Title: Time Loops & Meet Cutes
Author: Jackie Lau
Genre: Romance
Rating: 4.5 out of 5
Noelle Tom really shouldn’t have eaten those dumplings at the night market. But the old lady at the stall said they’d give her what she needed most, and what Noelle desperately needed after another long workweek was food.
Except now she’s reliving the same Friday over and over. Every morning her alarm goes off at 6:45 no matter what, the Wordle answer is always “happy,” and she watches a silly squirrel video go viral day after day. And no matter how much she works on the same proposal, it’s always erased when she wakes up. It seems Monday will never come in this workaholic’s worst nightmare.
Noelle has no idea how being trapped in a time loop is the “thing she needed most,” especially now that everything seems meaningless. Sure, three fancy meals in a row is a fun treat, but it’s getting repetitive. Noelle’s not sure what lesson the old lady was trying to impart. Even a trip to the dumpling stall doesn’t help…because there’s no sign of it.
But then she meets a young woman who also ate the dumplings, and good-looking Cam, who appears in multiple places on her Friday. While he seems to have no memory of their encounters, there are signs he might be the key to getting un-stuck. But Noelle will have to put work aside and live a little in order to make him notice her. As their flirtation progresses, Noelle begins to worry that if she ever gets to turn the calendar page, Cam won’t know who she is and her life may never return to what it was before that fateful Friday…
I wouldn’t say this was just a romance, because a large part of it was Noelle figuring out who she was—and who she wanted to be, and making changes to make that happen. The freedom she gets from knowing is she screws something up, the mistake will just reset gives her the courage to try new things, and that’s a lesson I think I could learn. The food in this book all sounded fantastic, too, and the night market was something I’d like to visit. Cam was pretty great, too, and I loved how he all tied into the time loop situation.
Jackie Lau lives in Canda. Time Loops & Meet Cutes is her newest novel.
(Galley courtesy of Atria Books in exchange for an honest review.)
Tomorrow Is Another Day 