Tag: romance

Recommendsday, romance

Recommendsday: Famous people romances

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A couple of years ago now, in spring 2023 I read a pair of books about a famous person and a normal (or normalish) person – Nora Goes Off Script and Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld. Since then I’ve read a bunch more because it really seems to be a trend, and since then we e had a positive rash of romances about campus people and normal people, or just involving famous or famous adjacent people. And I suspect the flood is not over yet because Parasocial relationships with famous people means these things sell. So for this week’s Recommendsday I’ve got a bit of a round of some of the others that I’ve read. And be warned, this is less a list of recommendations, more a survey of my reading…

The Break-Up Pact by Emma Lord

The premise here is good (if a bit far fetched) – with two former best friends doing some fake dating to reclaim the narrative after their respective relationship breakups go viral – but the reality of it is that I found it a really frustrating read. Neither the hero nor the heroine seems capable of using their words ever, and almost everything about their relationship (or lack thereof) and everything that goes wrong could have been sorted with a proper conversation. Add to that the fact that the heroine is both too stupid/naïve to live as well Peak Not Like Other Girls and the hero is incapable of making a decision on his own, and the only reason I made it to the end of this was to see if her ex got sufficient comeuppance for dumping her for his reality TV show co-star. Spoiler: he did get some comeuppance, but not really at the hands of the heroine. Which given how the rest of the book had gone for her was unsurprising by that point. Deeply, deeply annoying.

Love Songs and Ferry Tales by Julie Farley

This is a famous person-normal person type romance set on an island in the Pacific Northwest. Although there were things I liked about it, the pacing didn’t feel quite right to me – the ending wrapped up far too fast and didn’t quite resolve everything that the prior narrative felt it should have done. And your tolerance for deception may impact how much you enjoy the romance as the heroine doesn’t know the hero’s real identity for quite a lot of the book (and your ability to believe she wouldn’t have recognised him). A couple of the characters are meant to be British – but you wouldn’t really know except for odd bits of (not remotely accurate*) British trivia dropped in from time to time- which as a Brit really annoyed me! Also for me her brothers tipped over from fun comic relief into meanness. So not entirely successful for me – in fact I downgraded it a star on Goodreads while writing this review when I realised how much about it annoyed me!

How to Fake it In Hollywood by Ava Wilder

Grey’s role in a long running show has just ended and she needs to give her career a boost. So she agrees to a fake relationship with a troubled heartthrob. Ethan is newly divorced, newly sober and in mourning for his best friend; but he wants to produce the last movie they wrote together so he agrees to the plan to try and get everything back on track. And obviously sparks fly. This is another where I have distinctly mixed feelings. I bought it off the back of the preview, but for me the rest of the book doesn’t live up to the promise of that. It’s a fake relationship trope which I love but there’s not enough character development and growth here for me. There are some similar issues going on with Ethan and the hero to Funny You Should Ask, but in that book you get to spend large amounts of time with later Gabe and see that he really has changed and got a handle on stuff. You don’t have that here, and I’m not sure that I actually wanted them to end up together – I think Grey deserved better or at least more time to see that Ethan really has sorted himself out. Never mind.

I also read Melissa Ferguson’s Famous for a Living a year or two back which probably falls within the scope of this post- it’s about an influencer who goes to work at a national park in Montana after her career implodes and a rugged park ranger. When you read it, it’s more a voyage of self discovery than a romance – and there’s a lot of heavy lifting on that front done at the end. Still I did want to visit the national park afterwards, even if I didn’t love the book!

And that’s your lot. You could probably add Thank you for Listening to this list, but I’ve already written about it once and this is meant to be stuff I haven’t told you about before, but I did like it more than I like any of the three I have written about here so there’s that in its favour!

Happy Humpday!

*spoilers ahead: the hero grew up in Watford which is described as “Our town is far enough outside of London to not be a commuter town. Most people work in the factories and businesses nearby” and at one point says “ Sam and I took the Tube in a couple of times in high school, but we never had enough money to do anything once we got there.” The idea that Watford is not a commuter town is absolutely laughable and that someone living there would only have been into London from there a couple of times as a teen is frankly insane. I commute through Watford every week day and it is a) only 15 miles from central London and b) inside the tfl network so is actually massive commuter area as is evidenced by the fact that my train fills to full and standing only every time it stops there. Its like saying that no one from New Jersey commutes in to New York to work. Thus I suspect that the author has never been to Britain.

Book of the Week, new releases

Book of the Week: Philippa Flynn’s Year of Panic and Piracy

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I’m actually following up on a new release I mentioned a couple of weeks back for this week’s pick, because it really lived up to the promise of the blurb and the gorgeous cover and was a really great read.

At the start of the book Philippa is cycling to work as a university professor when she narrowly misses falling into a sinkhole as it opens up. This near miss gives her a wake up call and suddenly she doesn’t want to put up with the frustrations of her academic job any more – whether it’s the office that’s actually a cupboard or the (male) colleagues who seem to only value her for the fact they can force her to do the jobs they don’t want to. So she hands in her notice and throws her life in to chaos. Luckily she inherited her romance-author grandmother’s house (and boat) and so she moves back there to regroup. Unluckily the house is in need of some serious repair and also comes with a sitting tenant – her grandmother’s former co-writer (and cover model). As Philippa and Dylan start to navigate their awkward co-habitation situation they also get to know each other and eventually find outlines for six more novels in Philippa’s grandmothers fantasy pirate romance series, which they start to write together. But can Philippa actually find a new future outside of academia?

This has a really good slow burn romance with two characters who have a lot of issues to work through, but because Philippa has the backstop of selling the house (which is on prime ocean front land) the stakes are lower than you might expect. She does have the most awful parents that I have recently encountered in literature and I really, really wanted them to get a lot of comeuppance (more than they did get, I’m warning you). But Philippa and Dylan’s slow dance towards each other is worth putting up with the rage that her mother will generate in you (her siblings are better than her parents, mostly, but that’s not saying much). Philippa’s disillusionment with academia felt very real – as did her difficulty in letting go of her plan for her life and figuring out a new one. I think that’s very relatable for millennials especially, who graduated into the financial crisis of 2008 and feel like they’ve been trying to make their lives more secure ever since then.

And as a romance reader, I loved that Philippa’s grandmother was a romance author of the old school type and that romance novels were the answer to Philippa figuring herself out and finding love. This is a warm hug of a novel – well except for the leaking roof, and bracing sea breezes – and would make a great autumnal read as you curl up on a sofa and hide from the changing seasons. I haven’t read any of Jacqueline Firkins’ other books but I’m pretty sure I have at least one of them on the TBR so you may see that popping up on the weekly list soon too!

My copy came from NetGalley but it was an Amazon First Reads pick in August before it came out at the start of September and is now in Kindle Unlimited so if you’re in that you can get it. That does mean it’s not on Kobo at the moment, and I also don’t have much of a sense of how easy it might be to find in the shops but I’ll be keeping an eye out for it.

Happy Reading!

Book of the Week

Book of the Week: The Irresistible Urge to Fall For Your Enemy

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Happy Tuesday everyone, this week’s choice was one of the easiest that I have recently made. I started this one on Sunday night and finished it on Tuesday and I would have finished it sooner if I hadn’t had to work. Anyway, to the book.

Osric is a member of an order of assassins, Aurienne is a healer and a member of an enemy order. But Osric needs an expert healer – he’s injured and his order doesn’t let members retire. Luckily Aurienne desperately needs funding to help find a cure for a disease that’s ravaging children. And that is how the two of them find themselves flung together. As Aurienne (reluctantly) tries to heal Osric, the two of them discover that there may be some thing bigger behind the reoccurrence of the Pox. The trouble is that the longer the two of them spend in each other’s company, the harder it is to ignore the attraction between them – no matter how much they want to ignore it.

This was just a total delight. Really, it absolutely was. It’s got witty banter, two main characters who really don’t want to like each other but who really need each other and the forced proximity is truly epic. If I have a gripe with it, it’s that you don’t get all the answers in this book – but that’s also good news because it means there is a sequel, which came out in July. I wish I’d read this sooner – because the sequel was on NetGalley if only I’d known and now I’m going to have to pay money (and quite a lot of money) for it if I want to know what happens next any time soon.

I have a very mixed record on fantasy, but this is exactly the sort of end of fantasy that I like. It’s not cozy but it’s not to terribly high concept for me to deal with. Snarky banter is one of my favourite things in books and this has some of the best banter I’ve recently encountered as well as a brilliant inner monologue from the two leads to keep you going when they’re not actively fighting with each other. And the slow burn and forced proximity is excellent. it’s just so good. So, so good.

This one is super easy to get hold of – I’ve seen it in bookshops all over the place in the last year and just never got around to picking it up (more fool me) and of course it’s on Kindle and Kobo too. Place your bets now on how long I manage to resist the sequel!

Happy Reading!

Recommendsday

Recommendsday: Sports Romances 2

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After doing Books with Sports earlier in the year and first sports romances post back in 2024, I’m back with a sequel because we are now deep into the Summer of Sport – England play Argentina tonight for a place in the World Cup Final on Sunday, the Wimbledon finals were last weekend and the Commonwealth Games start next week – I’ve got two sports romances for you too. And it’s only two because the reviews are slightly extended, because I had *a lot* to say!

Abby Offsides by Anna McCallie*

This is about an American social media manager who runs away to the UK and gets a job working on a Premier League club’s social accounts. The club is basically Liverpool (but it’s called Mersey) and soon Abby’s forming a friendship with the club’s latest signing – Lachlan – who is returning to the club he grew up at. When she has to move out of her flatshare, she moves into his spare room, but is it really a friendship or is there chemistry for something more? I think this is going to be a divisive one – and it’s worth noting that the blurb and cover are very different on the UK and US version. The UK cover is the one above – the US one is the one below.

The US is more women’s fiction coded, but the UK one has a very different sell and blurb – including on NetGalley where I got it from. And the difference is something so fundamental to the plot that I might not have requested it if I didn’t know about it – and that is that the hero is married. This isnt me Toones in the UK blurb, but the US one does has a reference: “despite the nagging guilt she feels about Lachlan’s mysterious wife who didn’t relocate with her husband.”

I’m not a hardcore no cheating in my novels person, but it’s a tricky line to tread. And the problem is that this is trying to tread it with a heroine who met the hero in the workplace, and is not acting at all professionally – beyond the wife issue, Abby is also keeping it a secret from her bosses that she’s living in his flat and to top it all off she’s working in sport, which is an area where women struggle to be accepted and treated as equals and has been told by her boss that they’re not interested in employing people who want to be WAGs. And yet, there she is. Oh and the whole reason she’s in the UK in the first place is because her fiancé cheated on her… I think under normal circumstances – with any other conflict at the centre of it – this would have been a book where I would have read it, and then realised afterwards when I was trying to analyse it that I had more issues with it than I thought. But because I was already analysing and thinking about the cheating issue I was reading with a more sceptical and critical lens than I might otherwise have been. But your mileage on this may vary depending on whether you were expecting “a novel” or “a romance”. This came out at the end of June and it’s 99p on Kindle and Kobo this month – so if you want to read it and tell me what you think, the outlay is small!

First and Forever by Lynn Painter

Duffy is a huge fan of her local NFL team, but she’s become enemy number one with the fans after she shoved the team’s mascot away from her for being a creep. She goes on to a TV show to try and clear her name – only to find herself face to face with Connor Cunningham, the team’s star player. The team is on a terrible run, but Connor is their star – and desperate to stay with the team who he suspects are going to trade their best players away as part of their rebuild plan*. So when the team ask him to take Duffy out on a date after their TV appearance generates some good press – he just can’t tell her what’s going on. You know where this is going.

This reads a bit new adult, and Duffy is a bit Not Like Other Girls as well as oblivious, but I’d rather have Duffy than Abby from the last book. A simple conversation could have fixed the issues in their relationship and Duffy’s family are terrible to her in a sort of oblivious way rather than a mean one, but it’s pretty readable and non-toxic NFL romance. Do I prefer the Chicago Stars series? Yes. But is it better than any of the Tessa Bailey Sports romances I’ve tried? Also yes. This is a pretty new release – it came out at the end of May and it’s also 99p on Kindle and Kobo at the moment, so again it’s not a big outlay and I liked this more than I liked Abby Offsides, so this one is more of a recommendation than the other one.

Also, this is a great opportunity to tell you that if you read that last post and remember me mentioning a massive hanging plot thread in the Simone Soltani book that the third book in that series, Crash Into You, comes out in August and is about the driver at the centre of that hanging plot thread – so we finally know that Zaid suffered two broken wrists which is not as life threatening as the first book implied (although definitely potentially career threatening) unless I’m missing something mega. Given that I didn’t love Cross the Line and the blurb for this says it’s also a pregnancy plot, I will probably give this one a miss – but that may well be right up some of your streets.

On the books I’d like to read front, Playing for Keeps by Alexandria Bellefleur which came out in January, is sports adjacent – featuring Poppy, a publicist for an NFL quarterback and Rosaline, the publicist for a popstar whose two client start a romance (yes, it’s also Tayvis adjacent) and I’ve got The Open Era on the Kindle although I’m not sure that’s actually a romance-romance for all that it’s recommended for “fans of Heated Rivalry and Challengers”.

Happy Humpday!

*This is an actual thing that NFL teams do try when they’re doing really, really badly – the Miami Dolphins seem to be currently trying it for the second time this decade!

Book of the Week, romance

Book of the Week: Dream on, Ramona Riley

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Happy Tuesday, it’s book of the week day again. and I think maybe the Deanna Raybourn was my favourite-favourite last week – but that’s the eighth in the series and the given that i’s nearly the end of June and thus the end of Pride month, it’s maybe fitting that the last BotW of the month is a queer romance.

Dream On, Ramona Riley is both a small town romance and a normal person and famous person one. When Ramona’s mum ran away, teenage Ramona helped her dad with her baby sister until Ramona left for college. Then when her dad was involved in an accident, she dropped out and gave up her dreams of a career in costume design to come home and help her family again. But now Olive is about to leave for college and Ramona’s best friend wants her to give up her job in the local diner and pursue her dreams again. And it just happens that this summer there is a big budget Hollywood rom-com coming to film in town, that might give Ramona the chance to kickstart her dreams. The only problem is that one of the stars of the movie is Dylan Monroe, the actress daughter of two 90s rock stars and also Ramona’s first kiss, one magical night back when she was a teenager, and now Ramona has to teach her to waitress and other Normal People things.

I realise that that seems like it’s already quite a lot of plot, but actually it really is just the set up and there’s loads more that happens after that and I’m not spoiling anything. This has got the same sort of witty dialogue that Ashley Herring Blake’s previous series Bright Falls has – and actually in a delightful crossover between the old series and the new, the movie that is being filmed is based on one of Iris’s books. It’s got a culture clash between the small town life and the famous people one, Dyland has got a lot of issues about her upbringing that she’s working her way through and the two heroines are keeping so many secrets from each other it’s a wonder they manage to sort it all out satisfactorily at the end, but they do, and I’m almost convinced that they’re going to manage to make it work despite their very different life experiences. It’s got quite a lot of sex scenes in it – more I think than the Bright Falls series and some language in them that I don’t love, but hey, each to their own, at least nothing was described as oozing or dripping…

I’ve already got the second in this series, Get Over It, April Evans, on the shelf after my trip to Gay’s the Word, whcih was actualyl the catalyst for reading the first one, and there is a third (and maybe final?) book in the series, Take a Chance, Sasha Sinclair, coming out in September, so you never know by the end of the year I may even have read the whole series! I definitely enjoyed this one enough that I won’t delay reading the next one too long.

I bought this in Saucy Books back at the end of last summer, but I’ve seen it in a bunch of other bookshops since then too. And it’s available on Kindle and Kobo too.

Happy Reading!

romance, series

Romance Series: Written in the Stars

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It’s Friday and it’s Pride month so I’ve got a romance series that fits the brief for you. I was going to say trilogy because there are three of them, but I think trilogy suggests that they have to be read in order or together, but you don’t – they’re linked by a friendship group but you don’t need to have read the previous one to enjoy the next on. In fact I read the first one last and it bothered me not a whit on that front.

This is a series of three connected romances set in Seattle. The first one is Written in the Stars about an astrologer and an actuary who end up in a fake relationship for: reasons – Elle is looking for the one and Darcy isn’t looking for anything after a broken engagement. The second book is Hang the Moon and features Darcy’s brother Brendan who is a side character in the first book and Annie who is in town to visit friends before she moves around the world. And finally Count Your Lucky Stars is Elle’s best friend and business partner Margot and her former best friend and first love Olivia.

These are fun romances with interesting characters and witty dialogue. I like them rather than love them – mostly because a lot of the conflict could be solved by people using their words and having conversations. But that’s a common gripe for me and honestly I’d often rather have misunderstandings based on not communicating, which is pretty low stakes over some of the Big Dramatic things and definitely over Creepy Danger ones! I’ve actually got one of Alexandria Bellefleur’s standalone novels waiting on the virtual TBR which I really should get around to before I acquire any more and she has two more books coming out this year as well, including a second paranormal romance.

The good news if you want to read these sis that book one and book three are in Kindle Unlimited and Kobo Plus at the moment and although the middle one isn’t, it’s still only £1.99. I think my favourite is book three – but I wouldn’t swear to it!

Have a great weekend.

Book of the Week, romance

Book of the Week: Star Shipped

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Amidst all the Marilyn Monroe of yesterday, I forgot to mention that June is Pride Month and I’ve got some bits and bobs planned for that – so keep your eyes peeled on that front as we head through the month. And I’m also coincidentally starting the month off with a m/m romance pick so that’s somewhat serendiptious too. This was also one of the books in my Anticipated new releases post at the start of the year, so I’m really pleased that it lived up to my expectations for it!

Star Shipped is Cat Sebastian’s first contemporary romance and it’s a slow burn enemies to lovers story about two co-stars on a sci-fi TV series. It’s told entirely from the point of view of Simon, who has spent seven years hating his co star Charlie even as the fans analyse their every move on screen to try and work out if their characters are (secretly) in love. Now he’s leaving the show and can get away from it all. Except that there’s a chance that people might think he’s been forced to leave the show because he’s difficult to work with (which he knows he kinda is) and that could cause him problems down the line. Charlie is also worried that he might catch the blame for Simon’s exit because of what happened during his first season on the show. So they agree to stage a public friendship to try and quash any rumours. And then when Charlie needs to leave LA in a hurry, somehow Simon finds himself joining him. Thus begins a road trip that should be everything that Simon hates, but he’s actually sort of enjoying. And maybe they actually don’t hate each other after all?

I read this in less than 24 hours from getting my grubby hands on it (it was delivered to my parents house for *reasons*) and when I was on a family holiday away in Wales and probably should have been being more sociable (sorry family) because it was just so good. I’m going to have to take some time to think about why Simon – a hero with an actual anxiety problem that he’s not really dealing with that well – worked for me when some other anxious main characters have really not, because I’m not sure how I could have enjoyed it more. It also fell exactly on the right side of the enemies part of the enemies to lovers spectrum – mostly Simon’s “hatred” of Charlie consists of being snarky to him (off page, before the book starts) rather than pranks or things that actually affect Charlie’s career, and Charlie never really hated Simon to start with. Then you add in a road trip (love a road trip) with some Only One Bed scenarios and a bit of found family and it’s really my thing. Additionally this is quite low angst on the external front – and none of the angst comes from fear of being outed or homophobia in it’s many forms and I really like that too.

This came out in paperback at the end of April – I had mine pre-ordered from Waterstones in their pre-Christmas discount offer and what has turned up appears to be an American edition but I’m not complaining. I spotted this in Gay’s the Word when I was in there a week or two back, but I’m not 100 percent sure if I’ve seen it anywhere else yet. It’s £1.99 on Kindle and Kobo this month, which is annoyingly a pound more than it was lat month, but it’s not often that Cat Sebastian is on offer at all, so don’t necessarily rely on it dropping back down. That said there are a few of Sebastian’s back catalogue at £1.99 at the moment, so if you have gaps in your library you want to fill in this may be the time.

Happy Reading!

Recommendsday, romance

Recommendsday: Recent Romance Reads

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It’s Wednesday again and today I’ve got three reviews for you of romance novels that I’ve read in the last little while. These are all new – or relatively new – releases. The is the newest because Alisha Rai came out last week and the Jeevani Charika is the oldest and came out in November.

Enemies to Lovers by Alisha Rai*

Sejal’s got some issues: her parents were on both the wrong side of the law, also each other and sometimes her. This means that there are also some unsavoury people after her and she’s been trying to lie low. Krish’s brother has gone missing, and he’s pretty sure Sejal’s crime family have got something to do with it. So he does what any self respecting brother would do: pretends to be an FBI agent and persuade Sejal to help him find his brother. This means an epic cross country road trip where a grudging truce starts to seem like it’s turning into something else. I have a mixed record with career criminals but I love a road trip novel and I’ve really enjoyed some of Alisha Rai’s other series (including the complicated characters in the Forbidden Love series) so this was a no-brainer for me to read. However – it is the second in a series and I hadn’t read the first so I think I would have got more out of it if I had. That said it’s a twisty romantic-suspense that’s at the less scary end of the spectrum with really interesting and complicated protagonists who are both hiding plenty of things from each other and from themselves. It took a bit longer than I was expecting for me to get into it, but I did enjoy it a lot.

How Can I Resist You by Jeevani Charika*

Vidya is on a work trip to Waterloo Bay. Or at least that’s the main reason that she’s there. The other reason is that her sister came to a work party and hooked up with one of Vidya’s colleagues and can’t remember who and as the sensible sister Vidya is trying to find out who it is – based on a vague description and a shoulder tattoo. One of the suspects is Leo – handsome, furstrating and above all a colleague. This is a fun rom-com with a buttoned up rule following hero and a heroine who feels like she’s always trying to fix her sister’s problems. This took me a little bit to get into, I think because of the involvement of a trope that I don’t love (which I can’t tell you because it’s a spoiler) but it’s only a tangential thing mostly and once I got into it I was properly up and running. I liked the work trip setting – all the worrying about the HR issues that are thrown up by trying to see a colleague’s tattoo on a part of their body that is usually covered by clothing from Vidya and from Leo’s side the fact that Vidya’s a colleague and he’s been burnt by that before. Also there’s a seagull. This is the fifth book by Charika that I’ve read and although The Winner Bakes It All is still my favourite, this is pretty good too.

Falling for the Rabbi by Jennifer Wilck*

Josh is a Rabbi whose grandmother has got a matchmaker involved to try and find him a partner. Except when he turns up on the first date that the matchmaker has arranged she has bought her best friend along with her – a best friend who happens to be the same person who is buying his grandmother’s house. Emma is buying the house so that she can fulfill her dream of starting her own business and opening a bookshop. The two of them have more chemistry than Josh does with his actual date, but are there too many obstacles in the way for them to have their happy ending. This was my first actual Harlequin-Harlequin romance in I don’t know how long and I thought the premise was really promising. However it felt a little 2D in the execution – the side characters felt very black and white and you didn’t really get to know a lot about Josh or Emma’s inner life beyond her issues with trust and his with change. Now I would say that this is partly a limitation of the format, except that I’ve read some really good Harlequin/Mills and Boons that managed to flesh out the characters and conflicts really well – and this is a Harlequin special edition, so I think it actually has more pages/word count at it’s disposal than some. Still, it’s always nice to read a romance with a bookshop owner and it was a perfectly find way to pass a few hours.

Happy Humpday everyone!

Book of the Week, romance

Book of the Week: Slow Dance

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We’re less than a month away from the release of Rainbow Rowell’s new novel Cherry Baby, so I thought I could probably risk reading her previous adult work now. You know what I’m like about saving things sometimes. Anyway, I wasn’t feeling very well last week so it seemed like a good potential treat in a week when I needed one. And here it is, this week’s BotW,

Shiloh and Cary were best friends in high school. The two of them and the third member of their trio Mikey were inseparable. But it was Shiloh and Cary that everyone thought would end up together. But they didn’t – and more than a decade later they’re going to meet for the first time in years at Mikey’s second wedding. Shiloh’s divorced with two small kids and Cary’s in the Navy, spending months at a time at sea. But is this the time that they will finally work out that they’re meant to be together?

This jumps backwards and forwards between the characters’ present day, high school and college showing how things were, how it fell apart and how they’re trying to make it work. I ended up really enjoying this, but I did have a few frustrations about it. Both characters needed to use their words more and have actual conversations, but I understood why they didn’t as teens because both had complicated home situations that they were working their way through. However, being inside Shiloh’s head made me anxious some of the time because the self sabotage was very real. But perhaps that’s what makes you root for them so much. This made me feel quite on edge through the final third, waiting for it all to fall apart again, but actually the resolution was pretty good. I can find military heroes a bit trying, but I understood why Cary was joining the Navy and what it was doing for him, but it was very much in the subtext and I felt like Shiloh’s lack of understanding about as a teen that was quite out of character for her considering how smart she was in other ways.

I can see that it won’t be for everyone – common threads in reviews that haven’t enjoyed it are around Shiloh being too hard to care for because of a perceived “too cool for school” or “not like other girls” type personality, or the characters not changing/developing as the years pass, but honestly I read Shiloh more as stand-offish and not letting people get close to her because if people are close they can hurt you (or judge you) more than anything else, and I think they did grow and change although it’s mostly in the subtext rather than one character overtly saying “OMG you would never have done that when we were at school” or similar. But I read this across about 24 hours and was smiling at the end, so that’s a pretty good recommendation and if you look at how much I’ve written about it, it will at least make you think!

My copy of Slow Dance came from NetGalley (yes I know, I told you I was behind) but it’s out in paperback now as well as in Kindle and Kobo. Rowell has a new book out in April, so I wouldn’t be surprised to see a price drop on the ebook price next month to go with the new release. You should be able to find it in bigger bookshops relatively easily too.

Happy Reading

Book of the Week

Book of the Week: The Love Haters

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I mentioned yesterday that I had to crack out an emergency book over the weekend because I wasn’t feeling very well and that’s what I’ve ended up picking today: the latest Katherine Center, The Love Haters, which came out in paperback back in November. And it’s particularly good timing because it turns out that Center has written an Amazon Original story that is out today too.

Katie Vaughan is a videographer. For her day job she works for a small media company who make corporate and promotional video. For herself she makes day in the life videos about people who have done something heroic. The trouble is the passion project doesn’t pay the rent and there is a massive round of layoffs happening at the day job. So that’s why when her boss Cole offers her a last chance job she takes it. Trouble is, it’s filming a coast guard rescue swimmer and Katie doesn’t swim and the swimmer is Hutch, Cole’s brother. Hutch is internet famous after his rescue of a dog went viral, but he’s turned down every interview request since. But Katie really needs her job, so she heads off to the Florida Keys, where she finds that everything is just a bit different – and Hutch is definitely not what she was expecting either.

So I had a few qualms at a couple of points when I was reading this. Firstly there was a point where I was worried that this was going to have too much comedy based on humiliation, then there was a big third act twist that I was a bit dubious about and then I was concerned about the finale. But every time, it pulled it around – for me at least. I can see from the reviews that some people have found the plot strand around body image too much for them, but as someone who grew up in the terrible times that were the early 2000s I could totally understand where Katie was coming from and found her evolution on that front quite satisfying. Hutch is a great character – I wasn’t really aware of Coast Guard Swimmers being a thing before this book, but it was the perfect match of character and job and makes total sense for the way that the ending plays out. I don’t know that it’s my favourite of hers – I think I love The Rom-Commers the most, and it’s not a surefire recommendation for people because for reasons that may be apparent from what I’ve already written, but I read this in the space of an afternoon and evening and really enjoyed it.

This is out now in Kindle, Kobo and paperback. It’s showing up as being in stock in some of the London Waterstones so I think you should be able to get it in stores too.

Happy Tuesday!