alongside them in sympathy.   I really loved the way #bookstagram was incorporated into the story (I’ve never read a story where it’s mentioned yet!) and setting it out in the book with the ‘instagram comments’ was such a unique idea.  There are a ton of bookish references throughout the book, and if you’re classic buff, you’ll probably appreciate them even more than I did.

There were parts of the story that were a bit predictable, but I kind of expect that from a rom-com style book and although a lot of the story was lighthearted, there were parts towards the end that had me blinking back a couple of tears.

This is a fantastic book for any book lover, especially those of us entrenched in the bookish community!

 

 

 

Photo from my Instagram account

 

AUTHOR INFO

Ali Berg

Ali Berg is Co-founder of Books on the Rail with Michelle Kalus. She is also Creative Director and Co-founder of Hedgehog Agency, Melbourne. 

Together they wrote The Book Ninja, published in 2018 by Simon & Schuster Australia, which has been sold to nine different territories around the world. 

Their second book, While You Were Reading, is published in 2019.

Michelle Kalus

Michelle Kalus is a primary school teacher and Co-founder of Books on the Rail with Ali Berg.

Together they wrote The Book Ninja, published in 2018 by Simon & Schuster Australia, which has been sold to nine different territories around the world. 

Their second book, While You Were Reading, is published in 2019.

Twitter: @thebookninjas

Instagram: @aliandmichelle

Facebook: @aliandmichelle

Website: www.aliandmichelle.com and www.booksontherail.com

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