I cannot overstate how disappointed I was by this book. Initially, it was a three star read: the writing style and I were not getting along, and I prefer a little more tension in my boss/employee romance. The vibe here was very much more friends-to-lovers than boss & employee.

It lost another star about halfway through the book, for plotlines that came out of nowhere and some math that just wasn't mathing. The attention to detail didn't seem like it was there to me.

And then, finally, we're down to one star at 10% left in the book, which seems pretty late to have something that egregious come up, but even if it had been a 5 star read till then we'd still be here. Ray

is sent to prison for conspiracy to commit fraud, because he made some terrible decisions that absolutely didn't have to be made. He's not thrilled about it, but accepts that it's his debt to pay to society. Elvin describes Ray's six-month prison sentence "more like an extended stay in a country club," with a tennis court on site, and tells us that Ray was "delight[ed]" that the two of them got several conjugal visits, because "he wanted the 'full experience,' he claimed, even though his living arrangements were more like a college dorm room than a real prison."

I'm an American and reading this from an American perspective, and this book is set in Canada. But it's clear that Ray's privilege as a wealthy person from an even wealthier family went a long way in quickly bailing him out and then getting him a fairly lenient sentence. It's disturbing to me to see the prison sentence being presented as a small obstacle to be waved through in the epilogue, instead of a life-changing event that Ray got the absolute best version of in a system that disproportionately jails Indigenous and Black Canadians.

Unfortunately, I cannot in good conscience recommend this book. Thank you Carina and NetGalley for the ARC.

CWs:

childhood financial insecurity, sick parent, temporarily sick sibling, absentee parents, drug transport, incarceration