Just a beautiful read had me engaged from page one. Some couples just don’t have the opportunity to be together from day one through a series of events and misunderstanding.

we also have an adult child’s quest to get to know his family and in particular to learn all about his mum.

Some lively characters and the book enables you to get a snap shot into their lives.

This story is told from a dual timeline which is something that I enjoy.
I loved the characters and the build up but felt that the main storyline was somewhat lacking.
Saying that I would read anything by this author

I’m so late reviewing this book. Huge apologies HQ Stories.

Anyhow. This is a heartfelt and thought provoking story involving a love triangle between Emma, Yvonne and Lewis. Yvonne wants to keep her demons buried and focus on moving forward, however her guilt is always with her and weighs heavily on her heart.

The story is told in two timelines, alternating between 2001 and the present time, moving between London and Kenya and it works well.

I would’ve liked more detail about Kenya when Kiama goes back to find out more about his mother. Kiama is Lewis’ son, who went to live with him in the UK when sadly his mother died when he was eight. Naturally, when he turned 18 he wanted to explore and go back to Kenya to find out more about his mother and her death, as he still grieves, and he turns to Yvonne to help him. She knows she can’t refuse but knows that this will set in motion an unravelling of the past that maybe they’re not ready for.

Kiama’s character development was intriguing after what he had been through and what had happened to his mother.

Secrets emerge. Personal demons raise their heads.

Homecoming is a moving story of love, family and friendship it’s about coming to terms with your past, opening yourself up to the exquisite pain and pleasure of love and of what happens when three lost souls bound by one person come together and finally share their truths.

I really enjoyed it, even though it was a little slow in places, however the way in which romance, coming-of-age, friendship, betrayal and relationships were weaved into the plot was exceptional.

There are a few trigger warnings for substance abuse, infidelity, suicidal tendencies and depression.

The story ends well when Goldie pulls together everything quite simply and perfectly into a satisfactory finish.

Goldie is a great storyteller and is able to sympathetically create a story that is a pleasure to read.

Thank you so very much HQ Stories, Luan Goldie and NetGalley for this ARC provided in exchange for my unbiased review.

A book about family, friends and relationships. I enjoyed reading it. Beautifully written and flowing well.
Thank you to both the publishers and NetGalley for gifting me this book.

Thanks for my earc of Homecoming! I loved the settings in this book and between this and the characters I was fully immersed. This book feels like it’s been written with lots of heart & feeling.

My thanks to HQ for an eARC via NetGalley of ‘Homecoming’ by Luan Goldie in exchange for an honest review. My apologies for the late feedback.

This is a relationship drama that spans two decades and moves between events in England and Kenya.

In 2001, Yvonne and Emma became close friends while living in a shared student house. When Yvonne is introduced to Emma’s new boyfriend, Lewis, she is shocked to realise that she already knows him as they had hooked up at a bar some months earlier.

Not wanting to upset Emma, Yvonne and Lewis agree to keep their encounter secret. However, there’s an undeniable attraction between them. While Lewis and Emma quickly break up, things get complicated when she finds out that she’s pregnant. Emma gives birth to a son and names him Kiama. Yet what of Yvonne and Lewis? As I said … complicated.

In 2009, Emma decides to return to Kenya where she had grown up and her expat parents still live. Yet six months later Emma is dead and Kiama, deeply traumatised, returns to the U.K. to be raised by his father.

In 2020, Kiama decides that he wants to visit his grandparents in Kenya and learn more about his mother’s death. He asks Yvonne to accompany him and while she has reservations, she agrees.

The narrative point of view moves between Kiama and Yvonne as well as between the past and present. I felt that Goldie was quite restrained in holding on to certain details until late in the story and that she smoothly handled the time shifts.

It certainly held held my attention and while love triangles, secrets and lies are common themes in these kind of novels, the relationships felt vital and I was invested in whether things would be resolved for its various characters.

3.5 rounded up to 4.

I really enjoyed this novel, with the contrasting settings of London and Kenya, and two key characters, Yvonne and Kiama. I enjoyed piecing together their characters' pasts and how the lives of our two main characters intertwined.

Overall a good read with interesting characters and a good well-paced story.

With thanks to the publishers and NetGalley for an advance review copy.

At the heart of this novel is a story about the toxicity of secrets, but it is also the tale of a young man coming to terms with his mother’s violent death and finding his place in the world.

18-year-old Kiama gets in touch with his mother Emma’s old friend Yvonne, who hasn’t seen him since his mother’s violent death in Kenya when he was 8. He has quite a request - he asks her to travel with him to Kenya to revisit the scene of his mother’s death in order to lay his demons to rest. Yvonne is 40, divorced, leading a busy, tidy life, and is initially reluctant, but she is carrying a guilty secret related to Emma’s death and Kiama’s father, and has her own closure to seek.

The mysteries and secrets at the heart of the story are built up very effectively, keeping you reading to find out more. I found the character development a little less convincing however. Kiama is a suspiciously sweet teen on the cusp of adulthood, but he also has his entitled moments and acts as if the world revolves around him - perhaps understandable given his troubled early life, but he is not very convincingly fleshed out. Yvonne remains a bit of a cipher too, and I found it hard to understand why she puts up with all sorts of things that obviously bother her - the student squalor she lives in, her ramshackle first property, her secretive relationship. The life-changing trip to Kenya in search of answers is similarly anti-climactic, turning into a litany of fraught car journeys, disappointing reunions with people from Kiama’s past, and general irritability as the doMina the emotion. When the manner of Emma’s death is revealed it is not the momentous pivotal event I had been expecting, without wanting to give anything more away.

I know this book has been longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction, but I was left generally underwhelmed and feeling that it was a bit of a missed opportunity, although it is perfectly readable and not hard work.

Nightingale Point was one of my favourite books of last year so I was very highly anticipating Luan Goldie’s next book and I’m so happy to say that I very much enjoyed it. This novel follows three characters: Yvonne who has buried her demons and is trying so hard to move on with her life and to ignore her guilt. Kiama who has grown up without his mum and he desperately wants to know more about her. And Lewis, Kiama’s father, who just wants to protect his son and to keep him from the pain of the past. I loved Kiama and Yvonne in this novel and was intrigued at how she had been in his life when he was a young child but then lost touch with him over the last decade. The two end up going back to Kenya to try and resolve what happened in the past. I found this such a beautiful and moving novel. I could understand everyone’s point of view and so felt for all of the characters. The setting of London and Kenya were so vividly written that I felt I was right there along with Yvonne and Kiama. I just adored this novel and keep finding myself thinking about the characters and wondering how they are now. I recommend this one!

This is a poignant story about culture, family, friendships and love. Yvonne and Emma became friends at university, their cultures and family lives differed, but their friendship was strong until Lewis. There is a love triangle at the centre of this story, but only two people are aware they are in it. Yvonne's life, marred by her guilt over Emma and her loss of the two people she loved most in life, agrees to a journey to Keyna with Kiama Emma's son.

The story moves between the early days of their friendship to the present day. A tragic event alters everyone's lives. Believable characters, relatable relationships and well-described setting make this an absorbing read. Parenting, culture, race and social class underpin the narrative in a way that resonates. There are many poignant moments in this story, but ultimately it is positive and uplifting,

I received a copy of this book from HQ via NetGalley in return for an honest review.

This is a beautiful book and I read it almost at one sitting.

the themes are family, friendship, love and our roots.

There are thee main characters and at the time the book takes place, one of them is dead. Emma and Yvonne were close friends but there was a secret dividing them. Kiama is Emmas child and as his mother died when he was young, he grew up with his father Lewis. The secret that divided Emma and Yvonne, carries on into the future and also separates Yvonne from her best friends child. Now grown up, Kiama wants to explore his past and he invites Yvonne to help him with this, by travelling to Kenya to see his grandparents and to revisit the place his mother died.

there are twists and turns in the plot. I’m not going to spoil it for you but I encourage you to read the book, it is gripping and draws you into the story of these people, gradually revealing what has been hidden.

The dynamics of the love triangle in this story can feel frustrating - why not tell the truth we shout! But it is entirely believable and makes a good read.

A hypnotic story of love, friendship, loss and betrayal that takes you from London to Nigeria - I couldn’t put this down.
Yvonne and Emma are best friends who just happen to be in love with the same man, Lewis. When Emma has his baby after a brief fling, their friendship is never the same again, but it’s only when Yvonne returns to Nigeria with their son Kiama years later that she finally comes to terms with her feelings and guilt.
I must admit that I never warmed to Yvonne as a lead character as I found her to be fairly cold, but luckily the other characters had so much more to them, and the story was so beautifully written that I still loved this. I loved all the different family relationships and dynamics - from Yvonne’s tight knit family, to Emma’s rich but distant parents and Lewis’s warm and welcoming mother, there was a lovely contrast throughout the story. At the heart of this there is a love story, but it’s not anything like your usual romantic novels - the characters are real and make honest mistakes, and there’s no feeling of an inevitable happy ending, which I loved. There are a few twists and turns but overall this felt like an exploration of coming to terms with loss, and of the mistakes and decisions we make and the ripple effect they create.

There were some aspects of this book that I really enjoyed and then there were other parts of this book that I struggled with.

This book is a beautiful book and the friendship between Emma and Yvonne was beautiful. I enjoyed reading about them.

However, I found that the book lacked pace for me. I prefer books that have a bit more happening in them and are most engaging.

That said, the writing is beautiful and it has not put me off this author's work, I will just be sure to read anything further by this author when I need a reset.

Thank you for letting me read this book.

After enjoying 'Nightingale Point' I thought I would give another of Goldies works a try. While I didn't enjoy Homecoming as much as Nightingale Point it was still a very enjoyable and worthwhile read about grief, secrets, love & forgiveness.

I loved the dual setting of England and Kenya throughout this book and what how Kenya represented something for the characters which doesn't exist.

The characters were deeply flawed, yet I believed in them and as a reader was able to forgive them too, which adds to the overall message of the book.

Overall, a beautiful and pionant read.

I found this book a rich and moving story, with some wonderful characters, who were both believable and complex. An emotional story of love and loss and forgiveness. The story itself was very enjoyable but I did find the pace a little slow for my taste at times. I liked the flipping back and forth of the time line and thought it was well used to slowly reveal the truth of the past between Emma, Yvonne and Lewis. I loved the parts set in Kenya and found the he ending was very well done also..

Really enjoyed Luan Goldie's latest book - thank you so much for sharing this review copy. The writing was absolutely brilliant and I found myself completely immersed in this intriguing story. It's one of those books that you won't be able to put down, and you'll find yourself feeling bereft when it ends! Highly recommend.

A moving story of a split family with lots of secrets. Story told of a split timeline of three parts which made it hard to keep track of in some places but an enjoyable read all the same.

What a fabulous read. The main characters are close friends Yvonne and Emma and Lewis who becomes involved in both their lives but when a tragedy occurs it changes all of their lives. The story is set in England and Kenya and is beautifully written and the characters are very believable, it pulls at your heartstrings in an emotional way. A5🌟read and i thoroughly recommend it.

Fast paced, well written book based on betrayal.
All the characters are well described and sympathetically written. The star of the story is Kiama, the innocent party, who is moved from London to Africa, then back to London when his Mother is killed. He has a difficult time settling down with his Father and Grandmother, it takes him till he is 18 to return to Africa for some answers to long held questions about his past.
Homecoming moves through different time periods and different characters tell their version of events, easy to follow

An emotive story about friendship and family ties in the face of loss


18-year-old Kiama had grown up living with his dad Lewis and doesn’t remember much about his mother Emma, who died when he was a small child. As he reaches adulthood, he seeks out her best friend from university, Yvonne. He implores her to come with him to Kenya, on a voyage of self-discovery and to learn more about the place that his mother grew up and where they briefly lived before her passing. Kiama believes Yvonne is the only one who can help him feel closer to his mum, but Yvonne has secrets of her own that involve not just Emma, but Lewis and Kiama as well. As the unlikely pair delve into the past, they both end up discovering more than they expected, and potentially more than they can handle.


This was a well-written, richly detailed and unusual story that is told from two separate time points – Kiama and Yvonne’s voyage to Kenya in the present, and Yvonne and Emma’s friendship from university in the past. The mystery of what happened to Emma is slowly pieced together as you learn more about her past and the link between her, Yvonne and Kiama’s father Lewis, with the reveal at the end packing an emotional punch.

I found Kiama a very likeable and realistic character – I’ve often found teenagers and young people are written in a very poor and stereotyped way. Still, Kiama was believable and had the perfect combination of teenage angst and arrogance that made him both genuine and sympathetic.

Emma also came across as being fun and full of life in the flashback sections, which made the tragedy of her death all the more painful, even though you know it has already happened from the sections set in the present.


Unfortunately, I really didn’t get on with the character of Yvonne, and that really impacted on my enjoyment of the story. When I first read about her, I thought she was significantly older than she was, and quite a boring, uptight person; lacking much in the way of personality, which didn’t tie-up with the fun-loving party girl that she apparently was in her youth. I also found her behaviour towards Emma throughout the years extremely selfish and quite deplorable at times. I didn’t emphasise with her at all throughout the story. Additionally, as significant parts of the book were set in Kenya, I would’ve liked a bit more description of what I imagine is an atmospheric and vibrant country. The pace of the story was also a little slow-moving at times, and the plot could have been a bit more succinct and snappy.


In conclusion, whilst this was an enjoyable novel with an intriguing plot, it lacked a fast-pace and consistently strong characters. However, I did enjoy reading it and wouldn’t be averse to reading a novel by this author again.


Daenerys


Elite Reviewing Group received a copy of this book to review.