The Seven Year Slip — Books, Beauty, & Buys

By: Ashely Poston
Published Year: 2023
Publisher: Berkley
Pages: 352

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Sometimes, the worst day of your life happens, and you have to figure out how to live after it.

So Clementine forms a plan to keep her heart safe: work hard, find someone decent to love, and try to remember to chase the moon. The last one is silly and obviously metaphorical, but her aunt always told her that you needed at least one big dream to keep going. And for the last year, that plan has gone off without a hitch. Mostly. The love part is hard because she doesn’t want to get too close to anyone—she isn’t sure her heart can take it.

And then she finds a strange man standing in the kitchen of her late aunt’s apartment. A man with kind eyes and a Southern drawl and a taste for lemon pies. The kind of man that, before it all, she would’ve fallen head-over-heels for. And she might again.

Except, he exists in the past. Seven years ago, to be exact. And she, quite literally, lives seven years in his future.

Her aunt always said the apartment was a pinch in time, a place where moments blended together like watercolors. And Clementine knows that if she lets her heart fall, she’ll be doomed.

After all, love is never a matter of time—but a matter of timing.

First Impressions

Honestly, I hadn’t heard much about this book and the cover didn’t catch my eye. I did see it on TikTok a few times, but people were frequently putting it under “most overrated” as opposed to highly recommends. This made me a little hesitant to pick it up.

What I thought

My work decided to do a book club, and this was one of the books picked. I didn’t even vote for it since TikTok had made me so hesitant. However, once I read the summary, I knew it would be my kind of book and I looked forward to reading it. I’m so glad that my work forced this across my path because it was so enjoyable.

Clementine inherits her Aunt’s apartment after she passes. She grew up being told the apartment was magic. At any time, it could take you back seven years. Her aunt always told her that she would get sent back when her life was at a crossroads and that there was one rule. Don’t fall in love. 6 months after her aunt passed away, Clementine gets sent back and finds a handsome stranger in her apartment from 7 years ago.

I love alternate timelines so I loved the concept of this book. Clementine/Lemon and Iwan/James were so freaking cute. I think some people might dislike this book because it’s a bit predictable but it also makes it easily accessible to a lot of readers. I think there were about 3 “twists” that I caught beforehand and two that I didn’t get until right before they happened.

I loved the growth of Clementine as the story moves forward. She is struggling with the loss of her aunt, who was basically her best friend and who she wanted to be when she grows up. Now she’s lost and unsure if she’s on the right path. When she gets sent and meets Iwan, she starts to find who she was seven years ago which helps her rediscover who she is now.

My one issue I did have was with her friend characters. She had two best friends/coworkers who were married. I think they were good friends to Clementine, but there was like a weird underlying annoyance with each other? Nothing ever really came of it but it seemed like one of them didn’t really like the other very much. They also had another friend/coworker that it seemed like the three of them hung out with just because they felt sorry for her, yet she seemed to think they were all friends. But honestly, this didn’t detract from the sory very much.