#BlogTour: THE NEXT CHAPTER by Rebecca Ryan @WriteBecsWrite @simonschusterUK

Publication: 17th July 2025 – Simon & Schuster UK

Lily Brown is ready to turn the page and see what adventure awaits . . .

Lily Brown prides herself on her organised, surprise-free life. Whether it’s charity yoga for polar bears or crafting a ninety-six-piece balloon arch, Lily always goes the extra mile. But when her adoptive father asks her to reconnect with her birth mother, Lola Starr – a legendary pop punk singer who vanished from fame – Lily decides to venture off the well-trodden path.

With her best friend Seb, Lily tracks Lola to her humble hotel on the beautiful Isle of Skye in Scotland, far from the glamorous life she imagined. Hiding the truth, Lily gets to know Lola and finds a kind, free-spirited woman. If life wasn’t complicated enough – she meets Noah, a charming travel writer on a quest to discover hidden gems.  
As Lily takes a chance and embraces new possibilities, she begins to question whether the safe rules she’s built her life around are what she really needs.

AMAZON

WATERSTONES

The Next Chapter is a beautiful and entertaining novel about second chances and facing the past. Lily Brown is a fantastic protagonist: funny, smart, and genuine, she is a fan of to-do lists, making plans, and eating super healthy. She is on numerous Whatsapp groups, she is looking for a stable and boring relationship and no surprises. However, her life is about to be full of surprises, when she finds a letter from her late adoptive father asking her to go and meet her birth mother, Lola Starr, a former rock star who disappeared from the music scene thirty years ago, around the time she was born. Convincing herself that she just wants to persuade Lola to let her write her memoir (which will also save her company), Lily and her best friend Seb travel to the Isle of Skye where Lola runs a hotel. Here, Lily not only will have the chance to connect with the woman she spent her entire life wondering about, but also it’s her opportunity to discover more about herself.

At times hilarious, at times emotional and heartwarming, I really enjoyed The Next Chapter. There is romance and comedy, found family and friendship, and also a new one for me, fake siblings, all framed in the beautiful setting of Scotland. The cast of characters is wonderful and authentic. On the Isle of Skye, Lola is not the only person that Lily will have to face. There is also Noah, the handsome and adventurous travel writer who convinces Lily to go on a motorbike and hike mountains even though Lily doesn’t have an adventurous bone in her body, so this creates some quite hilarious scenes, and Harper, the troubled teenager on holiday with her foster parents. The Next Chapter is a witty, immersive, and charming read that kept me immersed from the first to the last page!

A huge thank you to SJV and Simon & Schuster UK for inviting me to the blog tour and providing me with a proof of this wonderful novel.

Rebecca Ryan is the author of My (extra)Ordinary Life, The Philosophy of Love and The Next Chapter, although she can’t quite believe that she’s written three whole books. She left a career in teaching to pursue writing full time, and now mostly spends her days making up stories, replying to emails from her children’s school, or killing off brain cells watching reels on Instagram. Rebecca lives in Bradford with her three children, no small number of notebooks and an expansive collection of scatter cushions. And she wouldn’t have it any other way.