It is the second book of the sequel but the stories are set before the ones in the first book, so you get more insight into the lives of those who run the cafe. In short, it is a prequel.

The promise of this book is the same. It revolves around the experience of a couple of protagonists who have lost someone and wish to see them one more time. Something has been preventing the protagonists from moving on in their lives, hence this desire to go back in time to get closure. The only place where they can meet them again in the past is a small Café called Funiculi Funicula.

When you have read the first book and know the important rules that the protagonist must follow in order to be able to come back from the past, you realize that the second book just repeats the core or the premise from the first one. I got bored. The book just dragged itself to the last and only interesting story; The owners’ one. I couldn’t care less about all of the customers wanting to go back to the past. It became too repetitive. Each time, we are told the rules. Each time, we are given a description of what happens when the customers travel back in time. Each time, their travels go right.

It would have been so much cooler if we were investing in a customer’s journey that went left. We are constantly given alerts about rules that could go awry. We are only given the ghost woman we know nothing about in this book and hardly know about in the first one as an example of what might happen to them if they don’t respect the rules. Why am I not given the full story of that ghost woman? I know it might sound gruesome, but it would have been more exciting. Despite being a 200pages book that could have been read in one go, it took me forever to read it. Because I did not give two cents about the customer’s motives for travelling back in time. If I want to reread a book, I pick it up from my shelves and read it again, I don’t go to the bookstore to buy another version of it with slight changes. I may be harsh on that one, but it was a disappointment.

Besides, notice how there is a cat in the cafe design of the book covers. There are no cats whatsoever in the books. I am fond of cats in stories and I felt kind of tricked by this design, which suggested that there might be a cat character. I literally shake my head at that kind of misleading marketing. 

Picador( publishers) do better. 

I would say that this book is not necessary. I should have been warned by the title that is exactly the same one as the other book with nothing else added. I get why now.