What a wonderful story set in such a beautiful place. The characters were so full of color! Boo Walker has such a way of describing the people and places, that I feel as if I’m right there along with them.
Another brilliant book I didn’t want to end.

I felt so honored to read A Spanish Sunrise early. Any book I have read by Boo Walker has been good, but he really hit this one out of the park. His characters have a sad sweetness to them and I didn't want to put the book down as they were evolving with each page. I loved the book so much that I would love to visit Spain to see the country and experience the culture. If the family in this book were real I would book my flight today. Don't miss out on a good read that deals with every day life including sadness and happiness. Hats off to you Boo! Keep writing!

Boo Walker managed to write another wonderful story about how families are created in unusual ways and grow into something wonderful. This was a heartfelt story about love, loss, and reconnections. As a reader, you will be quickly engrossed in the plot and find the book hard to put down.

#netgalley #aspanishsunrise publication date 16 Aug 2022
Boo Walker is a new to me author and I loved this book, it is a book of love,loss,heartbreak and the true meaning of family. Mia is a beautiful little girl who absolutely broke my heart but I am so glad she found her family. You'll need tissues to read this story. 5/5 stars

This book was so good! I read it in one day!
Baxter and his daughter Mia are still trying to adjust to life after Sophie’s unexpected death. An email from possible family in Spain has Baxter and Mia headed to olive country.
Many secrets and surprises come to light during the story. I’ve read several of this author’s books and they just keep getting better and better.
Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the early copy

This is a story about love, loss, and a special father daughter relationship. When Baxter wife is tragically killed in a store parking lot, he quits the band and hangs up his guitar. Months later Baxter is running a construction company raising his daughter, Mia. Neither of them is living life and happiness is no where to be found.
An email from 23and me have them taking a trip to meet Sofias biological family, fulfilling his wife’s dream of knowing where she came from. But the trip to Spain does more than either expected as the share stories of Sofia. Sometime healing comes in the strangest ways.

this was a lovely story of love and loss and how family can both protect and damage you when you least expect it.
It made me long to visit Spain again and enjoy the food, the drink and the country.
A wonderful holiday read.

In this novel we follow the lives of a widower and his daughter. Baxter is a good father who tries to give the best life for his daughter after his wife's death. But when he unexpectedly finds out about his wife's real family in Spain, they set off a long journey across to meet them. The story was engaging and loved the characters. I particularly loved the part of the story that was set in Spain.

A tale of heartbreak and renewal set in rural Spain. I enjoyed the setting and the strong sense of family being pulled in different directions as events unfolded, however I found the protagonist self indulgent at times. An enjoyable holiday read.

Baxter is a single father with a daughter MIa. He finds out his dead wife who was adopted at birth has Spanish relations. They go to Spain to find out the link and find themselves in a family that have major problems. Brought the Spanish lifestyle to life.

I have mixed feelings about this book. Ultimately, I did like it...It just felt like it took forever to get good. The first third of the book felt kind of excruciating, and often times I will give up at that point. Because I was reading an advanced copy (thanks, NetGalley!) I felt obligated to stick with it. I'm glad I stuck it out, because I found the ending satisfying.
I had a hard time picturing the main character, Baxter. I felt like he embodied so many different personalities through the novel, that I couldn't "see" him(If that makes sense.) Usually, while reading I envision the character and how they look. I couldn't really get a handle on Baxter. He's a widower, he's a dad, he's the owner of a contracting company, he used to be a famous singer in a fairly well known band...I'm over here just confused by him. What warmed it up for me, is when he took his daughter to Spain, and the interesting Spanish family they encounter, Also, I just love Spain and it was well described, making up for the first half of the book, more or less. I'd say it's worth the read, but be patient, and you will be rewarded.

An engaging and emotional story about a father trying to cope after suffering a devastating loss. Beautiful descriptions of setting and moving exploration of grief, love, loss and healing. Thoroughly enjoyed this one! 5 stars

I thoroughly enjoyed this book by Boo Walker (who is new to me). I found the setting lush and evocative. I found the characters wonderfully drawn, and emotionally layered. This wasn't a book I'd normally read, and I was glad I gave it a try. I will look for more books by this author. Thank you NG and Lake Union for this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.

What a sweet story. Once again, Boo Walker wrote a touching story. He is able to keep you drawn in to see what happens. I can say that the last 25% was a bit of a twist that was unexpected. I learned a lot about the Olive Oil and more about the Spanish culture and that was an added bonus. You can't read this book without visualizing the Olive Farm and wishing you were there. I could see me sitting there and partaking in all that Baxter and Mia were experiencing. So good!! I encourage you to read this book if you have read other books by this author.

This is a lovely book you can dive into and want to stay. A widowed father struggles every day to juggle pressing work and his lost eight year old daughter. Grief marks their everyday until and email from a DNA test site draws them to the family of his wife-a family they know nothing about. A trip to visit them in Spain brings more than new family. It brings new life to them.
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

A thought-provoking family drama that follows recently widowed Baxter, and his 8-year-old daughter Mia, finding themselves on an unexpected journey in finding their way through grief.

I really enjoyed the storyline and overarching themes of this book and found myself invested in Baxter and Mia’s story, which kept me wanting to keep reading to see how it unfolded. Mia was a beautiful character, and I particularly liked the different relationships she developed with other characters throughout the book. Unfortunately, I didn’t enjoy that character of Baxter as much. A lot of his thought processes and actions, particularly in the first half or so of the book, really annoyed me. I struggled to find him to be a ‘believable’ character.

The writing style was also a bit of a letdown for me. Whilst it wasn’t enough to make me want to give up on the book, I did feel as though it could have done with some further editing. Some sections felt a bit disjointed and jarring, while others I found to be a bit wordy and repetitive.

Despite the few issues that I had with this book, I will admit that it left me feeling warm and fuzzy in the end. Overall, I think this story has good bones, however, wasn’t executed as well as it could have been.

Thank-you NetGalley and Lake Union Publishing view for a copy of this in exchange for an honest review

A fantastic, gripping sorry about loss, grief, parenting, love, relationships, and life.
After a heartbreaking loss, a father is doing his best to cope but making wrong decisions for the right reasons.
I couldn't put it down and have found a favourite new author.
Thanks for the arc in exchange for an honest review

A story about the healing nature of family overcoming the difficulties of family. I am afraid this was very difficult for me to get into. It begins with Baxter’s stream of consciousness, his insecurities and how he has dealt with grief for him and his daughter in an obviously damaging way, but can’t see it.
Unfortunately this goes on for a considerable portion of the book which left me a bit bored with Baxter, just over halfway through, the Spanish House, it starts to improve, and ends in a way that leaves the reader satisfied. I would say it’s a book that starts of as a very long stroll but ends with a sprint finish.

This is the story of Baxter and his eight year old daughter Mia who live in America. The story is centred around their grief in losing Mia's mother. Baxter thinks the right way is to expel any memories of his wife Sofia and try to forget her.
Mia suffers from nightmares, is not doing well at school and Baxter is working so hard that he is not spending enough time with her. Then fate in the shape of a message from a DNA family finding site takes over and shakes everything up. Baxter and Mia fly to Spain to meet Sofia's birth mother and the healing begins.

What a lovely story. Finding a family was exactly what Mia needed and her and her dads mourning through grief was so heartbreaking.
I loved the descriptions of Spain and the olive growing process. The interactions between all the family were true to real life as we know no one is perfect and there is no such thing as a perfect family.

I sometimes found it a bit unbelievable the things Mia said as an eight year old. I've never heard any eight year old speaking like her. Baxter was always a bit up and down. First he was unhappy then he was okay then he was unhappy again. I would then become a bit confused as to where we were with him.
But I enjoyed the story and it had a lovely epilogue. Good read.

Baxter Shaw is a forty-something widower of eight year old daughter, Mia. His grief after the tragic loss of his wife, Sofia, three years earlier has led him down a spiral of defensiveness and despair. He’s given up any close relationships, given up his creative outlets, and sleepwalks through work. Life has become meaningless and drab. It is seriously affecting Mia. Her schoolwork and social connections are suffering. Baxter already resigned himself to sorrow, but now he’s also a failure as a parent. Still, it is better than what he had as a child, he tells himself.

Then an email from DNA site 23andMe chimes on Baxter’s computer. Years ago he and his late wife submitted their information. Sofia was looking for her birth mother. The email is from Ester Arroyo and she is trying to find the daughter she gave up for adoption in Spain. This is the last thing Baxter needs right now. All of his efforts to move forward feel thwarted. How is he supposed to heal if painful memories keep getting dragged to the surface? Best to leave his old life behind and accept the new reality, right?

The rest of the novel chronicles the pilgrimage of Baxter, Mia, and the Arroyo family. It is beautifully written–a story that illuminated bright yellow within my soul. Yes, yellow. I cannot remember the last time a book resonated on such a personal level.

Author Boo Walker uses imagery with such gifted skill that I could see, hear, smell, and taste everything he described. He breathes a rare sensitivity into the characters, plus subtle symbolism for the perceptive reader. And, as someone who suffered a sudden loss, has found relatives on DNA sites, and had the opportunity to meet a branch of my family tree in an enchanted foreign land (Guanajuato, Mexico,) I could relate a lot. But those are not prerequisites.

The author describes himself as a writer of “page turners for soul searchers.” Aren’t all of us searching? Even if you do not have similar experiences, the depth and vibrancy of this book will leave you with an afterglow long after reading the last page.

This is the first ARC to receive a rare 10 Stars on my book review blog. Very well-deserved! Boo Walker’s work will definitely get highlighted more often on this site. Thank you to NetGalley and Lake Union Publishing for the advanced copy.