The Last Time We Met

Do you ever forget your first love?
This is the question that Celine has lived with for fifteen years.
A chance sighting on a London street on her 10th wedding anniversary of her first love from fifteen years ago leads to Celine finding herself divorced a few years later.
Now she finds herself with a choice, go back to her ex-husband, who was a good, safe second-choice or pursue her first love - the one she's never forgotten.
As she balances her feelings; her job; her sister; her inappropriate father; and an almost teenage, sulky, heartbroken daughter she experiences a growth in her and things fall into place and make more sense to her.
This was a wonderful read for me. The characters were well-rounded and I liked their quirks and mannerisms. I could picture each one in my mind's eye. The writing was flowing and took one along on Celine's journey.
The ending was totally unexpected.
Definitely an author I'd read again.

Celine is married to Mike, but her first true love Patrick is always on her mind. The story of an unexpected sighting of Patrick leads tonthe demise of their marriage. However, Celine reinstates a relationship with Patrick and this is the story. I enhoyed this book, apart from a couple of times where I was irritated with Celines indecisiveness, but I have never been in a similar position, so this could be a common confusion. Overall I really enjoyed and would recommend.

When Celine spots a face in the crowd during a trip to London, it is the beginning of the end for her marriage. Celine has been married to Mike for ten years but she has never forgotten her first love, Patrick, who she met in Vietnam when she was 21.

When Celine meets Patrick again she has to decide whether a love from long ago is something she wants in her life at the present time.

A good book which was easy and entertaining to read..

A pleasant read,but I cant say that I was impressed, by the characters.The main character,seemed a bit weak,dreaming about her first love for so many years seemed a bit unrelistic.

I received this ARC from the publisher and netgalley for my honest review.

I'm not sure I was 100% in love with Celine, the main character of this novel who's romantic eye seemed to teeter back and forth throughout the book. It was a fun, light, romantic novel that would be great for an easy day of reading.

Loved this book. It was hard to put down. Everyone has a "what if" and the "one who got away." It was delightful to see what happens when a connection is reestablished. Loved the characters and the story as a whole.

Celine is married to Mike and they have a daughter. Mike is madly, deeply in love with Celine, but, does she feel the same way, or is she still in love with a man she met several years ago (for 4 blissfully happy days) A chance meeting, a mystery person sending a text. Will Mike and Celine stay together or will this mystery lover come back into her life? Celine has set up a matchmaking company called "The Love Market" this is where she first met Patrick the first (and only) man she ever truly loved.

I loved this story, beautifully written. I felt for Mike and Celine and absolutely loved the ending (which I will not spoil) Go and read this if you love love

If nothing else, this book will move you to tears. A compelling read, heartfelt and a woman's journey through life, discovering herself and her love. Thanks Netgalley for the eARC.

“Last Time We Met” by Carol Mason asks the question of whether it is possible for a person to get over his/her first love.

Celine met Patrick while visiting Vietnam. The couple spent four eventful days together before separating. Several years later and married and with a daughter, Celine runs into Patrick on a London street. The book jumps ahead where Celine is now divorced amicably from Mike and pining for Patrick. In a twist, Celine works as a matchmaker and is tasked with possibly finding a new mate for her former husband.

This is the first book I have read by Carol Mason and though I found the characters believable, I did not find Celine especially likable, though I really liked the character of Mike and could not help but root for him to end up with the person he deserved (even if that person ended up being Celine). Carol Mason did manage to avoid predictability so the reader is not sure whom Celine will end up with until the novel’s end.

This book was previously published as “The Love Market” and will be republished by Lake Union Publishers on October 16, 2018. I'd like to thank NetGalley for providing me an advanced copy for my unbiased review.

Thanks Netgalley and the Publisher. I am not sure what to write about this book as my review as whilst I did enjoy it I didn't

I struggled with this book at the start and I didn't like Celine or Patrick, in fact it was the other characters that made the story bearable for me and it's nothing to do with the author, its not my usual type of book and it's more to do with me. I just found the ending was predictable. I would like to thank the publishers and netgalley for letting me have the arc to review and the opinions expressed are entirely my own and are unbiased.

I absolutely loved this book. A beautiful story of one’s first love and whether you can rekindle the flame years later.

Highly recommend to those who love a romantic love story.

You are sitting in traffic. Your mind wanders from your to-do list to the what-ifs in your life. What would your life be like if your first (blinding) love had worked out? Suppose you had a second chance?? Carol Mason explores those questions, contrasting one woman's memories and reunion with her first love, fifteen years later while juggling the demands of family, work, and friends.

Mason writes in first person and often, present tense so that the reader is experiencing life from the main character's point of view. Her dialogue is spot on, and frequently, reminded me of my own conversations. The plot moves at a fairly fast pace. While it seems like light romance, this is by no means fluff. Mason slides in enough insight about life and love so that you will feel satisfied with the time spent!

#thelasttimewemet #netgalley

I received this book "The Last Time We Met" from NetGalley and all opinions expressed are my own.
I loved the idea of this story - well the description of the book about first loves. Celine and Patrick were quite annoying though. She sleeps with a stranger, only knows him 4 days and she is in love. You really don't know someone in four days. So you pick up where you left off 15 years later and give up your marriage for some fantasy. Then she seemed to regret it and then she didn't. The story was all over the place.

When she is 21 and traveling the world, Celine meets Patrick. After four bliss-filled days together, the lovers part. Fast forward fifteen years and Celine spots Patrick on a busy London street while she's celebrating her anniversary with her husband Mike. And that's where the story goes powerful, riveting, and glorious wonderful. The author manages to convey the tumult, the doubt and the desires, the "what if's" that haunt so many long-marrieds contemplating who they might have been, what they might have experienced with their first true love. Each character was so well-developed and sympathetically presented that I felt totally at ease handing the control of the story to the writer, to Celine, to find her own way, without my having to intervene for a happy ending. Even the secondary and tertiary characters including a nameless waiter are vivid, realistic, immediately relatable. This was a book that kept me up late racing to the end, because I had no idea what was going to happen next -- and what's more, I had no stake in anything other than Celine finding her own way.

This stunning first-person narrative is a heart-breaking yet uplifting story of Celine whose otherwise happy marriage to Mike is torn apart when they both realise she is unable to forget her first love, Patrick. Mike is a good man and Celine loves him; but she’s not in love with him.

When a mysterious matchmaker reunites Celine with Patrick, she’s given a second chance but should Celine let her heart rule her head and choose a relationship full of passion with Patrick; or should she be content with life as a family unit with Mike and their daughter, Aimee?

There are some real tear-jerker moments where we see how the repercussion of family breakdown has affected Aimee, and it is these moments of heightened emotion that really showcase the skill of this author’s literary expertise.

The Last Time We Met is a revised and updated re-release of The Love Market which wasn’t available as a printed edition in the UK when published in 2010. I can’t tell you how super-excited I am that not only will this fabulous book be available in print, it has also been re-vamped with a contemporary new title along with a gorgeous new book jacket.

But its new title and cover aren’t the only changes. Contemporary language and contextual updates bring a fresh new vibe to the narrative: selfies and Netflix were barely heard of when The Love Market was first published, and poor old Brad Pitt has been dumped as the named heartthrob in favour of Ryan Gosling! Narrative tweaks give extra depth to the novel: Carol Mason is one of those authors who just gets better and better with each book, and The Last Time We Met is evidence of how the author has grown and developed as a writer since initial publication. Structural changes have also been made: introducing Celine and Patrick’s time together in the past, before we see Celine in her present everyday life (as in The Love Market) gives Patrick’s character more of a voice. This helps the reader to identify more with Patrick and alters the dynamics of the novel, making the novel’s conclusion even more satisfying.

The Last Time We Met is a beautifully written, thought provoking, and emotive story. I would recommend this book for anybody who likes JoJo Moyes or Dinah Jefferies.

Under Literature Love’s rating scheme this book has been awarded 5 out of 5 stars.

This was my first book of Mason's and whoa, I've got some reading to do. Mason gifted us with an absolutely stunning, first person narrative about heart-break. The story centers around Celine, married to Mike, and how their marriage is broken when they both come to realize that she has not forgotten, cannot forget or get over her first love, Patrick. A compelling, beautiful read.

You could not in all honesty call this ‘chic lit’. I am sure it will be featured as a ‘romance’ and written for women, but it is better than the ‘chick lit’ phrase suggests.

Celine travelled to Vietnam 15 years ago where she encountered Patrick who she terms ‘the love of her life’. Over four days, they meet, enter into a love affair and she is smitten forever. She learns that he is married but although he wants to be with her he cannot abandon his wife in Hong Kong. After all she followed him there to enable him to further his career as a photo journalist and it would ‘not be right’ to leave her in those circumstances – but he would work something out. So Celine watches him leave, her heart broken. (So far sounds pretty chick-let, doesn’t it.

Moving on, Celine is now married and she has a daughter. She admits to her sister that she is not ‘in love’ with Mike as she can only recognise Patrick as her one true love. Then on a visit to London she catches sight of Patrick and chases after him. Poor Mike. So eventually she and Mike divorce to the dismay of their daughter. The divorce is amicable and they both work hard to keep it that way. In the meantime she focuses on her introduction business ‘The Love Market’ named after the market where she met Patrick in Vietnam.

I found the whole matchmaking business fascinating as it allowed the author to introduce some interesting, funny characters and situations whilst the irony was not lost on me that she could not order her own love life. We are presented with an examination of what true love is – romantic love or lust or the love measured in kindness, respect and time. What is interesting is that there are no real badies in this, just measured acknowledgement and understanding.

Thank you Ms Mason for a really, really good piece of women’s fiction.

Thank you to the author, publishers and NetGalley for providing an ARC via my Kindle in return for an honest review.

Lovely story telling. This is a tale about regrets, new starts, and second chance romance. Celine's voice comes through loud and clear- and sympathetically. Mark and Patrick are both well fleshed out. I enjoyed this more than I expected to, chiefly because of the writing. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC.

Celine runs a match-making service in London. She has a husband of 10 years, Mike, and a pre-teen daughter, Aimee.
But we find out that Mike is not the "love of" Celine's life. No, she is still in love with Patrick with whom she had a 4 day affair with in Vietnam - 12 years ago.

A divorce between Celine and Mike is eminent. She knows inwardly that she was comfortable with Mike but never was in love with him. This, particularly after she and Mike are out for their 10th anniversary at which time Celine chases a taxi she swears she sees Patrick in.

Someone emails Patrick using Celine's email address. Patrick and Celine begin a steamy long-distance love affair (both of them are now divorced). Patrick is fine with this as he is a photojournalist who travels extensively. Celine, however, wants a means to an end with these short visits - not an end. Patrick is either a commitment-phobe or is content with this arrangement?

In the meantime, Celine has some wacky match-making scenarios. This includes her ex-husband and father!
Both Celine and Aimee visit Patrick in Toronto, Canada. After this pivotal trip, Celine realizes that she cannot go on with the long-distance thing. Although Patrick wants Celine and Aimee to fly out for Christmas, she decides not to go. Is she wanting the comfortable life back with Mike?


Many thanks to Amazon Publishing, UK and NetGalley for a sweet read !

Amazing book. Loved it from beginning to end.
Well written which kept me captivated throughout.
I will definitely be reading other books by this author

Easy, escapist fiction with relatable characters, a dilemma that doesn't feel too forced for the genre, and some hard-hitting lines. Easy to read, but still relatively meaty.

(The cover makes it look like more of a classic, period-type romance book when it's in fact largely set in 2017.)

One line stuck out as being out of place, purely because when a British character visits Canada and describes the temperature as being "in the nineties", it makes no sense given that no one in that scenario, including the British author, would use Fahrenheit. A small quibble, but enough to take me out of the page for long enough to google the author's nationality (grew up in England, moved to Canada)!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ERC in return for an honest review. For details of my star rating system please check out my Goodreads profile.

I'm sure we’ve all been there before = that first love that got away. Combine that with the uncertainty of divorcing the only other man you’ve loved who is also the father of your child and you’ve got The Last Time We Met. Celine and her exhusband Mike are now officially divorced except Celine keeps wondering if she made a mistake letting Mike go. He was a faithful and supportive companion of many years yet she never truly felt like she was in love with him. Certainly not like her first true love Patrick who she met in Vietnam when she was 21 years old. She only had a few days with Patrick before he walked out the door, never to be seen again, yet Celine can’t stop thinking about him...wondering if he was the one that got away? 15 years later, Patrick is about to re-enter her life. Will this time be different or was their romance best left in the past?

The story navigates between some awkward and poignant scenes. The author compares that exciting instant attraction kind of love with dependable, deep friendship love. Is it better to be with someone predictable and who loves you to the moon and back, or is it better to play for all the marbles and risk your heart being hurt? There is a whole cast of characters that seem to revolve around Celine including her 11 year old daughter, her step sister, her quirky father and a variety of clients who are also looking for love through Celine’s high end matchmaking business, The Love Market. To be honest, I found the array of characters to be too much distraction as they didn’t seem to add much to the story. I was very taken with Patrick and Celine’s romance and wished the story had focused exclusively on that as well as Celine’s marriage with Mike. I could sense Celine’s impossible decision and her residual feelings for both men, BUT I WANTED MORE! The uncertainty of who Celine would end up with, if anyone, was the heart of the story. A more developed background into each of her relationships and the past and present emotions attached would have made this book 5 stars for me.

Despite its shortcomings, this is a solid piece of chick lit. If you’re looking for something heartwarming, I would suggest giving it a go. It moves at a decent pace. If you enjoy dysfunctional characters trying to sort through love to find THE ONE, this is the book for you.

Thank you to publisher for an ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

A quick read, feel good, human dilemma story. Better written than a lot of chick lit and really drew me in. One to look out for.

Celine had a brief fling with Patrick in Vietnam 15 years ago when he was married and returning to his wife, and although she moved on and married Mike and had a daughter she could never forget him, and so when she catches a glimpse of him in London all the feelings come flooding back. Thinking that she never loved Mike in the same way her marriage falls apart and she divorces Mike and is back in touch with the also now divorced Patrick....... but has she made a big mistake and is what she has always wanted been right that her nose all the time or is Patrick really her destiny?

A good book with interesting storyline, is first love the one that you always remember and are you wearing rose tinted spectacles with your memories, I felt sorry for Mike a as he came across as such a nice man.

Easy, escapist fiction with relatable characters, a dilemma that doesn't feel too forced for the genre, and some hard-hitting lines. Easy to read. Lovely story telling. This is a tale about regrets, new starts, and second chance romance.

THE LAST TIME WE MET by Carol Mason is one of those books you leave everything for until you finish ... Facebook, TV, laundry, talks with your spouse, breathing, EVERYTHING! Because you just have to know what happens to Celine, who though married to the adoring Mike, sees her only real love on a street in London 15 years later. All that time ago she’d spent four blissful days in Vietnam with Patrick but the memory remains indelible upon her heart. And OMG what a story! I absolutely will not tell you what happens. But I will promise that you will thank Carol, a wonderful writer, for giving you respite from reality while mad-dashing you through the whitewater rapids of love. 5 Hearty Stars!

Thank you to Amazon Publishing UK, Lake Union Publishing, NetGalley & Carol Mason for the free digital copy! This book is available now! #partner
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🌟BOOK REVIEW🌟
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▪️MY THOUGHTS
✔️I thought this book was really good! I read it fairly quickly and before I knew it I was half way done. I enjoy love stories and triangles - I wasn’t really sure who she was going to end up which I really liked! The connection between all the characters felt real so it made me really want to invest my time in the characters. I also liked reading about how the main character sets people up - it was funny and very entertaining!
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▪️OVERALL RUNDOWN
✔️I enjoyed how the chapters were short and there was a lot of dialogue. Plus there was a whole chapter dedicated to Toronto!! Reading about my city just gave me all the feels!! It wasn’t the main part of the book at all - but I LOVED it!
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▪️FAVOURITE QUOTE
✔️ "Divorce is like hacking down a mature tree; it leaves an unsightly gap and you want something to quickly grow in its place. You find yourself staring at it and remembering not why you cut the thing down in the first place, but only how nice it used to look. But eventually you can look at the space it occupied and a part of you forgets it was ever there."
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▪️TITLE RUNDOWN
Love
Adore
Smiles
Timing
Toronto chapter! 😂
Inviting
Marriage
Enjoyable
World
Europe
Matchmaker
Exciting
Time
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▪️RATING
✔️🌟🌟🌟🌟/5

Easy and light read with relatable plot and characters. The "one that got away" story line is not unique, but it is fun to see what happens when the characters reconnect.

Whilst I didn't LOVE Celine as a character, I really enjoyed this read. It's an easy read that keeps just enough intrigue throughout the plot that it doesn't seem to drag.

Lovely book, very well written, I don’t want to give anything away so I highly recommend that you out and buy this title.

Thanks to NetGalley for allowing me to read an ARC. I was excited that Carol Mason had a new book out and this one was mysterious and enjoyable; very creatively crafted as her other stories.

As a divorced woman, it is always difficult for me to read about marriages ending. And I wonder if I should have made extra efforts to encourage a relationship with someone who might have been my true love. I have to admit that I have thought about that individual for years…since our last interaction. And with the failure of my marriage, should I have made the effort to reach out to the guy for whom I really cared?

So I recognized myself throughout the pages of this book. However, Celine’s feelings for both men and the decision she had to make were tough. I think I would have enjoyed learning more about the background of each of her relationships and how the past and present emotions were factors in her life.

This is a somewhat heartwarming but not a quick read. The writing flowed and the author kept your attention with good character development. However, I did not connect well with Celine…who was the main character.

Thank you to NetGalley and Lake Union Publishing for my advanced review copy. All opinions and thoughts are my own.

An easy romantic read, with a lovely storyline. I really enjoyed the character of Celine, she was really appealing to me and I loved the story overall.

I knew very little about the author, had never read one of the books, so was pleasantly surprised. It wasn't a 'deep' book,
just a very interesting and relaxing book