Happy Tuesday everyone, and possibly not a surprise that I’ve picked the new Annabel Monaghan this week, but it is so fun and I enjoyed reading it so much that I couldn’t help myself.
Dolly is a problem solver. When her mum left when she was a preteen, now her family needs her and she’s 39. She’s back in her home town with her son for the summer to try and help save the family home. And that’s why, when the scion of the Whitfield family (so prominent the town is named after them) asks her to pretend to be his girlfriend after she helps him with a flat tire, she says yes. Except that the more time they spend together, the more she likes him – and the more she thinks he likes here, even though his world of galas and charity dinners is usually one she only sees when she delivers the seafood from her family store. But can Dolly bring herself to put her trust in someone else for once?
If I was doing the 50 states challenge this year, this would be the book for Rhode Island and it would not have been a hardship at all. I love a summer people and year round people clash of cultures story (it’s sort of rich people problems adjacent really isn’t it) and also a hero who can come in and make life easier for the heroine by throwing some cash around in a nice, non-skeevy way. A rich hero could be a little fraught in the current climate, but Monaghan deals with that pretty well, by making Stewart the guy who wants to pivot his family property business towards renovating historic buildings (rather than strip malls) and he’s not a billionaire so it was fine for me.
I read this in double quick time and really, really enjoyed it. It’s a satisfying romance with a great cast of characters and a lovely setting, which does some of the things I like about Pretty Woman, but without the sex work, rude sales ladies and opera! It’s not quite Nora Goes Off Script (but what is!) but I think it may be my favourite Monaghan after that.
This should also be pretty easy to get hold of – I’d preordered the paperback but it’s also on Kindle and Kobo.
Happy Reading!
Verity Reads Books (lots of them) 