When Anna Benoit wishes she’s married to the enigmatic owner of the chateau she cleans, she wakes up in a topsy-turvy world where she’s Max Barone’s wife.
Anna is a romantic who believes in The One and Love at First Sight. Why? Because it happened to her. The second she saw Max Barone she fell desperately, hopelessly in love.
It didn’t matter that they were from completely different worlds—he owned a jewelry empire, she cleaned houses—love had no barriers.
Except one.
Max didn’t know Anna’s name, much less that she existed.
Then one day Anna made a wish. Suddenly she was in an upside down world where everyone believed she and Max had been happily married for years. It was passion. It was romance. It was love. It was everything she’d ever wished for. Wasn’t it?
Dear Sarah Ready,
American born Anna Benoit is a cleaner. Once a week she attends Max Barone’s chateau in Geneva. Max is handsome, austere and lonely. Anna falls in love at first sight. Max does not see her at all. One day she is cleaning in the library and sees a sapphire necklace in a box on the table next to a note which invites her to make a single wish on the jewels. She wishes she was happily married to Max. It doesn’t go well – initially at least. Max discovers her in the library by which time the necklace has made its way mysteriously into her pocket (she really did not put it there, or if she did, she does not remember it). Fired for attempted theft, Anna’s life changes but not in a good way.
Anna, 25, lives with her mother and eight-year-old (half)sister, Emmy. They are still paying off medical bills associated with the care of Anna’s late father. Emmy’s father is no longer in the picture. They have a very tight budget and Anna’s salary is necessary for their survival.
The next morning however, it appears Anna’s wish has come true. In fact, the book begins here, with Max being advised that “his wife” is waiting for him in his office. (The story then backtracks to how the pair got there.) Max knows full well he is not married. Max and Anna are the only two people in this world who know the truth and remember what really happened. What starts out as a contentious and mistrustful relationship quickly becomes something more. Max and Anna travel to Paris, where the remainder of the parure is kept (the necklace being only one part of it). The plan is to make another wish to set things right.
Up until this part, the narration is shared fairly equally between Amanda Ronconi and Will Watt. After the second wish, the narration is all Amanda Ronconi, right up until the epilogue.
There is a bit of “wish-ception” in Wished. By the end, I admit I was confused by what was real and what was not, who remembered what and why. It’s a romance so it’s not a spoiler to say they end up happily together. They are clearly very well suited to one another; once they actually start talking it’s clear there is chemistry and more between them. But I had questions about the magic of the story. I didn’t quite understand what the point of the “Checkov’s letter” was given where the story ended up and I got lost in the timeline. Had no time at all passed? How does that work?
Anna is a person of extremely high morals. She will take a bus ride she can’t afford to return a single franc she was overpaid in change. (I believe in honesty but this is overkill Anna.) When she finds herself getting what she wished for she has a moral dilemma about consent and self-determination. I didn’t think Anna needed to be quite so pristine in her moral compass in order to have some serious qualms about this. She wants the love between her and Max to be real. Of course she does.
I wondered how she could possibly fit into a life where she had been married to Max for seven years when she remembers nothing about that time. Can you imagine? Going to a job you’ve been doing for years and everyone knows you and remembers things about the preceding time and for you it’s all brand new? The book largely skips over that. Fair enough. It’s not particularly romantic and the timeframe of the book is mainly the five day break Max had planned for his and Anna’s seventh wedding anniversary. (In this reality they got married very quickly and very young.)
I listened to Wished in three bursts, taking short breaks to listen to podcasts. There were times in the book I was less engaged and impatient for some action. And then when the second wish happened I felt a little exhausted. It felt a little like starting everything all over again but this time oh so much more complicated. I sometimes feel this way when there’s a third act break up or when something happens in a story which feels insurmountable, it doesn’t necessarily mean there’s anything missing in the story. Here, I needed to take a breath because it felt like I’d climbed halfway up the mountain and had slid straight to the bottom. The summit felt very far away and I needed extra energy to tackle it. I understand why the author chose the first wish and the second. If the second wish (I’m trying to be a little vague here because spoilers – the second wish happens somewhere around the halfway point or just after if I recall correctly) had been the only wish, listeners wouldn’t have had a chance to know Max.
The narration was very good and that helped me stay engaged with the story. Amanda Ronconi is a narrator I associate with Molly Harper books. In fact, I associate her so strongly with Molly Harper I sometimes struggle to listen to her reading books from other authors. There’s a kind of cognitive dissonance for me. However, in Wished – and I mean this in the best of ways – Sarah Ready’s writing style was similar enough to Harper’s (similar humour, if less frequent) that I did not struggle at all. Ronconi is an excellent narrator, very good with emotion and humour, pretty solid with accents and is able to depict a broad age range of characters. Will Watt is new to me but also very good. Max, despite being French and living in Geneva, has a British accent (it’s explained in the book). Watt has a deep voice and is a native Brit so the accent lined up well. He also delivered Anna’s softer tones in a convincing American accent, in addition to portraying various French-speaking characters. I’d happily listen to him again.
Wished had a strong premise but I’m not entirely sure it stuck the landing for me. Apart from my confusion, the last part was a little too treacly – and this from a listener who likes to wallow in a HEA. While this audio is my first Sarah Ready, there was enough to like that I’ll be reading or listening to her work again. I have Ghosted (in ebook) on my TBR in fact, which is the first book in this loosely connected series.
Were I to rate the book’s content separately to the narration, I’d give the content a B- and the narration a B+ which means overall:
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Kaetrin
Kaetrin started reading romance as a teen and then took a long break, detouring into fantasy and thrillers. She returned to romance in 2008 and has been blogging since 2010. She reads contemporary, historical, a little paranormal, urban fantasy and romantic suspense, as well as erotic romance and more recently, new adult. She loves angsty books, funny books, long books and short books. The only thing mandatory is the HEA. Favourite authors include Mary Balogh, Susanna Kearsley, Joanna Bourne, Tammara Webber, Kristen Ashley, Shannon Stacey, Sarah Mayberry, JD Robb/Nora Roberts, KA Mitchell, Marie Sexton, Patricia Briggs, Ilona Andrews, just to name a few. You can find her on Twitter: @kaetrin67.
