Sonnet Romano is back in Avalon to serve as maid of honor at best friend Daisy's wedding. Growing up, all she could think about was getting out of this small town to see the world. Now she lives in New York, dates the campaign manager of her father's Senate race, and works at UNESCO helping children around the world. She's happy to visit Avalon but has no plans to live there, even if she's discovered that childhood friend Zach Alger is a hottie who rocks her boat.
Everything changes when Sonnet learns that her mother is pregnant and has health issues that make it extremely high risk. Sonnet puts her life in New York on hold to help her family through the crisis. She hopes to reestablish an easy friendship with Zach but he's not cooperating. He bristles every time she brings up wanting to be friends. The tension mounts when they both find themselves working on a reality show filming at Camp Kioga featuring an ex-con celebrity singer mentoring inner-city children. Soon, Sonnet finds herself torn between the life she should want in New York and the love-filled life she's rediscovering in Avalon.
RETURN TO WILLOW LAKE is sweet, sad, hopeful, and romantic...all the emotional twists and turns that fans have come to expect from the Lakeshore Chronicles series. We have followed Zach and Sonnet as they appeared in the background of a number of books and it's extremely satisfying to see them get their own happy ending. While the story can be read as a standalone, I would recommend reading the earlier books in the series. Sonnet and Zach are separated or at odds for much of the book and I think appreciating their romance requires knowing the backstory. Nina's health issues serves as a vehicle to bring Sonnet back to Avalon but they also add depth and emotional richness, and serve to demonstrate why this town is so great when everyone rally's around the family.
Sonnet Romano's life is almost perfect. She has the ideal career, the ideal boyfriend, and has just been offered a prestigious fellowship. There's nothing more a woman wantsβexcept maybe a babyβ¦brother?
When Sonnet finds out her mother is unexpectedly expecting, and that the pregnancy is high risk, she puts everything on holdβthe job, the fellowship, the boyfriendβand heads home to Avalon. Once her mom is out of danger, Sonnet intends to pick up her life where she left off.
But when her mother receives a devastating diagnosis, Sonnet must decide what really matters in life, even if that means staying in Avalon and taking a job that forces her to work alongside her biggest, and maybe her sweetest, mistakeβaward-winning filmmaker Zach Alger. So Sonnet embarks on a summer of laughter and tears, of old dreams and new possibilities, and of finding the home of her heart.
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