The Turning Point by Marie Meyer

Title: The Turning Point

Author: Marie Meyer

Publisher: Forever Yours

Release Date: January 12, 2016

Source: ARC from Publisher

Buy the Book: Amazon / Book Depository / Indigo

It’s funny how a piece of paper can change your life—a diploma, a ticket…a plain white envelope.

For as long as I could remember, I was the girl with the plan. Good college, good medical school, good career. I would save lives instead of standing by helplessly, watching while they slipped away.

That was before my father called for the first time in fifteen years to tell me about the terminal illness stealing his life—an illness that might be stealing mine, too. It was before he gave me the name of a doctor and a plane ticket to Italy. Before I flew across an ocean. Before I realized how brilliantly bright life could be. Before I met Lucas.

He’s everything I’ve always wanted, and the timing couldn’t be worse. I can’t do this to him—he deserves so much better. My head tells me I can’t afford to fall in love with Lucas, but my heart won’t listen. Lucas is fearless about the future, while I’m not even sure I have one. There’s only one way to know what’s ahead and it’s waiting for at home inside a plain, white envelope.

All I have to do, is open it…

I pretty much love any book that involves travelling. And I will read pretty much any book that involves travelling. And travelling was all I really knew about Marie Meyer’s The Turning Point when I found out about it. And that’s pretty much the only reason I wanted to read it. Well, that and the fact that it was a romance.

Sophia thought she knew what the summer after her college graduation was going to look like. She would spend a couple weeks helping out her mom at her family’s gelato shop, and then she would start med school early. But that was before her estranged father dropped and information bomb in her lap. Before he offered her a six-week paid trip to Italy. And before Sophia decided to go on that trip and met Lucas. She couldn’t have met Lucas at a worst time. But she can’t help the way she feels about him and Lucas shows her what the future could be like. But in order to have that future, in order to be with Lucas, Sophia is going to have to go back home and face what her father revealed.

Travel books are totally one of my weak spots. If a book involves travel, I will read. I don’t really need to know much more about it than that. And that’s all I really needed to know before I clicked “request” on Marie Meyer’s The Turning Point. Well, that and that it was a New Adult romance. Travel + NA + romance, that’s like the definition of an Emilie book if ever we were to put what those books are into words. Add to that the fact that the travelling in this books is in Italy, which is pretty much my favourite place to travle, and I just had to read this book. And I was absolutely right in assuming that I would enjoy reading The Turning Point because I totally did. I loved that there was more to this story than just a girl hopping on a place to Italy where she meets a hot guy and falls in love. Don’t get wrong, I love those stories (and I not so secretly wish they would happen to me any time I set foot on a plane), but I liked that there was more to it than just that with The Turning Point. And a lot of that, for me at least, had to do with the fact that I really enjoyed the characters, almost more so than the story itself.

I really enjoyed seeing Sophia’s growth over the course of the story. Seeing her go through everything she did in order to accept what was potentially happening to her and coming out the other side. Granted, there were times when I anted to tell her to stop being stupid and just be with Lucas. But at the same time I could absolutely understand her reservations and why she was doing what she was doing. But still. You don’t walk away from Lucas. Because when I said that the characters were a large part of why I enjoyed this story as much as I did, what I really meant to say is that I loved Lucas and therefore I really liked this story. I don’t know what it was about Lucas but he just worked for me. That’s really all I can say about him. Well, I can say more (and I will) but that’s all you really need to know about him. But for real, I loved how easygoing Lucas was, and how willing he was to just be there for Sophia no matter what. And the next time I travel to Italy, I hope I find my own Lucas. Because I really wouldn’t mind. 

If you’re looking for a fun romance that digs a little deeper while also making you want to hop on the first available flight to Italy, then Marie Meyer’s The Turning Point is the book you’re looking for. Just know that you’re going to want to find a hot video game creator the next time you travel to Naples.