The Island Affair

The Island Affair

by Helena Halme

2 out of 5

Synopsis
Can one summer mend a broken heart?
After the tragic loss of their 17-year-old son, journalist Alicia and surgeon Liam struggle to keep their marriage afloat. During their usual holiday to Åland, the Nordic islands where Alicia grew up, the rift between the couple deepens.

Enter tall, blonde Patrick, with the most piercing blue eyes Alicia has ever seen. When Patrick confides in Alicia about the near loss of his daughter and the breakdown of his marriage, Alicia is surprised to feel an affinity with the Swedish reporter. He’s the only person who understands Alicia.

But secrets held by people close to Alicia give her life another surprising turn and she finds there is a reason to live – and love – again.

Read this new family drama set in one of the most captivating holiday islands in Scandinavia today!



Review
Alicia has lost her son, and her life is falling apart. Only when she returns to Åland, can she start to feel alive, and heal again.

I received a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

This story follows Alicia and her husband, Liam, who live in London. They are making their annual visit to Alicia's original home in Åland; but this is the first time they will be without their son Stefan, who dies in a scooter accident at just 17 years old.
Everything they do, every step they take, is followed by the grief that it's happening without Stefan.
It is very slow, and numb, as Alicia and Liam go through the motions.
Alicia finds solace in being home, as she appreciates the islands of her youth, and spending time with her parents.
English surgeon Liam is left feeling more of an outsider than normal. Without his son to bind them all together, this is his wife's home, his wife's language: a wife that he no longer feels close to.

This vacation pushes them to make decisions about their lives, and their relationship.

This books is written in third person present tense, which I found very jarring at first, but as it moves on, I felt that it suited Ålander Alicia's narration, it felt quite authentic for her.

It's too slow and neutral for me, as Alicia goes over every little detail, and minutiae in life. She views everything with a blandness (even the potentially hot affair with handsome Patrick), and I soon formed the opinion that Alicia didn't have a personality, or identity of her own, beyond "Stefan's mum".
That might have been the point, to convey the numb emptiness after loss, and credit where it's due if that's the case. But for my own reading experience, I found it hard to stay interested.

I got the feeling that the story really doesn't know where it wants to go, and what it wants to be.
With the title and description, I was expecting some sort of hot love affair; but there was no passion.
It played with the idea of having a murder mystery, and Russian heavies; but these were approached with the same slow tempo, casually picked up and dropped whenever it suited the plot.
(Don't even get me started on a Financial reporter being sent to cover the story of a suspicious death...)

Overall, this had some intriguing ideas, but it wasn't for me.

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