I am sorry that I can't make my review for this book as complimentary as I had hoped prior to starting. While I sympathize with the plight of the FMC, relate to having a van tour of scotland, and enjoy the same media as her, I found her insufferable TBH. And I think that was because of the writing and not because of the character. I did not enjoy this book until about 70% in, at which point I had read nearly all of it in one sitting and I think got desensitized to the poor writing. I felt like the MMC was shallowly written until like 80% of the way through. I don't enjoy writing a review like this but since my disappointment ran deep I think I need to share.

I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. I thank NetGalley for offering me the e-ARC of this title.

This was a heart warming story of a woman names Alice who escaping her life with books a literary bus tour across the UK. This trip from day 1 has not gone right for Alice, but in the moments of moments of disaster and pure chaos becomes something beautiful and fun for Alice with the help of lively group of elderly ladies and an infuriatingly handsome Scottish driver. There were so many beautiful moments in this book that were healing for Alice. Great story, fun characters and beautiful settings.

🖤🖤🖤🖤✨
4.5/5

This book was absolutely lovely. I just adored it so much!! And I am still in shock that it is Kat Mackenzie’s DEBUT book. Like WHAT?! HOW. The writing in this is phenomenal. I was hooked from the first page. Probably more like first paragraph.

This journey starts with Alice brashly booking a UK bus tour after her fiancé cheated on her, proposed with her ring to the home wrecker, and losing her job. I mean, I don’t blame her. This seems like it was the right call. Until the airport crushes her bag. Yes, crushes. And then all of a sudden, there’s this grading voice…a man that interrupts her already unlucky events appears. She thinks she’s rid of him after he finds his lost airport friend….until she shows up at the bus for the tour. Yes, he’s her tour guide, Robbie. And the bus tour…it’s a bunch of (absolutely lovely I literally adored them) ladies in their golden years.

I loved…

💼 This trip is about growth, love, finding yourself…I felt like I did all these things, just as Alice did, while reading this book.

📚 the history is this is amazing. I love visiting historical places & Mackenzie really did so well in making you feel like you were literally right there with Alice.

👯‍♀️ the ladies in this were AMAZING. I love when a book has great supporting characters.

📺 I grew up watching BBC shows and movies. So, the references to this were so fun for me!

✍🏻 I also grew up watching and reading Bridget Jones…the tally on each chapter a la Bridget Jones was like having a little bit of an old friend there with me.

📖 the tour focused on a book theme!

✨ when I tell you I love witty writing…this book has it. I loved the wit and charm!!

🖌️ the amount of annotations I had reading this.

🩷 I loved Alice and I really related to her in so many ways.

👀 Robbie was also an amazing MMC

Review of Work in Progress – A hilarious and heartfelt romantic comedy

Work in Progress is an absolute gem of a romantic comedy that had me laughing out loud from the very first chapter. The story follows an American woman in her thirties who finds herself on a tour of the UK, where she meets the charmingly attractive Scottish tour bus host, and OH MY do those two start off quarrelsome (but sparks FLY!!) If you’re a fan of witty banter, heartwarming moments, and swoon-worthy romance, this book is for you.

As a die hard fan of anything set in the United Kingdom, particularly Scotland- this book checked all the boxes for me. As someone who has traveled through both Scotland and England, I absolutely loved being able to visualize my memories of the iconic locations mentioned throughout the story. The author paints each setting with such vivid detail that it made me long to revisit those places again (is it May yet?!) This book is also a love letter to the UK that anyone who’s traveled there will appreciate.

What truly makes Work in Progress stand out is the relationship between the two main characters. Their chemistry is electric, and the witty back and forth banter is pure gold! I found myself laughing out loud at the hilarious insults and comebacks that flew between them. The evolution of their relationship, from playful rivalry to deep connection, is perfectly paced and incredibly engaging.

The book’s structure is also delightful! Each chapter kicks off with a clever lesson, a book recommendation and a Bridget Jones-style entry, which added an extra layer of charm and excitement to the story. With every new chapter, I couldn’t help but wonder, “What’s going to happen next?” It’s the kind of format that hooks you instantly and keeps you turning pages at lightning speed.

As the characters grow throughout the story, we also get to know the rest of the tour group, and I loved seeing how everyone met as strangers at the beginning and ends up becoming lifelong friends by the end. The twists and turns were unexpected and kept me on my toes, and I found myself becoming deeply invested in the journey of each character on this tour.

A huge thank you to NetGalley for the ARC! I’ll absolutely be purchasing a copy of Work in Progress to add to my shelf and will no doubt revisit it often. This book is a must read for anyone who loves a unique romantic comedy—one that breaks the mold of the typical, predictable rom-com. It’s fresh, fun, and full of heart. I’m already planning to gift it to my friends who will be traveling with me back to Scotland this year—I know they’ll love it as much as I did!

Work in Progress is a truly special read and I can’t recommend it enough.

I need this tour to be real.

It is my ideal tour of the UK.

Kat Mackenzie please tell me something like this actually exists. I am due for a vacation abroad. 😘

Tour stops that correspond with UK writers and literary locations? That also has a recommended reading list? Sign me up. Throw in a handsome Scot and some retired ladies to help me get my life on track and it is the PERFECT tour. 😍

I loved this debut from Kat (and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it)! If you like travel, and shenanigans, and bickering and teasing, and enemies to lovers, and dancing, and deep heart to hearts then this book is for you. ♥️

This book was so fun to read! The history, the journey across the U.K., and the group of quirky older women along for the ride made this book even better. Not to mention how relatable Alice was as a character whose life wasn’t going exactly how she’d planned. The way her relationship with Robbie develops over time from bickering to bantering was top tier! Overall, I really enjoyed this read and would recommend it for anyone looking for a light, quirky romcom!

This is a delightful read for anyone seeking a heartwarming and humorous romance that will transport them on a journey of self-discovery, love, and laughter, as they join Alice on her transformative adventure of finding herself and love in the unlikeliest of places.

This is going on my must read/top recommendation list. Why, you ask?

Because having new experiences and traveling are some of the highlights of my life, and this book brings me that feel of exploring a new place! It’s *that* well written.

Alice arrives in Edinburgh (my favorite city on the planet) with crushed luggage and jet lag. Then she realizes her tour is for elderly folks— she’s the youngest!

She gives Robbie, the tour guide, such a hard time, but it just rolls off him.. which was super cute to read about. (Also, while Alice was grumpy, I think she handled herself well given the circumstances.)

This group embarks on trip from Edinburgh around the UK, and it’s an atmospheric, romantic joy to read!

With hilarious and sweet side characters, nods to Bridget Jones— and matching funny moments— and Robbie being his adorable self, this is such a solid book!

I really felt like I was back in the UK, and I’ve spent a lot of time there.

The romance was my favorite (obviously) but I loved seeing Alice’s growth and quirky lists.

Sometimes, us type-A folks need to be told to live a little, and this book is all about that. I could gush more, and I know this will resonate with so many friends here.

Pick up this book to take your next adventure!

Desperate for a fresh start, Alice books a literary bus tour across the UK, but when she arrives she is surprised to find all the other guests are a group of lively elderly ladies and led by a remarkably handsome Scottish driver.

This was a fun ride as we join the tour group in cozy pubs and castle ruins. This novel was filled with genuinely laugh out loud funny moments and some heartwarming ones as Alice tries to make the most of her trip. While the romance was good, Alice’s friendship with the elderly ladies was the true highlight for me. Pick this up next if you’re looking for a little escape to the UK!

Thank you to @netgalley and @avonbooks for my advanced review copy.

"I sighed and kept my eyes closed as a supernova gathered in my tummy"

I liked the writing in Work in Progress, I feel like this was a book that is made for those who find romance in travel and it gave me the warm fuzzies at times. as well as making me laugh.
This book is about Alice who, needing a break from life, spontaneously books a bus tour of Scotland and England and meets a lovely cast of characters. I don't think this book was as romance heavy as I would've liked which is okay but with the women's fiction themes, I don't feel it went deep enough for me to connect. As far as the romance goes, I would've liked this to be dual POV as I honestly felt a little stuck in Alice's POV which, as stated previously, I didn't connect to.
The book really shines in its use of the scenery as another character in the story and I found myself googling "bus tours England"
3.25 stars!

My sincere thanks to Avon and Harper Voyager as well as NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read Work In Progress by Kat Mackenzie. I give my unbiased opinion of it in the following review.

Alice Cooper (yes, that is her name) impulsively books a trip to the UK for a literary bus tour. She's always wanted to go there, and she really needs to get away after finding out her boyfriend has been cheating, and her job is no more. Little does she know that the bus tour is for women only and not just any women, but women of the grey haired and full of wisdom variety. There is also the tour director and bus driver Robbie who she had an altercation with at the airport. Let's just say it was pretty much hate at first sight. But since the money has already been spent, Alice decides to go with it and make Robbie's job more difficult every chance she gets. Who knows, it could be fun. Right?

This was a cute book. I loved how Alice became friends with all the ladies and how a few of them kind of took her under their wing. While the banter between Robbie and Alice got too be a little snarky and mean at times, it was fun to see them learn how to be friends while keeping their humor most of the time. There were a lot of literary references, with each chapter heading stating the book the bus tour was exploring at the time and if Alice had read it or not. I was wishing I had photos of the places they were touring. I was not familiar with all of the books referenced so sometimes I felt a little disconnected from the story because I wasn't able to relate to the tour the characters were on. All in all, I enjoyed the book and would recommend it to friends who enjoy a rom com with Scottish or UK setting, or who just love a good rom com.

This overall has a very “Hallmark,” over-the-top, borderline “cringe” feeling throughout. They’re enemies, but there really is no basis for it so it feels a bit like they’re arguing for the sake of arguing. Alice is a bit insufferable and I couldn’t really root for her. Her attitude was off-putting, and it just brought everything down. Overall this just wasn’t for me. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to provide my honest review.

3.5/5 🌟 Big shoutout to NetGalley and Avon for the eARC!

This one took me a bit to get into but once I did, I enjoyed the (bus)ride. Alice is a budding character that was a little to on-the-nose in fairy tale land to begin with, but I suspect that is what author Kat Mackenzie was aiming for. The women of the bus tour added such fun to the story, which made me recall all of the fun times I had with my grandmother's friends growing up!

As for the romance aspect, Alice and Robbie were a totally believable couple, but it was *very* slow goings for me for them to get to that space. At times I found myself enjoying the relationship between Alice and the ladies more than with her and Robbie.

Either way, Mackenzie's debut novel was a good, solid read. Again, thank you to NetGalley and Avon for this one!

When hating each other is a form of foreplay. So many good insults were thrown between Robbie and Alice, I loved their chemistry together. All the quirky ladies in the tour group were fantastic and hilarious. I laughed many times and had a great time. The writing was great it really set the scene into the bus tour throughout the UK.

It took me a little time to get into this because their banter was too close to the line of just being mean, maybe even crossed it a few times but I did eventually get into it and was rooting for our main characters to figure their stuff out. I absolutely loved the setting and now I too want to go on a 3 week tour of the UK with a handsome Scottish bus driver.

This book is absolutely everything to me!!! I am typically an Emily Henry type of girl and I struggle to find books that have the same amount of humor and romantic connection between the characters, but this brought me all of that and more! By the time I finished this, I had happy tears streaming down my face and felt like my soul had just gotten a warm hug.
Now, I've never been to Scotland before, but this book was so descriptive, I almost feel like I really have. It is so rare to find a non-romance book these days that puts so much effort and love into the world-building, but I was so glad that this did because it really made it all the more magical. I absolutely adored every single side character in this as well, and loved that each one of them had their own little quirks and personality.
Don't even get me started on the romance in this... for something with very little spice, there were PLENTY of scenes that had me giggling and kicking my feet!! And the banter!!!! The MMC and FMC start off as enemies (kind of), and the way they argue back and forth is hysterical, especially as you watch their relationship grow.
I think the moral of the story here is that I desperately need to book a three week bus tour of Scotland with a sexy Scottish bus driver and a bunch of older women, because honestly that seems like the perfect solution right now. I am so impressed with this and absolutely cannot believe it is a debut novel (I was devastated when I finished this to learn that there were not MORE Kat Mackenzie books that I could not immediately devour).

Thank you to NetGalley, Avon and Harper Voyager Publishing, and Kat Mackenzie for this ARC!

This was a fun read with colourful cast of characters (loved our eclectic mix of older ladies). Decent chemistry between our two leads Alice And Robbie, though I did find some of the bickering a little childish. Overall an enjoyable read 3.5 🌟

The premise and idea of this one was super cute to me - unfortunately it fell pretty flat.

I struggled to get invested in the characters and story - it was too dialogue heavy and all felt pretty obvious. I just wanted it be better.

Thank you Avon and Harper Voyager as well as NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advanced copy of this book! All opinions are my own.

First let me say that I absolutely adored Work in Progress. It is a perfect travel romance full of fun banter, lots of mishaps and the sweetest happily ever after.

Being impulsive is not Alice’s strong suit but when her life starts to fall apart she decides that the only way to face it is by leaving her comfort zone behind and embarking on an epic adventure -- a three week, all-female, literary bus tour across Scotland. But nothing could prepare Alice for the worst travel day of her life, the destroyed luggage, the rickety old bus she is expected to travel on, the seasoned travel companions who are far from the jet-setting thirty-somethings pictured on the website, and the tour guide who is nothing short of infuriating. Determined to see things through, Alice chooses to take a leap of faith and is rewarded with a life-changing experience that she will never forget.

You know that I love a good slow burn romance but it was the relationship that Alice formed with the women on her journey that won my heart. My favorite scene in the book was when in honor of Alice’s birthday each of the women told a story about a time in their lives when things didn’t go as planned. Their stories and the connections made were so heartfelt and beautiful. As Alice says, “There was so much wisdom there, so much laughter and pain and so many things that I wanted to write in my notebook and never forget.”

This book was such an amazing gift and I will absolutely be running out to get a physical copy for my shelves. If travel romances are your thing, then this one is a must read!

Quotes that had me

“I was going to Eat, Pray, Love the crap out of this! But rather than mediation and moderation in an ashram in India somewhere, I chose tea, castles, and book chat in Britain.

“Happiness comes from within, so fill yourself up”

“I fell forward into their stories, feeling their joys and sorrows along with them: my friends, my role models. Then I gathered each one into a hug and tried to press all my gratitude into them”

“Still healing -- yes. Still a mess -- maybe. But a beautiful mess who was learning to adapt, who was learning to take life for all it had to offer, to be able to learn from the hardships and move on.”

Read if you like

Slow burn
Travel romance
Enemies to loves
Amazing characters
Found family
Forced proximity
Mostly closed door spice
Main character growth

thank you to the publisher for an arc and alc!

it’s crazy how i’m finding so many scottish romances months before my trip with my bestie… coincidence?? i think not!!

i absolutely loved a work in progress: from the literary tour with a gaggle of super cool older women (and a dog!), thrifting after our fmc’s whole suitcase gets pooped on…, and of COURSE our beautiful scottish mmc who is the literary tour’s guide, how could i not eat it up?

while a work in progress was definitely a romcom, it had so much depth thanks to the cast of characters sharing their lives and lessons.

the one thing i could have done less with was our fmc alice being petty towards the mmc robbie… like enough, he wants you babe 🙄✋🏼

as for the audio, the narrator did a fantastic job!