“Two weddings and a baby…but who will get their happy ever after?”
The second book in Victoria Walters‘ Glendale Hall series and published in 2020, New Beginnings At Glendale Hall follows Emily Prescott whose life isn’t going to plan. Her dreams of starting a family with fireman boyfriend Greg and opening up her own bakery in London feel like they will never come true. So when a wedding
invite arrives from her oldest friend, Beth Williams, Emily is thrilled. Not only will she get to return to her childhood home in Scotland, but best of all – Beth wants her to bake the wedding cake!
However, her excitement is cut short when she discovers that Greg has cheated on her. Devastated by his betrayal, Emily flees to Glendale Hall, Beth’s grand estate in the Highlands, and tries to distracts herself with helping with the wedding plans, but that’s not easy when Greg keeps hounding her to forgive him. Then she’s introduced to Glendale’s new young and handsome vicar Brodie, and things become even more complicated.
When Emily discovers that Greg’s betrayal runs deeper than she imagined, she finds herself with a whole host of decisions to make, especially when she discovers her long-awaited dream is finally being fulfilled – at exactly at the wrong time…
Rating: 
After surprisingly loving the first book in the series, Coming Home to Glendale Hall , I immediately downloaded this sequel. And then over two years later, I have finally read it!
I was disappointed to quickly learn that this second book focuses on a different main character. Although we do get to spend some time with Beth and Drew and go back to the beautiful Glendale Hall, the story instead focuses on Beth’s friend, Emily, who has troubles of her own.
In Coming Home, I loved Beth’s strength of character. But I feel like that’s where this book dwindles. It’s one of my pet peeves in lighthearted romances where characters are given everything on a plate, so I found Emily quite needy in how she relied on the support (and money) of everyone around her to get through this situation. These types of coincidences just get under my skin, so I couldn’t relate to Emily’s situation as easily when I was yearning for more of Beth’s resilience.
I still really enjoyed this book, though. The themes were more serious than I expected them to be, and I think this side of the story was handled well as Emily must decide which direction she wants to take. However, much of it was predictable, so it just didn’t tug on my heartstrings in the same way as the first book did.
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