Such a cute, sweet read. It was a quick read with good narration. I mean look at this cover so pretty how could the book not be as cute

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.
A really sweet audiobook. Easy to listen to and follow along. Great job by the author and the narrator. Even a little mystery thrown in.

an easy and low angst listen! it was filled with lot of small town charm and a little bit of mystery that kept the book interesting too!

the quirk of the small town characters with the second chance trope balanced out nicely and made the book fun if not a little predictable.

it was a cute little book althought didn't inspire me to read more from the author which books like this tend to do for me.

thank you to the publisher for an audiobook arc in return for an honest review.

I enjoyed A.J. Pine's The Second Chance Garden. There were some marvelous descriptions of this small Illinois town, and the quirky folks who live there.

Emma was an enjoyable character to get to know, though as a lifelong asthma sufferer myself, I was pulling my hair out over her mismanagement of her condition.

Three stars for the audio version. I thought the voices for the younger female cast were well done, but I'd like to see this narrator do a bit of work on the older folks' voices.

Thank you to the publishers, author and NetGalley for the free copy of this audio book.

This was a cute little read! It took me a bit to warm up to it but I ended up enjoying it quite a bit! The narrator was good.

This audiobook was a cute, sweet, and quick read and such a sweet story. The author did such a great job with the characters!

This was a cute cheesy read. I did enjoy it but I felt we were thrown straight into the story without any context in the beginning. We Meet Emma and learned she was a social media influencer going home because of a tornado. A contest with prize money was mentioned so you know that the town is entering but it wasn't really detailed until towards the end so it left me feeling a little confused. I did think the characters were a little immature but since this isn't a serious book, it wasn't too hard to overlook. I liked the writing style and the plot of the story but there were parts that I felt could have been more elaborated on.
Thank you NetGalley and publisher for the opportunity to read a new to me author.

Second Chance Garden is the first book in A. J. Pine’s Summertown series. Emma Woods has quickly packed up for an impromptu visit to her family home in Summertown, Illinois, after a tornado devastates the area. As Emma works from her home in Chicago in the online industry anyway, going to help out is a priority without being a problem.

As Emma nears her hometown and sees the damage she is fearful. When she arrives in Summertown, Emma is relieved to see minimal damage at the Woods Family Inn even though there is great destruction in the town. What Emma finds inside is much of the town and their menageries taking shelter at the inn. What Emma never expected to find is her former boyfriend Matteo Rourke doing wildlife control at the inn.

Some years ago, when Matteo broke things off with Emma both were just kids, although it could be argued that life’s battering had taken a larger toll on Matteo. While in college his mother was diagnosed with cancer and embarked on a battle, however it was a battle she lost. This devastated Matteo’s dad Dennis and older brother Levi. Trying to keep it all together for the family, Matteo became lost, especially when a DUI led to jail time. When Emma visited him in jail he cut her loose and as devastated as she was, she never pushed back. Now that they have come together face to face mysteries will be unraveled.

Now that their beloved hometown of Summertown has been flattened just weeks before the big garden competition between them and neighboring Middlebrook, which just so happens to have pilfered Summertown‘s garden designer, the mayor’s ex-wife, the town is even more devastated. This is very bad timing! Never would the prize money have been more important for the town than now.

Just when it seems all is lost, beautifully designed, painted, and perfectly placed “flowers” made of scrap metal and old hubcaps begin popping Up. Is this what will give the town a new competitive edge and will the mayor really prosecute the artist for vandalism?

This is a fun story that will make the reader smile and wonder as the mystery comes full term to a lovely conclusion. I really like this new series by A.J. Pine, and look forward to the next book in the series. I definitely do recommend it!

I listened to an audiobook version of this story. I enjoyed the narration and lost myself in the story. Emma comes back home after a tornado tears through her hometown, and of course her high school sweetheart is still there and they have some unsettled issues between them. Matteo is helping his father out with his pest control service but has secrets and issues from his past that he just doesn’t want to talk about, even with Emma.

Sweet, but very touching, and sometimes heartbreaking, story.
Feels to me more like a young adult/teen kind of book...
Emma Woods is a Social Media guru who moved away from her smalltown of Summertown, Illinois almost a decade ago... after losing her love...to jail...
BUT, a tornado has come through the town causing damage and havoc...especially since the big gardening contest is coming up...and Summertown could REALLY use the winnings from the contest to help the town!
So, Emma moves back home temporarily, to help out her parents (who own the town's Inn, that most of the townies are staying at while their places are fixed up)...and to hopefully come up with a plan to help the town win the contest.
Of course, while she is there, she runs into Matteo, her former love/heartthrob, but she is determined to keep her cool and move on with her life.
The ensuing book is filled with laughs, and tears, and friends, and family, and love!
4 stars for me!
Thanks to NetGalley and Dreamscapes Media for the ARC of this audiobook which was released on September 5th, and I was lucky enough to receive yesterday!

Emma returns to Summertown, Illinois in the wake of a devastating tornado. The tornado (and the mayor's wife's infidelity) has placed the town at risk of losing the annual Garden Fest, a competition with their nearby town of Middlebrook. She's barely arrived back in town when she comes face to face with her ex--Matteo Rourk, the man who broke her heart years ago.

In a town the size of Summertown, it's impossible to avoid each other. They agree to start fresh as friends, but old feelings keep popping back up. And so do art installations all across town. The sheriff calls them vandalism, but to the rest of the town, they symbolize hope.

Second Chance Garden is a charming and sweet second-chance romance. The love Matteo and Emma still have for each other is real and enduring, despite the situations that tore them apart in the first place. They slowly rebuild trust and connection, and I was rooting for them from the very beginning.

And I loved the family of squirrels. IYKYK.

This second-chance romance featured Emma and Matteo, who was once Emma's high school boyfriend and is now an ex-convict. They haven't seen one another since soon after they graduated high school. They'd had their lives planned with each other when Matteo's mom became ill and he stayed home to help out while Emma went on to college.

There are a lot of things they need to work out between them, including what happened after Emma left that landed Matteo in jail. But they have present-day issues to resolve as well. Their town was affected by a natural disaster and everyone is pitching in in different ways to restore it before the annual garden competition. The problem there is, their master gardener, the mayor's ex-wife, is now supporting another town (and mayor). And it was always her unique skills and talent that won the competition for Summertown.

But as spirits are flagging and the mayor is considering forfeiting the competition, mysterious garden art installations start appearing all over town. Emma is determined to unmask "The Gardener" and stop the mayor from forfeiting the competition when all hope is not lost.

So there are a lot of little threads going on in this story. But in a lot of ways, I felt most of the characters were underdeveloped. For example, the main thing we learn about Emma's dad is that he owns the inn, likes to play mystery games, and embarrassingly wears a deer-stalker hat. And those three traits define him anytime he appears in the story.

And honestly, I didn't understand when Matteo finally got the answers he was looking for, what they actually were.

So, while I enjoyed the overall story, I felt it still needed more work.

Thank you to A.J. Pine, Dreamscape Media and NetGalley for an advance review copy.

First in a new series

I believe Summertown is supposed to be a Stars Hallow (Gilmore Girls) like town, but it kind of misses the mark. The townsfolk feel underdeveloped. The quirky/eccentric type are lacking in quantity, while the grumpy type are strongly present.

Emma and Matteo are ok. The various nicknames in the book are super annoying (especially Ems and Hals- puke). They also all have multiple nicknames. Their history is made to be way more dramatic than it actually was. I don't quite by the chemistry, either.

This sounds very negative- and I don't mean for it to be. It was an OK book and I feel there is promise with the series. But on its own, the book is just ok. It was also predictable. If you didn't immediately figure out who the artist was....

Stephanie Rose narrates the audiobook. While her performance was good, I feel like it would have been enhanced with dual narrators for each POV.

I received an audio copy in exchange for an honest review.

This second chance, small town romance had great summer, beach read vibes with the emotional depth of CoHo's best gut-wrenchers. I really enjoyed the disability rep (asthma her and muscular dystrophy in a parent) and the redemption story angle (he's a recently released convict looking to redeem his reputation and help her save the town after a natural disaster destroys their chances to win the local Garden Fest competition). Good on audio narrated by Stephanie Rose and a great start to what looks to be a new small town series perfect for fans of authors like Laura Pavlov. Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an early digital and audio copy in exchange for my honest review.

Steam level: some open door spicy scenes

Emma Woods town left 8 years ago when her heart was broken. Nowadays a social media manager in Chicago, Emma is back in town to help her hometown after a tornado destroyed .
Whom she hoped not to come across was Matteo Route, the boy, now man, who broke up with her when he went jail.
Matteo is still in love with her, but believes she deserves better.
Getting the town to be part of the Garden festival using the anonymous sculptures around town might just be what they need to bring the town back. But obstacles and constantly being raised by the major. Still, Matteo and Emma begin to trust each other as they work together.
Will the artist reveal themselves? Will the town win the garden festival? Will Matteo and Emma finally get their HEA or will they go their separate ways?
This was a sweet romance of a couple in their late twenties getting a second chance in love and life.
I was entrusted a copy of this audiobook by Netgalley and Dreamscape. The opinions expressed are solely my own.

Second Chance Garden was quick and easy and low angst. It's a small town romance with heart and community and even a little steam! When a tornado hits her home town, Emma goes home to help her family at their Inn. While total chaos ensues, her childhood love is unexpectedly the one who helps make sure things get put back together. She didn't know he was home after years away. She didn't expect to be confronted with feelings and conflict and a smidge of love.

This was the perfect book to cruise through on audio while I worked and cleaned and went about my day.

Emma left town years ago with a broken heart and hasn’t been home for quite some time. When a tornado wreaks havoc she returns to help out her parents and their business. What she isn’t expecting is to literally bump into the very man who broke her heart. Avoidance isn’t possible in their small town. Clearly they both have feelings, but are both fighting them. It’s a sweet, funny, sometimes rocky road back to them letting go of the past, learning to trust each other again, helping their town and their ultimate happily ever after while helping their town recover. Easy nice listen.