Meeting Point by Olivia Lara

Hi Lovelies

Today is my stop on The Write Reads Tours for The Meeting Point by Olivia Lara. It is a cute rom com book that I needed in my life at the moment. One that was light-hearted and made me smile.

Massive thank you to Dave at The Write Read Tours and Aria Fiction for sending me an eARC of the book to read and review, as well as having me on the tour. All thoughts and opinions of the book are my own.

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The Meeting Point by Olivia Dara

What if the Lift driver who finds your cheating boyfriend’s phone holds the directions to true love?

‘Who are you and why do you have my boyfriend’s phone?’
‘He left it in my car. You must be the blonde in the red dress? I’m the Lift driver who dropped you two off earlier.’

And with these words, the life of the brunette and t-shirt wearing Maya Maas is turned upside down. Having planned to surprise her boyfriend, she finds herself single and stranded in an unknown city on her birthday.

So when the mystery driver rescues Maya with the suggestion that she cheers herself up at a nearby beach town, she jumps at the chance to get things back on track. She wasn’t expecting a personalised itinerary or the easy companionship that comes from opening up to a stranger via text, let alone the possibility it might grow into something more..

OUT 2nd SEPTEMBER 2021.

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My Thoughts

Who doesn’t love a contemporary romance? One that has a bit of soul searching, laughter, angst and a handsome love interest? No just me? Well to change your mind let me tell you about The Meeting Point by Olivia Lara.

The book is about Maya. She is not having the best of times at the moment. Her job as a junior journalist working in New York isn’t going well, she is being used by the senior editors of the magazine. She is overworked and underpaid, add to the fact that she is not happy in her current relationship adds fuel to the fire that is her life.

Maya gets sent on a last minute job that ruins her plans to surprise her partner, so off she goes to complete an interview that everyone knows the author is difficult. Things don’t go to plan and she has to ring her boss and tell her that she didn’t get the job – it ends in disaster when she gets fired. She decides to fly to meet and surprise her partner but when she arrives she can’t get hold of him and finds out that he has been cheating on her.

So this is where it gets interesting. Her partners phone was left in the back of a Lift Car – that’s Uber to us UK folks. From there it snowballs with the driver Max and Maya having a conversation via text and getting to know one another better than she knows her partner., she has the best Birthday and is on cloud 9. But alas heartbreak strikes, at the end of the Birthday (yes it was her birthday) her partner comes to find her and tries to make a go of it and the night ends there.

OR DOES IT

Maya has never forgotten the mysterious Lift Driver Max and heads off to Carmel a year later to try and find him and see if the spark she had through that one night they had together is something. She has left her partner and is determined to be happy.

Maya definitely has been through the ringer. For the past year she hasn’t really been able to catch a break her relationship has ended, and she has quit her job and decided to move back with her mother. However something stops her and she remembers Max and decides before she moves to go and see if she can find him and if that spark that was there a year ago survived. She falls on her feet and this is where the story begins.

I liked this book, it was cute a bit predictable at times and I totally saw the twist of who Max was. Did it detract from the cuteness of the book? No it didn’t. It made me want to read on and see how the book unfolded.

Lets talk Characters – they were cute. I felt for Maya she didn’t have the best of times but she had that spark of something and she decided to grab it with both hands and go and find happiness. Did I want to at times shake her? Of course, this as I have always said means its a great character as I felt invested in them. If I don’t feel anything for the character that is when I know they haven’t been written well.

Ethan – he is a bit of a grumpy character but from the small background we get for him this is understandable. I mean I like him as well but he isn’t prominent in the book. Celine is the same, she is a cute side character who is friends with Maya and has opened her arms to Maya. She is another great character who had her own side story that came through.

I really enjoyed the concept of this book. Of strangers meeting via text/phone call but not meeting. A spark began and grew through getting to know one another miscommunication leads to mishaps leads to love. I like that it is a bit like star crossed lovers, yes there is also insta love. I know I hear you all grown but even though there is some insta love there is also a slow bur – I mean there is a year between when they first met to when they finally got together.

Overall a cute and fun contemporary read that was easy to read. The style of writing was engaging and before I know it I had sat through and read it in one sitting.

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