Synopsis
From the author who brought you A Thousand Boy Kisses comes the new emotional novel, A Wish For Us.
A story of music. A story of healing. A story of love conquering all.
Nineteen-year-old Cromwell Dean is the rising star of electronic dance music. Thousands of people adore him. But no one knows him. No one sees the color of his heart.Until the girl in the purple dress. She sees through the walls he has built to the empty darkness within.When Cromwell leaves behind the gray skies of England to study music in the South Carolina heat, the last thing he expects is to see her again. And he certainly doesn’t expect that she’ll stay in his head like a song on repeat.Bonnie Farraday lives for music. She lets every note into her heart, and she doesn’t understand how someone as talented as Cromwell can avoid doing the same. He’s hiding from his past, and she knows it. She tries to stay away from him, but something keeps calling her back.
Bonnie is the burst of color in Cromwell’s darkness. He’s the beat that makes her heart skip.
But when a shadow falls over Bonnie, it’s up to Cromwell to be her light, in the only way he knows how. He must help her find the lost song in her fragile heart. He must keep her strong with a symphony only he can compose.
A symphony of hope.
A symphony of love.
A symphony of them.
Review
Be warned that to keep this review spoiler free I won’t speak about the plot much but rather about my reactions to the book and the characters.
Some back story first…
I requested this ARC before I even saw the cover and the blurb. Call it intuition but I hadn’t read Tillie Cole’s last books as she went too dark for my tastes but I just thought “This one will be lighter”.
Turns out when I read the blurb and saw the cover that yes, she had decided to leave “the dark side of the force” and go with something sweeter but promising emotions (“For fans of A Thousand Boy Kisses” who was an ugly cry!).
Only… I got a mail telling me I was not selected to get the book. People had been chosen at random and I wasn’t among the lucky fews.
Swallowing my deception I asked other reads on Netgalley.
When I synced my Kindle as I had bought some books I got….the ARC! WTH????
I could not believe my luck!
When it landed on my kindle I dove right in and until 30% in the book I was “all ado about nothing” and “what’s wrong with me” because I should FEEL but..nope. Nada. Nicht. Niente. Nothing. MEH!
All ingredients were presents: the rebel DJ former music prodigy who was suffering deeply from a loss. Said loss pushed him to turn his back to his beloved music or rather music played with instruments rather than computer.
The good girl, straight A student and enamored with classical music. She told him straight away what he created lacked soul and feelings.
She seemed to be ill or recovering from an illness.
You’d think I would feel moved and invested right?
Wrong.
Boring. And frustrating as I was thinking “Hell I wanted this ARC so much and so far it’s a 3 stars for me whereas everything seems right to give me feelings overload. What’s wrong with me?”.
I just wanted to tell Cromwell to go to hell and stop whinning. Yes he had lost his daddy. Yes he was angry and hurting. But he was not the only one who lived a tragedy! Being polite to others, not treating girls like dish rags costs nothing!
I hate brats! Probably because I have some moody teenagers at home and sometimes their level of egotism is …floundering! No patience left in my bones with bratty book characters.
But I soldiered on. I had a review to write…
Luckily past the 35 to 40% I fell into the story and more important into the characters.
That’s around that time that Cromwell let Bonnie see the real him. And so did I.
Right alongside Bonnie I fell for Cromwell.
It tells much about Tillie’s writing as my moods flowed with Bonnie’s unveiling of Cromwell!
Then the waterwork began.
I had to have tissues as the ready so many times ! I thought “Oh No! Tillie will put A 1000 boy kisses on me!”. I dreaded this yet that was one of the reasons I was so impatient to read it!
Now I will use colors to rate everything and explain.
Cromwell got from murky brown (unattractive color to my eyes) to brilliant azure blue ( one of my favorite colors).
Bonnie was indigo to purple all along. My absolute favorite colors! She was sweet, passionate, fragile yet strong and her greatest quality she was not a doormat to Cromwell’s brattiness! Hata girl!
Easton was Bonnie’s brother and he was a bright and sunny yellow before plummeting into dark, dark colors.
The story was a weak green in the beginning to become bright red ( the color of love) but going through dark grey ( despair).
The writing is a flawless bright pink as Tillie made me see and feel exactly like Bonnie, disappointment and awe all rolled into one.
Final rating: all the colors of rainbow.
Now some music please!
And as Cromwell can write EDM and Classical you’ll get both!
Have you read it? Or plan to?
Thanks for reading and happy Monday!
Fabulous review, Sophie!
Thank you Astrid!!!
Love your review, Sophie! I’ve never read anything by Tillie Cole but this one sounds pretty good. I’m glad you enjoyed it, despite issues. 🙂
Thank you so much Raven!
Fantastic review Sophie! I’m really. Glad you got and enjoyed the book and I absolutely love the uniqueness of this review❤️
Thank you so much Ari!!!!