Well, contemporary romance and I have had a good run. I’ve mostly been good at picking the books in this genre that I’m actually going to like. And I really wanted to like this one too, but my feelings about it are pretty conflicted.

I did love the characters, especially Michael. Okay, mostly Michael. All of his internal conflicts are totally ridiculous, but they feel real. HE feels real. His family is written in a really lovely way. I adored his mother and grandmother and sisters from their first introduction, and if I read the other books in the series, it will definitely be to see more of that family.

My feelings about Stella are more complicated. The writing of her autism is really sensitive and thoughtful, which makes sense because Helen Hoang is also autistic. And I think this book tackles internalized ableism in a refreshing way. But Stella is SO rich and SO privileged and SO invested in capitalism and also SO straight that it was really hard for me to care about her as much as I wanted to.

This book as a whole is one of the most aggressively heterosexual things I’ve ever read. The whole underwear thing made me cringe multiple times. And that’s a personal thing! Many readers would find that aspect of the story sweet and endearing, but it was all too gendered and too California capitalist for me to really care as much as I would have liked.