lisaluvsliterature's Reviews (4.19k)

Listened to this audiobook as another shorter holiday read/listen. I actually kind of liked the idea of a holiday on my own. Not that I have issues with my family, I love the family time of holidays! However I do so many things on my own, including trips/vacations, I thought this sounded like something fun to do some day. Maybe later on in life when my family is (knock on wood it’s not soon) gone or off doing other things as my niece and nephew grow up. It would have been nice to maybe have a separate male narrator, but it worked out okay with the one narrator that I could enjoy it. Maggie had a lot of negative thoughts that at a certain point I was relieved when she finally stopped herself from thinking them. It was a bit annoying, even as I know that I do the same thing. Some bits were predictable, but overall it was a fun and sweet holiday romance, and quick to read as well!

This was another quick read. I got the fun paperback from my TBTB Santa this year. It started off really strong, with an aspect that I feel kind of got lost in the shuffle by the end. Not a bad thing, but something that I would have enjoyed seeing explored a little more. I did get a little confused while reading because it was similar to another holiday e-book I was fitting in bursts at work, lol. Plus one that I finished and one that I DNFed. Very similar topic for a lot of these holiday romances. Coming back to an enemy or a guy that now wants them back. I will probably want to read more by this author!

Eh, the "virgin" doesn't make sense in why she is one, and why she's now going to be okay with a quickie one night stand. Even if it is with someone she has a crush on.  Guess I read so much good romance now that I just can't do not so good ones.

It was really very repetitive and some scenes were confusing because she was talking about his fingers making her feel things, but then the next paragraph he pulled her towards him, so how?

This was a quick and easy read. The story was good, although a lot of back and forth between the two characters that got a bit annoying at times. The grammar and spelling in a few places needed to be caught, but overall, not a bad read.

This was another possible book for next year’s Gateway Award nominees. I finally got the audiobook from the library. Now, it started out kind of slow and I couldn’t quite see where it was supposed to be going exactly. Also the narrator wasn’t the best, so it might have been one better reading. However, about 20% of the way in it started getting really interesting. And as it went on it really got dark, but had a lot of crazy stuff happening. Things just kept snowballing and getting worse, and it was really keeping me listening at that point, wondering what in the world was going to happen. And if things were really like that outside the area, or if it was like that one book by Meredith Peterson Haddix that M. Night Shymalan stole the idea for his movie. The ending got a little crazy and some things were maybe sped past in any explanations, but I really did like it overall and I could see it being a good contender for the award list next year.

This is my first book by this author, but I don’t think it will be my last! I really enjoyed all of it! As someone who had become a bigger/fat woman at this point in my life, it was great to read this and see myself in the main character. All the things that the story talked about, the things that Everly was dealing with and pushing for the reality show to actually portray were things that I either don’t think about even though I want, or things that I don’t think other people realize. 

Now it did take me a bit to get into it, but I’m blaming that on the dog that I was watching for two weeks when I started reading this. The times I was able to sit and just read with no interruptions I was completely absorbed in the story. I did get what the producer was trying to show, that a “fat” woman could attract a “hot” guy. People are so negative that it can’t happen. There’s even a woman I follow on TikTok that is in that very situation and she gets horrible comments from people, and her husband I guess even gets women in his DMs offering to take care of him. 

So all of the stuff in this story was real and just worked. I loved that even though the tagline and that this is a romance makes you think that is all it is, it is more. It is about Everly realizing her own self worth, NOT because of a guy being interested in her, but because she is talented and is worth all she wants. I did have a little inkling that part of the “hot” guy’s reveal/secret was what it was. I did not get the whole idea. But I am totally with her in how annoying it is when guys do things that seem more than nice, but then when you think they like you, they say they don’t. I get that some people are just more flirty than others, meaning nothing, but it’s harder for some of us to deal with when other people are so standoffish or rude in how they treat us because of our looks.

A wonderful story and I highly recommend it! Also, I wish I could get on a show just like this!

I haven’t read a book by this author in awhile, although I do love her #Nerd series. I’ve been seeing the fun special edition covers for the other books so far in this series, the ones not with the naked men on them like this one, and finally had some time when I saw a blog tour that I could jump in and check one out. Although I did already buy one of the others just because I loved the special cover so much, lol. And after reading this one I definitely want to go back and get the stories for the couples we met here.

The story started off with a crazy scary moment, and then we got into a “fake” dating type of situation, although because Jess wakes up with amnesia, it is only fake for Ben, even though it is all real for him, the feelings he’s had for her since as long as he can remember. He’s an alpha, possessive male, and at times it was a bit annoying how he would jump all over even his friends, and his gay male friends, who might touch “his girl.” That bugged me a bit. I don’t mind a tiny bit of jealousy, but in some of the cases it was a bit over the top for me, and I’d have been annoyed. Now if he’d seemed a bit more joking in the way he did it, it would have gone over better for me.

Not that Ben wasn’t great other than that though! And when the first really steamy all the way scene happened, well let’s just see I didn’t see the twist that came with that! The bad guy was kept a mystery for a long time, although Jess got certain feelings even with her amnesia, when certain people were around, and that led to all the pieces of the puzzle falling into place with the right words from someone who knew what had happened.

As I said, I really did like the characters, and actually feel that while this is standalone for sure, there are a few things that might make a tiny bit more sense if I go back and read just what else has happened to this cast of characters in the other books.

This was a fun, fast-paced rom-com, where I adored all the texting bits, so much fun you can have with just those small little snippets of conversation between two people. Both characters had their own issues and special aspects that were unique and made the story so real! I loved how Savannah assumed that her new boss was an elderly recluse, it made when he first found her in his kitchen even more hilarious. 

The story actually went pretty quickly, which is nice, I enjoy when things aren’t crazy and drama filled just for drama’s sake. All the family and friends were also great additions to the story, making me eager for Savannah’s sister’s story next. Savannah had dealt with so much in her past that it was understandable why she was as reluctant to give more a chance. But Ian, oh how I loved hearing how Ian’s mother had tried to help him, and how he figured things out based on his own way of seeing and dealing with the world around him.