Where the Rhythm Takes You audiobook

Felt the rhythm and I was moved! In Sarah Dass’ debut novel Where The Rhytym Takes You we are taken to the beautiful twin island Tobago where seventeen-year-old Reyna is helping her dad manage her family resort Plumeria. Reyna who lost her mother at a young age and the love of her live decides to give up painting and is going through the biggest tabanca she’s ever experience- granted she is just seventeen. The cause of Reyna’s tabanca is Aiden, her first love, who left her and Tobago behind to pursue his career in music. Of course, like every tabanca, it hits harder when they show up to the hotel you are working at to spend an extended time with their group of friends. Aiden and Reyna must now either avoid each other for the entire stay, or confront each other. Friends, if you know me, I am not big on YA and Romance but this book truly did it for me. I felt the author did such a phenomenal job of taking me back to my teenage years and me thinking my first love was it and losing them was the end of the world- yea… the dramatics right?! The author writes convincingly about Tobago, love, and being a teenager who is heading into adulthood. The theme of grief, love, mother-daughter relationship and growing up was thoroughly and well explored. I truly enjoyed Reyna and how very likeable and realistically written she was. Granted, if my father owned a hotel, at 17 I wouldn’t be looking to manage it, I would have my friends over every weekend for a villa party… but that’s just me. If you are looking to escape, to visit Tobago, and to revisit how young, silly and in love you were at 17, Where The Rhythm takes you is the perfect book! P.S. The playlist at the end of this book is it!!! Love it.

Reyna is a 17 yr old girl living in Tobago working at her family's resort still grapping with the loss of her mother two years later. She still has feelings for her first boyfriend, Aiden who moved to the US and became a Grammy winning musician. As the front man of DJ Bacchanal he mixes island sounds with EDM that has taken the music scene by storm. So she's shocked when he's back on the island with his band in tow and a new girl at his side who also happens to be her half sister's sister-in-law. Aiden being back brings up a lot of memories she tried her hardest to suppress. Her hopes to avoid them are shattered when her father nominates her as their tour guide for the duration of their stay.Reading this book transported back to my vacation a couple of years ago in Tobago where we did some of the activities the group does in this book like the beachside horseback riding and boat ride the the Nylon Pool. And I loved how she showcased all the beauty the island had to offer not just from the tourist activity side but from the music, food, and history. Reyna does come across older than 17 but it in some ways made me think of my mother who had to act much older than her age at 17 because she was living in Trinidad trying to make a living on her own. Reyna's mother put a lot of pressure on her towards the end of her life to take over the hotel and keep her legacy alive. So Reyna has had to grow up fast and has thrown herself into day to day operations while trying to halt any changes around her. This depiction of grief was very well done. And there were flashbacks inserted throughout the story that added the right amounts of tension. Everyone close to her thinks she should be off hanging with friends pursuing her dream of being an artist but she's scared to move forward so she gives up what she loves. YA doesn't have the best reputation for including parents in stories and I liked that even though she and her father didn't have the best relationship he was a constant in her life and truly championing for her happiness even though she didn't always see it that way.I've never read Persuasion so I can't speak to how similar it is to that story. However if you love angsty summer romances and stunning tropical locales I suggest picking this one up. If you're a Trinbagonian whether on the island or abroad you're going to feel an extra connection to this story. The rhythm of the islands leap off the page giving this second chance romance a unique flair. And lovers of music should check out the Soca playlist at the end which was another fun addition. I received an arc from the author in exchange for an honest review.See original review athttps://womenofcolorreadtoo.blogspot....

Wow, more people need to be picking this book up! Where the Rhythm Takes You is a modern retelling of Persuasion by Jane Austen (great job of making the plot beats believable for a modern audience!) set in Tobago. It's a touching, joyful romance and coming of age story, one of the best YA romances I've read this year. Reyna is a 17 year old girl living in Tobago, helping out at the hotel that her family owns and operates. She's grieving the recent loss of her mother and kind of stuck in a rut when her ex-boyfriend (now a musical superstar) comes back into her life. If you know the plot of Persuasion you kind of know how things are going to go, but this was beautifully adapted. Reyna's characterization is fantastic and we really get to see the difference between what's happening in her head and what the people around her see. I even teared up at a couple of points in the book, and I'm rarely that emotional while reading. I just became so invested in her journey and grief! This is also such a celebration of Tobago with its culture, food, and people. It's very immersive and made me want to visit. Absolutely loved this uplifting love story from a new voice in YA fiction! I would absolutely read more from this author. I received a copy of this book for review, all opinions are my own.

4.5 🌟2nd Update, 12 hours later...: I love reading romance to get that giddy headed feeling, the jaw-dropping moments, the shrieks and flustered hand fanning, the thrills that make you roll in the bed with excitement and collapse back on the pillow, the groans when your favourite characters are making all the wrong decisions. Young adult authors are a treasure in their ability to give us lightness, excitement, fun while mixing in heavy sombre topics that anchor narrative and flesh out characters. But what cinched the deal for me was Dass' confidence in her sense of place.If you've read Jane Austen's Persuasion you will find particular pleasures in how Where the Rhythm Takes You riffs on Austen's plot and characters, in what Dass kept, paralleled, flipped and localised in a Tobago locale with the Plumeria hotel that has seen better days on a tropical island. But the Austen knowledge is not at all necessary to connect with this second chance romance between the prickly Reyna still floundering in the wake of her mother's death and the suave but shy Aiden still hurt from their break up two years ago.This is a slow burn but lawks the fire sweeeeeeeeet. From the awkward reunion to horse rides by the sea, wine up as the steel bands play, and drama by the beach bar threaded through with flashbacks of Reyna's past with both Aiden and her mother our couple must figure out the steps they must take towards realising their visions for themselves and their place in the world before they can take those final steps towards each other. Allow Dass' debut to become one of your happy places (wid a little cass cass). Let the rhythm take you.Bookstagram | Twitter | The Book Slut******1st update:Review comes after sleep because I stayed up all night reading this. Reyna is my gyal (to whom some persons still owe an apology!). Was prepared to dislike Aiden but he got to me in the first scene. The poopa is a true blue Austen Father. And Nicholas needs his own book!

me every five minutes while reading this: opens up google earth to drop the little man onto all the places they go to in tobago so that i feel like i’m ~there~ with them

I. AM. CRYING. I won't be doing a full review of this book until closer to it's release date but OH MY GOD MY SOUL. I've finally been represented in a book, and to explain these feelings of incredible joy and love to you will be impossible...but I will try. MY SWEET SWEET TNT. This book felt like a love letter from Tobago, addressed directly to this little Trini girl (trapped here in quarantined Canada and missing her island immensely). AND ALL OF THE SOCA!!! Did I mention that I'm crying!? I cannot WAIT for people to learn more about my beautiful country and it's culture. THANK YOU SARAH! You can't even begin to know how much this book meant to me.

Thoroughly enjoyable and great fun - a really strong YA Jane Austen retelling.

Read my review on my book blog, The Quiet Pond.Loved this gorgeous loose retelling of Jane Austen's Persuasion. It's set in seaside resort in Tobago, and I just loved all of the story's emotional beats.- Follows Reyna, a Tobagonian teen who runs her family's resort business following the death of her mother. When an old flame visits and stays at her hotel, their reunion sparks memories and old feelings - in which Reyna will have to choose between following her heart or letting go of the past.- I read Persuasion years ago so my memory of it is a little blurry now. Nonetheless, it can be absolutely enjoyed by those who haven't read Persuasion, especially if you love second-chance romances.- The romance in this book was so good. Their history is told in flashbacks, and there was so much yearning and unresolved feelings that the two characters had to navigate.- It's also a very profound and tender story about letting go - and how sometimes we self-sabotage our dreams in favour of what is safe.

I really loved this book. I read it in two sittings, and seriously fell in love with every part of it. It felt a little different than other contemporaries, maybe just due to the fact that it was a remixed version of Persuasion. I loved the setting, the characters, and the story itself. Enough to have me tempted to read Jane Austen. CW: illness and death of a parent (prior to beginning of book), grief, kissing.Reyna was a lovely main character, who felt very real and relatable. She was a painter, but with the death of her mother, she's moved her focus to her family's hotel. We know from the start that she has a complicated past relationship, and it was interesting to watch as she navigated that. Her character went through a lot of growth and self discovery, and it was so well done. I loved the journey that her character went on, she is easily one of the best contemporary female leads I've read in a while. I think Reyna sometimes read older than 17, but it's definitely worth noting that her mother died, and she was forced to grow and adapt due to that. Aiden was a very well written character. Sometimes love interests get lost in books, but Aiden very much stood on his own apart from Reyna. His character arc is interesting, I liked the flashbacks to the past where we got to get to know him better. I think their relationship was very well written, and it made sense. I loved seeing their past, and their present was so well written and interesting. There was a lot of angst within their relationship, and I loved every second of it. All of the side characters felt so real, they jumped off of the page. The models, the band members, Reyna's family, they all just lived so loudly. Olivia was a character I didn't love, but I understand why she was in this and still found her important. The plot of this book is inspired by Jane Austen's Persuasion, which I have not read. But essentially, Reyna and Aiden were childhood friends turned lovers, he left the island, she stayed, and he's suddenly back and she's stuck hanging around with him and his new friends. There's a lot of awkwardness and complicated feelings, with Reyna acting like a tour guide, and it's all done so well. Reyna's mom passed away two years prior, and instead of perusing the life of an artist, she's staying and running the hotel her mother ran because that's what her mother wanted. In this book Reyna is forced to change, through multiple series of events, and I think it was so interesting to read.This book is set entirely on the island of Tobago, and my goodness was it ever gorgeous. On the topic of language, I think that the island slang used in this book is really easy to follow. Learning and adapting to any kind of slang or specific dialect within books is simply a part of world building, and is something that readers may need to take time to get used to. Fantasy books have maps of made up worlds, and sometimes made up races. If you can recite all of the orders of the Grisha, you can take some time getting used to the way that people may speak in Tobago. The ending of this book was really nice. Throughout the novel we jump back in time to see Aiden and Reyna's relationship form and build, and it was so well executed. I loved the way this book ended, I think the choices made make a lot of sense. This book made me feel so warm inside. My dad's side of the family is all from Guyana, they immigrated to Canada around the 70's, and have been here ever since. A lot of the food, slang, and music felt very familiar to me and made me nostalgic for my childhood. My grandfather loved to blast soca music at family get togethers, and the playlist in the back was full of familiar music. I think this book was beautiful, and love the way it made me feel. If you enjoyed books like Clap When You Land, Happily Ever Afters, A Very Large Expanse of Sea, The Sun is Also a Stat, I recommend this book. The vibes just match, I can't explain further.

Oh I just adored this modern day Persuasion retelling set in Tobago. Everything about this worked for me — the vivid Caribbean setting, the second-chance romance and the adventures. I loved the whole cast of characters and the family story, too!

This was an incredibly fun read, with a lot of yearning! Perfect summer read that I could see myself rereading a bunch

*3.5I’m always a sucker for second chance romance! This one was super fun and I loved the setting ~ wish we got a little more romance on the page but still was a sweet time

First book I've finished in a long time.

Want to see more bookish things from me? Check out my Youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfer...*I received a copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for my honest review*17 year old Reyna lost her mother two years ago, and everyone seems to be moving forward. Her best friend

4.5 starsWhere the Rhythm Takes You by Sarah Dass is one of the best YA romances I've read recently. Second chance romance is my favorite trope, and I loved Reyna's and Aiden's angsty love story. I also loved the friendships, music references, and most of all, the location. It's the first book set in Tobago I've read, I enjoyed learning about the island and the culture. I was so invested in the story, I finished reading the book in one day. If you are looking for a diverse, well-written YA romance, I highly recommend Where the Rhythm Takes You!*ARC provided by the publisher via Edelweiss

🎧🎧🎧🎧 Four Stars (As rated in the songs Aiden won't let anyone listen to yet)Synopsis: Inspired by Jane Austen’s Persuasion, Where the Rhythm Takes You is a romantic, visceral novel about taking risks, chasing your dreams and giving lost love a second chance. “I stood, my resignation giving way to reluctant amusement when he offered his hand like we were characters in some nineteenth-century novel." My Review: This book was everything I wanted it to be. Sarah Dass stays remarkably true to Austen's Persuasion while giving the story a huge dose of modern context and relatability. I flew through this story in a single night which, admittedly, is my absolute favorite way to read romance.Follow me on: Blog | Twitter | Instagram | Tumblr | Pinterest | Storygraph

Wonderfully sweet and summery retelling

Her whole life, Reyna was being groomed to take over the family resort. The Plumeria Hotel was a constant in her life, and she loved the place with all her heart. But following her mother's death, she began to feel as though it was her only choice for the future, as she believed it was her responsibility to keep the hotel going. Then a person from her past returned and seeing how much his life had changed had Reyna questioning if the Plumeria was really her only option. For my Austen fans out there, this is supposed to be a nod to Persuasion. As I have said before, I have not read any of Austen's books, but you know what? I still enjoyed this story, and here are some reasons why. BEAUTIFUL ISLAND SETTINGThis was my first "trip" to Tobago, and Dass fully immersed me in all the wonders of this island. Reyna's father arranged for her to be a tour guide for her ex Aiden and his friends, and therefore, there were many excursions that allowed me to see so much of Tobago. Music and food were intertwined with each place visited, and I felt like I got the full experience at every location. Dass' descriptions were so vivid, that I often found my tummy rumbling and my hips swaying. FIRST LOVEThe flashbacks showcasing Aiden and Reyna's past melted my heart. These two went back quite a ways, and it was such a treat seeing their love story unfold. Watching their affection grow and develop, while they went from enemies, to friends, and then lovers was wonderful. I could feel those flutters of first love, and my heart ached when it all fell apart. The reason was one that always drives me batty, but it made sense in this story. SECOND CHANCESI have written entire blog posts about how much I love second chances. Kids, this was not an easy reunion as the ending to Aiden and Reyna's relationship was not a friendly one. But I was hopeful, and I was cheering them on. Every time one of them gave an inch to the other, I got excited, because it added to my hope that they could salvage what they once shared. But this wasn't just about a second shot at romance. This was also a second chance for Reyna to live her own life and pursue her own aspirations. It was an opportunity to tap back into the passion she once had and make her dreams a reality. Overall: I enjoyed watching Reyna and Aiden mend their broken bridges and find their way back to each other. I loved being on the island, and I adored the theme of second chances and new beginnings woven into this delightful story.*ARC provided in exchange for an honest review. BLOG | INSTAGRAM |TWITTER | BLOGLOVIN | FRIEND ME ON GOODREADS