~ Audiobook Review: Adelaide (ARC) ~

Author: Genevieve Wheeler

Narrator: Caitlin Kelly

Audiobook Length: 10 hours 14 minutes

For twenty-six-year-old Adelaide Williams, an American living in dreamy London, meeting Rory Hughes was like a lightning bolt out of the blue: this charming Englishman was The One she wasn’t even looking for.

Is it enough?

Does he respond to texts? Honor his commitments? Make advance plans? Sometimes, rarely, and no, not at all. But when he shines his light on her, the world makes sense, and Adelaide is convinced that, in his heart, he’s fallen just as deeply as she has. Then, when Rory is rocked by an unexpected tragedy, Adelaide does everything in her power to hold him together—even if it means losing herself in the process.

When love asks too much of us, how do we find the strength to put ourselves first?

With unflinching honesty and heart, this relatable debut from a fresh new voice explores grief and mental health while capturing the timeless nature of what it’s like to be young and in love—with your friends, with your city, and with a person who cannot, will not, love you back.

Find It On: Goodreads / Amazon

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Adelaide was not the novel I was expecting when I initially saw it, but it was an intriguing read. For me, I think it is highly important for all readers to read the trigger warnings before beginning as there are a lot of heavy topics in the novel and some of them are mentioned in the first few pages. The story opens with one trigger warning, and it seemed they kept piling up into a giant mountain by the time the story was finished. Another thing to note is that the story may revolve around the romance between Adelaide Williams and Rory Hughes as the synopsis states, but the actual story is more about Adelaide and her emotional journey. It goes through different events in the past and some in the present, so slowly all the pieces of Adelaide’s life are revealed to the reader.  

Adelaide is a 26-year-old American from the New York area living in London for graduate school. She’s almost finished with her degree where she is trying to figure out her future career when readers are introduced to Rory. Here, readers follow along from the beginning of their relationship and other bits of Adelaide’s past, including her ex-Emery, are given in flashbacks. The story is reflective and told mainly from Adelaide’s POV, so as she tells the story to readers there is many mentions where she did not know certain elements at the time. This part does get repetitive as the reader is already fully aware of this, so I just wish those sentences were polished more.

As for the narrator, I love Caitlin Kelly, although I usually have listened to her YA fantasy reads. She did an excellent job narrating the story and portraying the different emotions, especially for Adelaide. This main character goes through a lot, but I did find it very difficult at times not to judge her for not taking time for herself years before the main story. I don’t believe a lot of it would be solved this way, but some of her life may have been less stressful. Again, I found it hard not to judge her, yet I still did somewhat. Her story is relatable as elements of Adelaide can either be found in each reader or in someone the reader knows, which brings an excellent tie-in to reality. One rep that was surprising is endometriosis as this is rarely mentioned. While this diagnosis fits in part of the story, I feel the author did not go far enough as there is a lot more to this that could be tied into other elements of the story. Overall, this novel has ups and downs and delivered an excellent range of emotions.

**I give a special thank you to Netgalley and Macmillan Audio for the opportunity to read this enjoyable novel. The opinions expressed are completely my own.**