Delilah Green Doesn't Care was one of the the romances I binged earlier in the year, but reviewing it fell by the wayside. I wanted to circle back to it because it's one of my favourite romances of the year. In it we follow Delilah Green, a crotechy, all black wearing, big city photographer. She left her small town at 18 but she's forced back when her estranged half sister, Asterid asks her to be the photographer at her wedding. There she reconnects with Claire her embarrassing childhood crush who just so happens to be one of Astrid's best friends and bridesmaids.  

One thing that stood out to me about this book was how well fleshed out our two leads were. When reading a lot of romance you come to realize authors often use tropes to make rough sketches of character that fit archetypes but never go beyond them. In contrast Ashley Herring Blake uses tropes like "jaded city girl coming back to her small town" and "struggling single mom running the local bookstore" and expands them to create rich detailed characters that feel much more than plug and play tropes. 

I think what made Delilah and Claire feel like living breathing characters was the fact that they had lives outside of being in a romance with each other. On Delilah's end we follow the messiness of her relationship with her step family. We see the grief of her father' death to the anger and resentment feels at her step family and how its influenced her into adulthood. Yes, Delilah is jaded, but that description goes well beyond skin deep and we see it unfolded throughout. Her childhood insecurities (that she believes she's grown well past) actually inform how she pursues a relationship with Claire and gets in the way of her happiness in a way that made for meaningful character drama.

On Claire's end we get a rich portrait of what single motherhood looks like for her. I love single parent romances and Delilah Green Doesn't Care is a great example of how to do it right. Being a mother has a huge impact on how Claire moves in the world and how she dates. Her child is her first priority and  the book spends time showing what that relationship with her daughter, Ruby is like. Further, unlike most single parent romances where the protagonist's child is just a vessel for cute lines with maybe a single quirk, Ruby is a character in her own right with a personality beyond precocious. She builds a legitimate bond with Delilah which is essential if I'm supposed to believe she's in it for the long haul with Claire. 

I understand how all this detail about Claire and Delilah family life might put off readers looking for a focused romance but for me the richness of scope of Delilah Green Doesn't Care is what made the book so memorable even months after reading it. One of my biggest complaints with many romance books is flat side characters and hollow worlds but the level of detail and dedication to creating a full story made this book truly stand out for me.