Six Days

A perfect beach/airport read. A romantic mystery, the story of Gemma and Finn from their predictable bristling first encounter to falling in love and then Finn seemingly standing Gemma up at the alter. I kept reading, but the story seemed slightly stilted and the more their history was revealed the less I liked Finn and couldn’t imagine why Gemma waited years for him.

Dani Atkins is clearly an accomplished author, specialising (I suspect) in romantic novels. This was a good plot with plenty of twists and turns and I would be happy to read more of her books.

Finn and Gemma are getting married. They have had a few blips in their journey to the altar but are now very much in love and waiting to start their new life together. But he doesn’t turn up. Whilst Gemma is adamant that something has happened to him, the general consensus among her family and friends is that she has been jilted at the altar. The police refuse to start looking for him until more time has lapsed, so Gemma sets out on a mission to find him, following any leads and paper trails that she can find. Her determination is absolute, her conviction that something has happened almost unwavering, despite adverse peer pressure.

I really enjoyed this book. It was an easy read and there was plenty of tension and suspense which made it very compelling.

There were two minor issues that I had with this book. Firstly, the relationship between Finn and Gemma is a little too perfect, slightly sickly-sweet. Secondly, the book was probably a bit too long to sustain the content, but only very slightly. Neither of these things spoilt my enjoyment of the book and I concede that I am probably nit-picking.

I have never come across this author before but she seems to be quite a prolific writer who consistently gets good reviews. If the enjoyment I derived from this book is replicated in the rest of her work then I will definitely be looking out for more and would happily recommend it to others.

I read this very quickly, less than 2 days. It’s very light, a ‘holiday read’ and the plot really keeps your interest. A groom doesn’t appear on his wedding day and his fiancée desperately searches for him while everyone around her thinks he backed out and disappeared. The search lasts 6 days and the book follows this timeframe, with a lot of flashbacks thrown in. It really felt like this was written for TV, and could imagine seeing it as a minidrama on ITV!

I really enjoyed the initial premise to this book: stood up at her wedding day: where is the groom? The book then flicks back and forward from their initial meeting to efforts to find out what has happened.

I did enjoy reading this book, and would have initially given it four stars, but a couple of weeks after finishing it and now writing this review, I can remember only scant details about it - it hasn't stuck with me at all. Ideal for holiday/light reading.

Gemma, left standing at the altar on her wedding day, spends six days trying to work out what happened to her fiancé.

Finn, a near perfect specimen of a man, says and does all the right things in the lead up to their big day. Despite his no-show at the wedding, Gemma never loses faith in her man. She is convinced something untoward has happened to him and she is all about solving the mystery.

After being stood up, the story then takes off in search of Finn. There are lots of flash backs and background stories that add to the flow and ebb of this tantalising mystery. The other characters in the book - her BFF Hannah, her Dad and Inspector Graeme -  fit into a rather to-be-expected format.

Overall, this is a nicely written romantic, emotional tale. It’s not a genre of book I usually read, but it’s a fun, entertaining story. For me, the plot’s twists and turns were a bit too cliched. Without giving too much away, Gemma stands by her man, no matter what, even after some pretty red-flag moments. I don’t want to spoil the story, but I found it a little too contrived. For me, it all fitted together too predictably.

However, if you are looking for a love story that is a well-written, pacy, suspenseful summer read, this is a very readable choice.

This is a feel good romantic novel with an added mystery. The story jumps between when the main characters Finn and Gemma first meet and the present day. It was an easy read which I did enjoy. If a good romance is your thing you'll love this novel.

📚 I liked the style of writing for this book flipping between past and present. I enjoyed the funny quips especially in the present tense chapters. Gemma seems to be a switched-on character so it didn't make sense that she was so blindsided and failed to miss the endless list of red flags that Finn was dangling in front of her.

📚 Some of the past tense chapters were a bit too sickly sweet and I skimmed over these pages. I was querying where Finn's parents were before it was revealed that they were dead, which explains why they pushed no urgency in finding Finn from the grave. However, Finn's pals are very much alive and apparently couldn't care less that their best friend has gone awoll, or potentially missing.

📚 I wish Gemma would had a bit more oompf about her and embraced or owned her femininity more instead of feeding into the ideology that men make the world go round and women are on earth for the sole purpose of marriage and reproduction (but maybe that's the cynic in me, it's a romance novel about a wedding after all)

This is the first Dani Atkins novel I've read, and it'll definitely be the last. I received this book for free from my local book club, so decided to give it a read even though it's very much not my genre. Judging from other Goodreads reviews, it seems to have gone down well with those who like tear-jerking romance women's fiction, but for me it was a slog.

My main issue with the book is that I never believed in the central romance. The novel bigs up their love as being something so true and romantic, yet it's entirely based on over-the-top grand gestures, rather than on actual conversations and intimacy. Finn consistently dazzles Gemma with incredibly expensive dates (hiring a limo to drive from London to the south coast… where did he get that kind of money?) and yet never shares his true thoughts and feelings with her. When he ghosts her for two years, she doesn't even bother asking what happened. Later on, when they are well and truly into a relationship, they finally realise that she wants kids and he doesn't, and his first impulse, two minutes into the conversation, is, "I'm leaving you." No thought of compromise, or working things out together, or even discussing it further. Essentially, this novel presents an incredibly unhealthy relationship as "true love," and I just can't get behind that.

Other than the unhealthy relationship, there's not much else going on in this novel. I did quite like some of the side characters-- Gemma's dad was lovely, and her best friend was really fun (gotta say, I loved having the best friend be already married with a child)-- and many of the most poignant character moments were in their stories, rather than Gemma's. The main plot, however, focusses entirely on the "six days" that Gemma waits to find out what's happened to Finn. There's no tension here (we never think for a moment that he actually abandoned her) and the title gives away exactly how long we've got to wait, ruining any remaining suspense.

Overall, I found this book really frustrating, but I'm very much not the target audience. If you enjoy light reads focussing on an overly "romantic" romance that may bring a tear to your eye, this is probably a good bet. If you want a novel that actually depicts a healthy romance in a nuanced way, then steer far clear of SIX DAYS.