Four minutes late! The plane is leaving; Hadley will be late for her father’s wedding. At least there’s a cute guy to talk to as her trans-Atlantic flight is rescheduled and she tries to calm down in the overcrowded airport.
She can understand why Dad went to study in England – he is a poet, after all – but why did he fall in love with someone there? How could he leave her and Mom alone? Just sneaking in and taking his personal things from their house while they were on vacation – ha! How can he expect her to be a bridesmaid in this wedding and be happy? She’s never even met the woman – her new stepmother – arrgh!
Thankfully, the cute guy is on her flight. Oliver is British, studying at Yale, listens a lot, talks a little. He even has the seat next to hers and helps Hadley relax on her first long plane ride, inventing silly statistics and listening to her worries about the future.
Separated at the passport checkpoint in the London airport, Hadley hopes she can see Oliver one last time before she heads into a strange city and a strange new relationship with her father. With the delays, she’ll barely make it to the London church in time for the wedding.
As the day goes on and Hadley moves her jet-lagged self through the ceremony and family photos, she feels compelled to find Oliver, to find out why he was returning to England suddenly, to see if he can come up with a statistic that will make her feel better about what lies ahead.
Can she remember enough from their sleepy conversations to figure out where he is? Can she travel there without getting run over by traffic traveling on the wrong side of the road? Can she just make it through this nerve-wracking day and go back home to Mom, please?
It’s easy to understand Hadley’s fears and frustrations during all the changes in her life and to root for her to find someone special for herself, even if she doesn’t believe in love at first sight.
Recommended by: Katy Manck, Librarian-at-Large (retired academic/corporate/school librarian), Gilmer, Texas, USA
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Set those dystopian books down for a few hours and pick up this delightfully satisfying romance for a quick, fun, spirit-lifting read.
Seventeen-year-old Hadley Sullivan is pretty angry when her mother drops her off at the airport and insists that Hadley board the plane for London to be a bridesmaid in her father's wedding. Hadley is furious with her father and wants nothing to do with him and the new woman he has picked out for his second wife.
So, she's in luck when she misses the plane bound for Heathrow by four magical minutes. It's amazing what a forgotten cell phone can do to change one's future. Four minutes late is all it took for Hadley to be sitting in the Heathrow terminal when Oliver gallantly offers to carry her suitcase.
Four minutes is all it took for Hadley to board the next available plane and find herself sitting one seat away from the cute guy she just met. Four minutes is all she needed to find herself being firmly kissed in the customs line the next morning. Then, he's gone.
Now Hadley has a wedding to face and a stepmother to meet.
236 pages Ages 12 and up 9780316122382
Recommended by: Barb
Also recommnded: THIS IS WHAT HAPPY LOOKS LIKE by the same author
