This book follows Audrey, a young woman as she returns to her hometown with her Fiancé, Ben in order to finally introduce him to her parents. However that gets pushed to the side as Audrey faces her past, the people she’s left behind, and her complicated relationship with her mother.

It was an okay book. I felt like there was so many pages full of unnecessary dialogue and stories. It was incredibly slow and I just kept wanting the author to get to the point.

Audrey Zhou returns to her small midwestern town after 8 years in New York because her father is having surgery. She brings her wealthy fiance along with her. Back in Hickory Grove, she finds charm in her hometown despite the fact that she couldn't wait to get out of town and has stayed away for 8 years. She reconnects with her old crush and finds herself conflicted about her relationship with her fiance.

I liked this book more than I expected to. Audrey is likeable, as are her father, her fiance Ben, and her childhood crush Kyle. Her parents are immigrants and she has a fraught relationship with her mother. Her mother constantly questions her choices and expresses disappointment in her life.

Audrey makes some terrible choices and gets caught back up in the day-to-day life of her town, but she is so relatable. As she spends more time in Hickory Grove, she begins to appreciate the charms of the town. And she starts to understand her parents, their stories and how it has influenced their lives.

I really enjoyed this book and read it in a day. It combines the usual homecoming by the city mouse to the country story with unique AAPI point-of-view. And it eschews the more formulaic rom-com story in favor of developing in favor of a more nuanced story as Audrey grows to appreciate and better understand her parents.

A wonderful debut novel a story that drew me in kept me involved from beginning to end.Will be recommending looking forward to more from this very talented author.#netgalley #randomhouse

Very interesting read - huge fan of the ending.

Audrey and her new fiancé, Ben, return to her hometown for a Christmas visit and it provides a much needed dose of introspection for Audrey.

Caught between who she was and who she thinks she is, this story encompasses what it means to try to embrace your past.

ARC kindly provided via Net Galley.

This ARC was provided to me via Kindle, Random House Publishing Group- Ballantine and by #NetGalley. Opinions expressed are completely my own.

Beautiful story, well written, amazingly done debut novel.

I am not an Asian American, so I decided to not finish this book. After a few chapters in, I felt that it was the respectful decision to make because I can’t speak to the accuracy of what the main character, Audrey, experiences. However, I do believe that in just few chapters that I read, it allows for readers to understand that racism is still heavily in our daily lives. I read books about divorce, crime, coming of age, and while I haven’t experienced those thing myself, I’ve been part of many things that are very similar. However, I do not feel it is respectful to voice my thoughts and opinions on a book that the main character is Asian. White people don’t ask other white people where they are from if they don’t have an accent they can detect is from another country. It’s ignorant to ask people of color where they are from. Ugh. I do think that with the correct audience, this book will find its way into many hearts for a very long time.

I really enjoyed this novel, and was surprised to hear it was a debut! I loved Cai’s writing style and her vulnerable exploration about the breakdown and buildup of different relationships in Audrey’s life. I found it interesting how she was often not a super likable character to me, like when she was arguing with Ben or Kristen, she seemed stubborn and unwilling to listen to the other person. However I liked how this made her character more realistic and made the story more intriguing.
I really liked this book and can’t wait to read Cai’s novels in the future!
Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for the ARC of this novel.