Title: The Seven Year Slip
Author(s) Name(s): Ashley Poston
Published in: June, 2023
Why You Might Like This Book: Read this book if you enjoy
- magical realism,
- contemporary romance,
- strong female characters,
- same-sex relationships,
- romantic comedy,
- magic,
- time-travelling themes,
- love at first sight themes, and
- warm, cozy romance novels.
Who Should Avoid This Book: Avoid this book if you are triggered by or dislike
- break-up,
- loneliness,
- dementia and old-age related illnesses,
- death, or
- grief and loss.
Clementine is a book publicist working at Strauss & Adder, New York. She has travelled to tens of countries with her aunt starting from her childhood days and always wished she were like her aunt. She takes her job seriously and aims to be as successful as her boss Rhonda is. But she can’t honestly say that she is happy because six months back, she lost her aunt Analea, who was not just another family member but a highly influential person in her life, as she taught Clementine how to live unapolgetically and enjoy life as if everything were magical. Bold, exuberant, and feminist, her aunt would whimsically pack her bags and travel to different countries and enjoy vacations and lived her life to the fullest. they spent a lot of time togther and Clementine had lots of precious memories from those times. A few months before, she broke up with her boyfriend because she was too preoccupied with work, and, honestly, she didn’t even enjoy her time with him. Knowing that she is going through a tough time, her friend and co-worker Drew and Drew’s wife Fiona try to support her, take her out with them to different places and small adventures, and encourage her to date someone else now that she is single again.
Even though it has been six months, Clementine is still grieving and misses her aunt everyday, so she chooses to move into her aunt’s apartment but also spend most of her time at work. Her aunt had always told her that this apartment is “magical”, that when you expect it the least, it could take you to the past or the future, seven years back in time from the present. When she was a child, she hoped that some kind of magic might happen, so like any other curious child, she would want to know what might happen if she moved in time, what her future might be like, and all that. Her aunt also used to tell her about a few other rules, like to never turn on the shower and the faucet at once. Her aunt had also told her about how she herself travelled to the past when she lived in the apartment a few times – that the first time, even though she couldn’t believe it was real, she had moved into the past by seven years – and that is how she met a beautiful woman from the past who knew her, a woman named Vera, the woman she had fallen in love with and wanted to marry. The two women had met each other several times, and each time they had helped each other, grown closer, and bonded so well.
As an adult, Clementine knows that none of that can be real, but the good times she spent with her aunt will always remain with her. After a long day of work, she comes back home, to the apartment, falls asleep, and is then awoken by someone: there is a man in her apartment the next morning. A charming, boyishly handsome stranger with piercing grey eyes. She gets shocked, her sense of self-protection wakes up, she confronts him and throws whatever she can find – pillows – at him, only to see him not fighting back but gently protecting himself. Soon, he explains that his aunt Analea is his mother’s friend and has sublet the apartment to him. While this shocks her, she moves around the apartment to find many of her aunt’s things that shouldn’t have been there because they were discarded by her aunt years before or by her when she moved in. There is also a calendar that points to a time way back in the past. Still in shock, she insists that this man better leave the apartment immediately, to which he agrees and packs his things up, after which she goes for a walk and comes back, a part of her hoping that he might still be there.
The stranger did look handsome. Funnily, when she entered the apartment, he isn’t there, but all the old things her aunt owned that are supposed to not be there are still there. Clementine is irritated, she does not know what she wants or how this magic works, so she leaves the house, closes the door, and opens it again a few times, until she finds him right behind her, saying he just came back to take his toothbrush, which he had forgotten. She lets him in but starts engaging in a conversation with him naturally, surprising even herself. It dawns on her that if this time here in this apartment now is seven years behind the real, present time, it must mean that her aunt Analea must still be not dead and wandering somewhere in Europe now, on a vacation they both went on seven years before. Partly because she wants to stay in that time period where her aunt is alive and partly because she likes this man, she decides to let him stay. He is definitely charming, easy-going, does what he pleases with so much passion, enjoys the moment, is friendly to talk to, chases the moon, and loves life. and all these qualities of his remind her of her aunt.
The more they talk, the more Clementine starts liking the man, who also volunteers to prepare dinner for them. His name is Iwan; he is passionate about food, has come to New York because he wants to become a professional chef, and he is deeply passionate about the art of cooking a good meal. She realizes that the more she observes him and gets to know him, the more she finds him attractive. Iwan is unlike any other man she has ever met. The way he talks, gestures, moves about, looks at her, his freckle, his eyes, his eyebrows, his one-shoulder shrugs, his charismatic persona and gentle nature, Clementine couldn’t help but like him. When she learns that his grandfather was the most influential person in his life, the way her aunt was for her, and how the old man was recently diagnosed with dementia, she empathizes with him. She has offered that he could stay here for long. Is she falling in love? But then there is one problem: her aunt’s love story did not end well. While Analea and Vera fell in love in this same apartment, when Analea found Vera in the present timeline, that woman was different from the Vera she knew in the apartment. There was a gap of seven years, a lot could happen in seven years, and Vera had changed; Vera had a family of her own and Analea did not want to cause her any troubles, so with a heavy heart, her aunt had warned Clementine to not fall in love with anyone in this apartment because it would not end well and would only result in a heartbreak! Even though initially Clementine thinks that this is not something she needs to worry about because she wouldn’t fall in love, later she does. Should she let her love get the better of her?
While the first few chapters might give you the feeling that this is a slow-burn romance novel, filled with pain and grief, it quickly picks up pace from the moment Clementine meets Iwan, which is where the magical realism element also begins. As the shy, grieving woman with no purpose other than her work finds Iwan, a handsome, charismatic, sweet young man in her aunt’s magical apartment, travelling through time, she experiences shock, attraction, and awe. Meeting Iwan changes her life. While magical realism forms the main foundation of the story, it also normalizes homosexual relationships, breaks gender stereotypes, reminds the reader of their favourite person they look up to, and makes one’s thoughts wander about in fantasy, thereby serving as a good escapist break. I would give this a 4-star rating. If you are a romance fan, you should try this book at least once. I would like to read more of Ashley Poston’s works after this one!
