DISCLAIMER: This review is my humble honest opinion. I DO NOT claim to have any authority/power/intention to add/delete any value of the book or of the author. I wish nothing but success to the author.

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Yesterday by Samyann is a historical romance with the central theme of reincarnation. It starts when Amanda Parker miraculously saves a Chicago policeman, Mark Callahan. Both of them instantaneously feel the connection but can’t seem to put a finger on it. Things take an interesting turn when Amanda starts slowly uncovering the layers of her past life taking the readers on a rollercoaster of a journey through time. Her previous life experiences give her a new perspective on love, life and loss which helps her immensely to make important life altering decisions.

As we move deeper into Amanda’s past, the storyline picks up pace making it a thrilling read. The book does justice to the characters from Bonnie’s timeline, and I found them more real and fleshed out than the present ones. I was able to connect easily with them and their truth especially with Bonnie and Jack.

Also, given the book’s historical backdrop, the author has done a commendable job of extensively researching the landmark events to make sure that all historical details and facts are accurate. The scenes from the historic era, the flux during war and the difficulties faced by the civilians (both black and white) have been described with great detail and authenticity.

I picked this book because of its intriguing blurb which promised romance however, I was highly disappointed, to say the least. I found the present plotline very weak and far from reality and no, I am not counting the reincarnation bit.

Even though a full-length novel, it felt like a short story which had to be unnecessarily stretched in a single dimension to fill in the pages with not much to tell. Also, the characters fall flat with no personalities of their own especially, the protagonists. I struggled to develop even the slightest thread of connection with the characters making it very difficult to care about any of it.

The protagonists don’t seem to have anything which could remotely count as chemistry apart from the fact they are somehow “connected” from their “earlier lives” which the author reminds of in every single page and fails to give any actual evidence to support the claim. We as readers are asked to simply swallow this extremely important detail (on which the entire plot rests) with no questions asked.

The book reads very slow, sometimes like a therapist’s journal, with no interesting details or events except for Amanda who is for no reason obsessed with an old antique clock and can’t seem to make up her mind. Her self-pitying routine gets exhausting after a while.  Other than the poorly executed idea, the book is littered with numerous grammatical mistakes which makes it even more unappetizing to read.

I would rate this book two out of five stars as there are a number of things which didn’t work for me. The poorly executed plot, the protagonists with no chemistry, cardboard characters, and clunky monotonous dialogues made the book a tedious task. I feel that with only Bonnie’s plot this book could have been a much better historical fiction which could have been a treat to read.

If you are interested in Chicago’s historical events, American Civil War, subject of reincarnation and regression techniques, you could give this one a try. Maybe, you’ll like it better than I did.

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