Once, Again, Always is a refreshing take on the academic rivals trope and introduces another – which I love – amnesia! It asks us if we could be the same person if we knew we made these choices, could we make them again? Keep reading this book review of Once, Again, Always for my full thoughts.
Summary
Molly Graham’s day can’t possibly get any worse after she wakes up in a hospital bed with a head injury and amnesia. But then Aster Bishop—the Aster Bishop who made her life hell at boarding school—storms into her room calling her his wife.
To Molly’s shock, in the six years she no longer recalls, she somehow fell in love with a man she once despised. Persuaded by her lifelong friends to give her new reality a chance, she reluctantly returns to the home she and Aster share to try and piece together her life.So much has changed, not least the considerate and devastatingly handsome man who spends every night sleeping on the sofa to avoid making her uncomfortable. This Aster is nothing like the entitled boy she once knew. Their chemistry is undeniable, but he’s distant with her, infuriatingly so. It’s clear he has secrets, and Molly can’t stand it. Especially knowing that she might never regain her memories.
That she fell in love with Aster Bishop once is hard enough to believe. But to fall in love again? To promise a future, always, when she can’t remember her past? It feels impossible when faced with a man she hardly knows and isn’t sure she can trust.
Review
(Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher. This has not impacted my review which is unbiased and honest.)
Once, Again, Always is a fresh take on academic rivals. Not only does it put their tension in the past, it also transports us to years in the future when their feud is done, except Molly doesn’t remember that. Once, Again, Always is ultimate second chance romance meets amnesia meets asking ourselves if we could forgive or fall in love again. With the before perspectives, Once, Again, Always is a delightful story about seeing the choices in her life and wondering how she got there. The ways she changed, saw new sides of people, and even grew out of who she used to be. Like many amnesia stories, it asks us what we might be like with a second guess.
Once, Again, Always avoids falling into some pitfalls of the amnesia trope and if you like stories like “The Vow” then you will eat this up! I loved to see how smitten Aster is in this world and how careful he is being to not avoid the magic that was in the air when she forgave him the first time. Once, Again, Always asks us if we can ever be that same person again. If we can capture a lightning strike twice. And, if we can’t, is what we are left over with enough? I flew through this one and it was an easy recommendation to give as my heart broke for Aster and Molly. To see these tender steps of love, of forgiveness, and of understanding. We can never be the same person again, but we can figure out how to be a different person with these new elements.
(Disclaimer: Some of the links below are affiliate links. For more information you can look at the Policy page. If you’re uncomfortable with that, know you can look up the book on any of the sites below to avoid the link)
Find Once, Again, Always on Goodreads, Storygraph, Blackwells, Bookshop. org & Libro. fm.