Frances has imagined this wedding a million times. But in no version was she alone in her hotel room, trying not to cry.
In every version, she was supposed to be the one marrying Callum Sutton.
So how did they end up here?
Interwoven with the wedding weekend is the story of a friendship forever on the brink of being something more. From the early days of homemade mixtapes and drunken almost-kisses, through birthdays, weddings, life-upending bereavements, to the final heartbreak that led them here.
To Callum, marrying someone else.
As Frances unpacks her suitcase, there’s a knock at the hotel door. Callum, in the flesh, for the first time in over three years. And the answer to ‘will they, won’t they?’ suddenly becomes a lot less certain.
We Go Way Back is an epic will-they-won’t-they love story. But it’s also a novel about friendship, forgiveness, and figuring out who you want to be. It’s perfect for fans of Dolly Alderton, Coco Mellors and Caroline O’Donoghue, but, really, it’s for anyone who loves a good read-in-one-sitting, bus-stop-missing, late-into-the-night love story. This one has it all: it’s funny and tender and sexy and moving.
In every version, she was supposed to be the one marrying Callum Sutton.
So how did they end up here?
Interwoven with the wedding weekend is the story of a friendship forever on the brink of being something more. From the early days of homemade mixtapes and drunken almost-kisses, through birthdays, weddings, life-upending bereavements, to the final heartbreak that led them here.
To Callum, marrying someone else.
As Frances unpacks her suitcase, there’s a knock at the hotel door. Callum, in the flesh, for the first time in over three years. And the answer to ‘will they, won’t they?’ suddenly becomes a lot less certain.
We Go Way Back is an epic will-they-won’t-they love story. But it’s also a novel about friendship, forgiveness, and figuring out who you want to be. It’s perfect for fans of Dolly Alderton, Coco Mellors and Caroline O’Donoghue, but, really, it’s for anyone who loves a good read-in-one-sitting, bus-stop-missing, late-into-the-night love story. This one has it all: it’s funny and tender and sexy and moving.
Reviews
The love story you need in 2027. A tender, heart-wrenching, smart, will-they-won't-they tale that is so much more
A beautifully woven epic love story, filled with characters who leap off the page and into your heart, We Go Way Back is a sparkling debut that will make you laugh and cry and stay up way too late turning the pages
We Go Way Back brims with yearning and nostalgia as two soulmates try to reconcile twenty years of shared history in three days . . . before one marries somebody else. The tension between Frances and Callum crackles off the page - I couldn't put this down
An electric love story for anyone who has ever convinced themselves that they were over it, who believes that timing is everything (until it's terrible), or who wants to laugh, ache and be reminded of how big, strange and generous life can be. Funny, tender, true. Niamh Connolly writes the way life feels
Niamh Connolly's bighearted We Go Way Back illuminates the lives of two kindred souls destined to be together. Or are they? I couldn't stop turning the pages of this tender will-they-won't-they tale until I found out
I devoured this novel. With grace, precision, and immense emotional intelligence, Connolly captures the exquisite ache of longing. Beautifully written and utterly absorbing
We Go Way Back is a love story that is deeply sexy and sad and funny and unafraid of its characters' pain. Achingly honest, deft in its balance of bluntness and sincerity, it made me feel less alone and also turned me on . . . What more could one ask for, really?
I could write a book about this book, but instead I'll just say: read it, please - everything they told you about it is right, you really will struggle to put it down
Honestly the best romance I've read for years. I fell in love with the characters and ached with loss when it ended
Funny, heart-wrenching and completely divine. My favourite kind of love story
A heartfelt love story about the long tail of grief and trauma. I stayed up half the night reading it
Prepare to fall in love with Callum and Frances. This is an extraordinarily special book - so nostalgic, moving, funny, and beautifully written
If you could encapsulate yearning into a single novel it would be this one. The love, care and tenderness in We Go Way Back is addictive
I couldn't put this book down to save my own life; I felt Niamh Connolly's characters in my bones. We Go Way Back is Normal People meets My Best Friend's Wedding by a fresh voice in fiction - a masterful love story I'll be thinking about for a long time
I had a blast reading it. It's sharp, sweet and relatable, with a wicked turn of phrase. Gobbled it up in a weekend
Beautiful can't-stop-reading storytelling
Soul-wringingly gorgeous. Shot through with the yearning, longing, and embarrassment of youth, it is bittersweet and funny and tender. It beautifully portrays the anguish and euphoria of first love
I inhaled this book in one transfixed sitting. An epic love story with nerve-shredding sexual tension, you'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll scream into a cushion. Connolly writes with humour and compassion, insight and skill
Declaring my love for this book without hesitation or fear, in a way these wonderful, funny, infuriating, heartbreaking characters just can't! I've never read such a warm story set in such cold Irish houses. Niamh Connolly, what a spectacular debut!
We Go Way Back had me turning the pages late into the night, often through tears. Stunning, searing and sexy, this is an epic, decades-spanning love story that will make you believe in soulmates