One Step Closer To You by Alice Peterson

Title: One Step Closer To You
Author: Alice Peterson
Published: September 25th 2014 by Quercus
Amazon | Amazon UK

Blurb: After Polly ends her relationship with the father of her young son, Louis, she is determined to move on. All she wants is to focus on her job, her friends and to be a good mum. No more looking over her shoulder. No more complications…

Then Polly meets Ben.

Ben is guardian of his niece, Emily. They become close, with Polly teaching Ben how to plait Emily’s hair, and Ben playing football with Louis. Their friendship is unexpected. Polly’s never been happier.

But when Louis’s dad reappears in their life, all Polly’s mistakes come back to haunt her and her resolve weakens when he swears he has changed.

Will she give herself a second chance to love?

Review: In One Step Closer To You we meet Polly, a recovering alcoholic with a son. Thanks to flashbacks, we get to know her from her childhood, through her difficult teen years to her adulthood and it feels like by the end of the book, Polly is like a dear old friend of us. Her story is full of bad decisions, mistakes and pain but Louis, her beautiful son, makes her want a better life for them both so she starts turning her life around. She shows us what a strong woman she can be with a bit of support of her loved ones.

Reading about her years struggling with her addiction was heart-breaking and emotional, especially when she first had Louis and was still with his dad. I was shocked with her behaviour but I could see that she no longer controlled her life, alcohol did. And then, it was very inspiring to read about her present, how she had made the decision of being a better mother and how she kept going, appreciating the little things of life and always refusing to let alcohol control her again.

Polly definitely made a great main character and she awoke a lot of emotions in me but I can't forget to mention the secondary characters of this book, all well developed with their own story. There was Hugo, Polly's partially blind brother, and probably my favourite one. With his easy-going attitude towards his disability and his inconditional support to Polly, he was a pleasure to read about. And then, there were also aunt Viv, key to Polly's recovery and with her own dark secrets, and Ben, the shinning star in Polly's present. They all made this book special and worth reading.

One Step Closer to You is one of those books that will stay with me for a long time, one of those that you tell everyone about. Raw, emotional but also uplifting. Alice's talent keeps on surprising us and she is becoming one of my favourite authors. As I said, a must read. It was actually my last addition to my Top 10 books of 2014 and I highly recommend it.

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