On the Other Side by Carrie Hope Fletcher - A Review

This may be a little late to the party, but I finally read Carrie Hope Fletcher's first book! I really enjoyed this story, I thought that the concept was an original idea.

Evie Snow has lived a long and relatively happy life but now she is dead, she's suddenly faced with a door that won't open. Evie realised that her three biggest secrets are holding her back from entering her own heaven and she now has to face them and share her biggest, and secret, love story with the people in her life.

This was a really lovely idea for a story, and I love the idea that people face doors when they enter the afterlife. There is a hint of magical realism portrayed in some of the phrases of the book that gave it the feeling of a fairy tale. The story was enjoyable as a sweet romance, but there was not really much more to it than that.

Evie Snow felt very much like a self insert character for Carrie Hope Fletcher, which isn't really an issue but she felt very much like a Mary Sue character. She was constantly being told how great she was by the other characters in the book. We were told a lot of things about Evie from other characters, but we on't actually see much from Evie herself.  It was a story about an adult woman being told what she should do with her life by her adult mother.

Considering these characters are supposed to be 27 years old, they came across as rather childish. Not that a 27 year old cannot come across as a bit immature, but when reading the book I did feel as though I was reading about a group of children, this coupled with the was Evie is treated by her mother emphasized the fact that I believed these characters were much younger than they actually were. I do believe that this may have something to do with the fact that this is Carrie's debut novel, so I do hope that there is some improvements in the writing of the character's in her other books.

Another thing that bothered me a little with this book was the surnames of some of the characters we meet, like "Evie Snow" and "Vincent Winters". Not that there is anything particularly wrong with the names, I just feel like they sound like Carrie couldn't think of any other surname to give to her two main characters, and they took me out of the story sometimes by thinking "These names sound a bit silly". Nonetheless, the book is written very nicely, and it is a lovely feel good book.

All in all,. this was a very lovely feel good book that is a nice quick read for someone looking for something to make them feel happy, but it is not a complex novel. Not that it is trying to be a very complex story, but if that is the type of book you are looking for then I would suggest looking elsewhere for a different book.