What a refreshing surprise?! This book read like a Taylor Swift song.  At first I found the main character unrelatable and the audiobook irritating, and then next think you know I was calling Shubangi on the phone because Mhairi McFarlane broke my heart. You feel all the oscillating emotions of heartbreak just like you do in the best Taylor Swift songs.

Then the fake dating romance moved at a pace and maturity that I loved! I listened to this in the span of 24 hours. BRB while I go binge her backlist.

This is a closed door romance.

Taylor Swift songs:
How Did It End?
Fortnight
The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived
Gorgeous

Definitely the weakest book in the trilogy plot-wise, but I loved it because I love the characters and the writing.  I wish the pacing was a little different, but I will say the parts that could have been drawn out moved swiftly which I really appreciated!

This book was challenging for me personally to get through. I would not have been able to make it through as a physical read, but am very glad I stuck with the audio.

It's moving, upsetting, and insightful. The author created an captured an intersection of identities in a time in American history that I've never been able to experience before.

I definitely recommend this book, but also like it was heavy and serious for me.  VERY American.

Also happens to be one of two books I'm randomly reading around Memorial Day Weekend that is set around Memorial Day!

say it with me:     D A D D Y   I S S U E S

I think my expectations were too high for this book. But WTF yo. It's a classic tale as old as time: a book traumatizes you and then gives you a happy ending so you feel compelled to rate it high and forget the toxic shit-show that preceded it.

I think the slow burn(s) in the first book were so deliberate and well crafted, that we (the readers) fell for the MMCs with the FMC even when we knew it was toxic, unhealthy, not meant to last, but in this book we are forced into this instant-lust thing and meant to believe it's the strongest love yet?

Also the whole gang and conspiracy things is too over the top. The platitudes they spout read like teenaged stoner bros in foil hats who read the back of one philosophy book. Also the organized crime element of it just doesn't make sense... like are they a union or a gang? Like the author is just trying to make everything way deeper than it needs to be.

That being said there were some emotional moments and big reveals that hit hard. I think she did an excellent job portraying the complications and nuances of grief as well as living with shame and guilt.

For the time jump (in a surprise to absolutely no one), I have notes.  It should have been 10 years not 5 years for starters.  It would have made everything more believable and impactful.

Everyone is so reactive and melodramatic and flip-floppy to serve the plot it was painful!

The spice.... GIRL CAN WRITE SPICE AND CHEMISTRY MY GOD!!!!!!!!

BULLSHIT! that a multi-millionaire CEO would give it all up to be a waitress in a diner. She literally hated her life working in the plant. There's nothing wrong with being a working girl but it definitely felt more like a penance/self-punishment thing than a "the simple life is for me." Owning and working in a bookstore would be more on brand.

PS just say UGA and not UG in Athens

Thank you Casey for the rec! I'm glad I didn't read this any earlier in my reading journey, because there's definitely some TOXIC that would have made me hate this a few years ago.  The spice was giving! And the romantic suspense is promising! I'm looking forward to finishing this seres.

Nervous that I'm reading this around the same time that I'm writing my "Right Person, Not Enough Time" post for Peed's Reads.

Looking for a laird in Scotland. Castle. 6'5. thick thighs.

Thank you HarperCollins and NetGalley for the Audiobook Galley in exchange for an honest review.

I loved this! I think this is Eloisa at her finest! It's very saucy and has an instant chemistry between the love interests that kept a giddy smile on my cheeks from start to finish.

It was pretty run of the mill for as creative of a forced proximity premise it was. (The only thing keeping it from the full five stars.) But I enjoyed it and if every historical romance was like this one I'd be a happy girl!

I can't believe it's over. Exactly 21 months later... I finished.

I did finish by firelight which feels fitting.

UGH

Big takeaway was "symbols have power" isn't cringe propaganda it's like actually true

and hope is the antidote to fear

This NEEDS to be a big budget HBO series.

The graphic violence got to be too much. It became clear that the author was just trying to disturb and that there was no end in sight. That is not what I needed in this book.

This book has been calling me since the cover was revealed with the folklore cardigan. We have a midsize, Swiftie, romance novel-loving, eldest daughter FMC and a neuro-spicy, bi-racial child of two moms, who plays hockey and is an artist MMC? You know I was in.  Henry LOVES women. We've known this since Icebreaker, and it was so lovely getting to see him fall in love.

This was the perfect cozy read for me. It's a bit long and I could see it being boring for some readers, but what I wanted was a spicy opposites-attract romance with neurospicy leads who love so freaking hard, and it healed me a bit getting to follow them on their healing journeys.

There was some eye-roll cheese, but not too much to take me out of it.

I wanted to like this book but I just didn't. If you're craving the vibes of Christina Lauren's OG Beautiful series, this is for you! It just screams 2010 fan fic in a way I can't get behind. Call me jaded, but this is what rom coms would have us thing corporate girlies in nyc live like. I still can't get over her meeting someone for a drink "after work" at 6:30 AND THEN WE FIND OUT SHE WENT HOME AND SHOWERED IN BETWEEN?! in what world

anyway, it's cheesy and miscommunication central and straight up stupid at parts. But college me would have eaten this shit up.