Should Have Told You Sooner, is the kind of novel that’s quietly devastating and beautiful, pulling apart something deep inside you. This novel explores love, loss and the weight of time.

At the heart of this narrative is a woman at the crossroad of who she’s tried to become and who she once was. When the opportunity of lifetime takes her back to the place of the most life altering time of her life, London, she finds herself revisiting a chapter that she never closed. She finds herself confronting a truth that she buried, pulling you into the past and present of those choices that shaped her life.

The love story between Noel and Bryn, is unraveled in the most heart breaking way. What was her greatest love and deepest heartbreak, they had a young, romanticized relationship that all fell apart by their circumstances and a decision that changed the trajectory of their lives.

The dual timelines complemented the contrast of her younger self and her older self as she explores the internal conflict confronting her past. As she navigates her surroundings, it's as if she is being pulled back into her past as she tries to rewrite her future. As each chapter unravels an emotional simmer, and when the truth reveals itself in particular with her experience with Bryn, it plummets you into debilitating what if and how some things can’t be undone but understood and accepted.

This novel is about missed moments exploring the things we say, keep from each other and the ramification of the time passed to say them.Those integral moments where had we shared the truth, it could’ve changed everything but that internal conflict dictated by internal fear or uncertainty won. What makes these characters so compelling is how they are grounded in their emotional truth. They’re imperfect. We just don’t read their story, we experience and see them. As the narrative has a strained pain, there’s an underlying compassion and grace of forgiveness that brings their journey full circle.

This is one that you will find yourself completely immersed in. I feel the slow burning emotional arc made it a fulfilling read. My one and only issue is the end. I don’t know how I feel about it. For the emotional investment especially towards it, with that anticipated resolution leading up from the last couple of chapters, I felt the abruptness of the final reveal left me feeling a certain kind of way. Perhaps, it was meant to happen that way. Overall, this was a wonderful read, and I look forward to other books from this author.

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