Book Review: All the Feels by Olivia Dade

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: All the Feels
Author: Olivia Dade
Publisher: Avon
Publication date: November 16, 2021
Length: 385 pages
Genre: Romance
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

Following Spoiler Alert, Olivia Dade returns with another utterly charming romantic comedy about a devil-may-care actor—who actually cares more than anyone knows—and the no-nonsense woman hired to keep him in line.
Alexander Woodroe has it all. Charm. Sex appeal. Wealth. Fame. A starring role as Cupid on TV’s biggest show, God of the Gates. But the showrunners have wrecked his character, he’s dogged by old demons, and his post-show future remains uncertain. When all that reckless emotion explodes into a bar fight, the tabloids and public agree: his star is falling.
Enter Lauren Clegg, the former ER therapist hired to keep him in line. Compared to her previous work, watching over handsome but impulsive Alex shouldn’t be especially difficult. But the more time they spend together, the harder it gets to keep her professional remove and her heart intact, especially when she discovers the reasons behind his recklessness…not to mention his Cupid fanfiction habit.
When another scandal lands Alex in major hot water and costs Lauren her job, she’ll have to choose between protecting him and offering him what he really wants—her. But he’s determined to keep his improbably short, impossibly stubborn, and extremely endearing minder in his life any way he can. And on a road trip up the California coast together, he intends to show her exactly what a falling star will do to catch the woman he loves: anything at all.

All the Feels is a follow-up/companion to last year’s Spoiler Alert. Not a sequel exactly, since the timelines are somewhat concurrent, but a look at different characters in the same world, with some overlap. In both books, the framing is the massively popular TV series Gods of the Gates, a multi-season, big budget production based on a very popular but unfinished book series, which seems to have gone decidedly off the rails once the storyline moved passed the published books. Remind you of anything yet?

In All the Feels, we start with a bang as lead actor Alex Woodroe, who plays Cupid on the show, is being severely reprimanded by the showrunner after he’s arrested in a bar fight in Spain as production on the final season is wrapping up. Alex is impulsive and known for his outrageous behavior, but drunken brawls are not typical for him. Still, the production is out of patience and taking no chances, so they assign him a minder — someone to shadow him everywhere, be with him at all times, and make sure he does not step a toe out of line until the new season airs.

His assigned minder? Lauren Clegg, the (dickish) showrunner’s cousin, who’s currently assessing her own next career move after burning out on ER trauma. Lauren is not your standard beauty — she’s (maybe) five feet tall, very round, with a crooked nose (thanks to an out-of-control ER patient) and an assymetrical face. Her cruel cousin refers to her off-handedly as ridiculous and ugly, but in Alex’s view, she’s birdlike, reminding him of a winter wren. Which, for reference, looks like this:

Alex, described by a loving castmate as a “delightful asshole”, is outraged by being assigned a nanny — but beyond the external assholery, he’s actually a very good guy. So, while he delights in trying to get a reaction out of “Nanny Clegg”, he also treats her with respect and kindness, especially once they arrive back in LA and she takes up residence in the guest house on his estate.

Alex himself is a complex character. His outgoing, full-speed-ahead, screw-the-consequences persona is cover for a man who carries deep guilt over family history and who is willing to put everything on the line to defend people in need, even if it means possibly torpedoing the career he fought so hard for. His ADHD makes him hard for others to control, and while he has coping strategies that work well for him, his impulse control challenges cause him trouble again and again.

As we get to know Lauren, we see how she’s internalized other people’s view of her, even her own family’s. She’s dependable, but not as important as everyone else — this is\the lesson she’s learned over the years, and she dreads having others (including Alex) come to her defense at their own expense. She knows that the world sees her as unattractive (and that awful people seem to have no qualms about saying so to her face), and she’s rather just put up walls and remove herself emotionally that have anyone else take risks on her behalf.

As Alex and Lauren spend time together, they create a bubble of two, moving beyond resentment and impatience into trust and friendship, and finally acknowledging a deep attraction too. Their growing feelings for one another are challenged by the outside world and the demands of Alex’s career — but they’re also challenged by their own baggage and their deeply ingrained defense mechanisms. When hurt and self-sacrifice threaten their new-found happiness, they each find that they need to dig deep, work on themselves, and learn to get out of their own way if they’re to have a future.

This is absolutely an opposites-attract fairy tale. Alex is a gorgeous movie star, yet the plain woman with an unassuming personality who does not meet standard beauty ideals is the one who steals his heart. It certainly strains belief, but accepting the wish-fulfillment elements, All the Feels is quite a lovely and engaging read.

In Spoiler Alert, we learn much more about Gods of the Gates, which is pretty delightful in its own way. Here, we hear more about the problematic nature of the final season and why it causes Alex in particular so much grief. We also spend more time with some of the castmates introduced in the first book, via group text chats and in person, and they’re a treat.

All the Feels also includes some of the fanfiction elements introduced in Spoiler Alert — to a lesser extent, but in a way that’s so Alex and so outrageous, and it made me really laugh.

I did really enjoy All the Feels, but as I mentioned, there’s a wish-fulfillment feel to the story that sometimes made me take a step back and squint at the book. Could this relationship work in real life? Well, maybe… but put this story together with the main relationship in Spoiler Alert, and it becomes a little harder to embrace the idea that two gorgeous and successful leading men, who also happen to be best friends, would fall for two women who — to be clear — are absolutely lovely and delightful, but who do not meet Hollywood beauty standards by a long shot.

The last third of the book includes very graphic sex scenes, so if you prefer your romance on the implied rather than explicit side, you might want to be aware of this before going in. Explicit isn’t usually my jam when it comes to my reading choices, but I was invested enough in the characters that I wasn’t thrown off too much by these scenes (and anyway, the characters are so clearly joyful together that it’s hard not to be happy for them, no matter how graphically engaged they are.)

All the Feels could work as a stand-alone — there’s enough context provided to make the key elements of the show and its issues understandable — but I’d recommend starting with Spoiler Alert to get the full picture. Also, Alex and Lauren’s story happens in the background in Spoiler Alert, so it’s fun to see pieces of it unfolding through other characters’ eyes before reading their story on its own.

All in all, I recommend both of these books. All the Feels features memorable characters, snappy dialogue, a moving (if improbable) love story, and a fairy tale ending. It’s a feel-good book that, for all its unlikely elements (not just the central relationship, but also some of the pieces related to Alex’s career), will make you smile.

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24Oct2021

Audiobook Review: People We Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: People We Meet on Vacation
Author: Emily Henry
Narrator: Julia Whelan
Publisher: Berkley
Publication date: May 11, 2021
Print length: 364 pages
Audio length: 10 hours 46 minutes
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Purchased (Kindle); Library (audio)
Rating:

Two best friends. Ten summer trips. One last chance to fall in love.
Poppy and Alex. Alex and Poppy. They have nothing in common. She’s a wild child; he wears khakis. She has insatiable wanderlust; he prefers to stay home with a book. And somehow, ever since a fateful car share home from college many years ago, they are the very best of friends. For most of the year they live far apart—she’s in New York City, and he’s in their small hometown—but every summer, for a decade, they have taken one glorious week of vacation together.
Until two years ago, when they ruined everything. They haven’t spoken since.
Poppy has everything she should want, but she’s stuck in a rut. When someone asks when she was last truly happy, she knows, without a doubt, it was on that ill-fated, final trip with Alex. And so, she decides to convince her best friend to take one more vacation together—lay everything on the table, make it all right. Miraculously, he agrees.
Now she has a week to fix everything. If only she can get around the one big truth that has always stood quietly in the middle of their seemingly perfect relationship. What could possibly go wrong?
From the New York Times bestselling author of Beach Read, a sparkling new novel that will leave you with the warm, hazy afterglow usually reserved for the best vacations.

Poppy and Alex are a delightful pairing in all the right ways. They’re diametrically opposed when it comes to lifestyle and goals. Poppy dreams of travel and freedom; Alex dreams of home and family and being settled. He’s uptight, she’s loose and open. And yet, they bond so tightly that everyone and everything else in their lives are extraneous. So long as they have each other, even if they only see each other during their annual summer trips, then their lives are good.

But something went wrong two summers ago, and they haven’t talked since. And for Poppy, nothing makes sense any more. She has her dream job, working for a high-end travel magazine and basically getting paid to go anywhere in the world and enjoy the hell out of it… but her life has been pretty joyless ever since Alex was removed from the equation.

People We Meet on Vacation is framed around “this summer”, but interspersed chapters take us back to “10 summers ago”, “5 summers ago”, etc. Through these chapters that show past history, we get to experience the depth of Alex and Poppy’s connection, why they mean so much to one another, and get hints of why they are the way they are, as we learn more about their families, their upbringings, and their formative years.

I loved the chemistry and the adorable banter between the two. They’re funny in so many unexpected ways. Any scene that they’re both in absolutely shines.

At the same time, there’s plenty of harder times in the mix as well. Why did their friendship fall apart? Why do they seem to have such a hard time identifying what they want? Why do none of their romantic partners ever work out for them?

The travel segments add crazy fun, as most of their plans end up derailed or taken in unexpected directions, and their random adventures and encounters keep the entertainment value of this novel high.

I listened to the audiobook, narrated by the masterful Julia Whelan, and it was a delight. I can see why people become fans of certain audiobook narrators. I’ve now listened to more than a few audiobooks narrated by Julia Whelan, and she’s truly gifted. Here, her voices for Poppy and Alex are perfectly tuned to their personalities, and her delivery of their funnier exchanges made me laugh out loud.

I have to admit that it was touch and go for me for the first few chapters. The introduction of Poppy’s best friend, a social media influencer, made me want to duck out, and their discussion of “millennial ennui” was practically the nail in the coffin… but since I really enjoyed my last book by this author (Beach Read), I decided to stick with it. And I’m glad I did!

People We Meet on Vacation is surprisingly insightful for a book with such an upbeat cover and title. It allows its characters to dig into their wants and needs (while also showcasing their outstanding chemistry and dynamics), including introspective moments that give greater depth to the story without ever weighing it down.

This ended up being an excellent audio experience — highly recommended!

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21Oct2021

Book Review: Eight Perfect Hours by Lia Louis

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Eight Perfect Hours
Author: Lisa Louis
Publisher: Atria
Publication date: September 28, 2021
Length: 336 pages
Genre: Romance
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

In this romantic and heartwarming novel, two strangers meet in chance circumstances during a blizzard and spend one perfect evening together, thinking they’ll never see each other again. But fate seems to have different plans.
On a snowy evening in March, 30-something Noelle Butterby is on her way back from an event at her old college when disaster strikes. With a blizzard closing off roads, she finds herself stranded, alone in her car, without food, drink, or a working charger for her phone. All seems lost until Sam Attwood, a handsome American stranger also trapped in a nearby car, knocks on her window and offers assistance. What follows is eight perfect hours together, until morning arrives and the roads finally clear.
The two strangers part, positive they’ll never see each other again, but fate, it seems, has a different plan. As the two keep serendipitously bumping into one another, they begin to realize that perhaps there truly is no such thing as coincidence. With plenty of charming twists and turns and Lia Louis’s “bold, standout voice” (Gillian McAllister, author of The Good Sister), Eight Perfect Hours is a gorgeously crafted novel that will make you believe in the power of fate.

Do you believe in destiny and meant-to-be? If so, Eight Perfect Hours will make your heart happy… and if not, you may find yourself scoffing a bit, but you’ll still be in for a sweet and thoughtful read.

In Eight Perfect Hours, Noelle becomes stuck in a snowy traffic jam on the way home from an upsetting and disappointing reunion. Sad over the memories stirred up, heart-broken over a letter retrieved from a time capsule, Noelle finds herself a teary mess without phone service or charger while stuck on the road — until a (handsome, of course) stranger offers her a warm spot in his passenger seat and the use of his power cord.

As the two wait out the traffic shutdown together, they share stories, dreams, and laughs, and seem instantly connected… but when the roads clear, they say goodbye and go their separate ways.

Noelle has a lot on her plate in her regular life. She dreams of becoming a florist and has a real gift for flower arranging, but she works instead as a cleaner while supporting and caring for her homebound mother. While she has a delightfully hippy-ish best friend, she’s still lonely. Two years earlier, her long-term boyfriend/fiance dumped her when she declined to leave her mother to follow him to an overseas job. At the center of Noelle’s sorrow, though, are her memories of Daisy, her high school best friend who died in a car accident at age 18. Noelle has never gotten over Daisy’s death, and carries around enormous guilt over something she could not have prevented.

After the traffic jam and those eight perfect hours, Noelle’s life goes back to same-old, same-old, until she randomly encounters Sam once again. And once again, their instant connection sparks back to life — but when she suggests that they keep in touch, he’s not so enthusiastic. Still, Noelle and Sam continue to bump into one another or find out that they’re connected in various ways, and eventually, Noelle becomes convinced that the connections between her and Sam can’t possibly just be random.

Is it fate? Were they always meant to meet? What is it that’s brought them together, and what does it all mean?

Eight Perfect Hours is a touching love story that also highlights the devastating and long-lasting effects of grief and guilt. It also presents different views of love: Is settling into a relationship that’s comfortable enough? How much can a person change their life, and if they have the chance, should they? How does someone balance love, individual happiness, and goals with family obligations and commitments?

These are all important questions, and the author gives Noelle great food for thought as she works through all of her issues and finds ways to address the traumas of her past.

As for the romance, while I really liked Noelle and Sam together, I’m not personally a huge believer in destiny and the one perfect soulmate, so bits of the story started feeling pretty farfetched to me. Still, even the more outlandish coincidences are balanced out by explorations of emotional connection, friendship, and purpose, so I could ignore the elements that didn’t particularly work for me.

On a quibbling note, I did feel like the “eight perfect hours” that Noelle and Sam spent together weren’t fleshed out enough. In the moment, while reading about their initial time together, I didn’t get the full sense of how special it was. The connection between them was described through Noelle’s thoughts and reactions, but I didn’t actually see it. I wish this part had been stronger, but their chemistry becomes more obvious over the course of the novel, so this wasn’t a huge issue, more a minor annoyance.

Overall, Eight Perfect Hours is a fast, engaging read about characters who really moved me. If you enjoy contemporary romances, check this one out!

PS – A quick note on the cover: This is NOT a Christmas book (in fact, the snowstorm/traffic jam takes place in March), and I feel like the cover makes this seem like much more of an upbeat holiday book than it actually is.

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6Aug2021

Series wrap-up: Moose Springs series (#1 – 3) by Sarah Morgenthaler

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Sometimes you need serious reading material. And sometimes, fluffy reads rule! I’ve been leaning into light, not-too-serious reading lately, especially when it comes to audiobooks, and these sweet romances with an Alaska setting have been just right for my mood.

Title: The Tourist Attraction
Published: 2020
Length: 352 pages
Rating:

He had a strict “no tourists” policy…
Until she broke all of his rules.
When Graham Barnett named his diner The Tourist Trap, he meant it as a joke. Now he’s stuck slinging reindeer dogs to an endless parade of resort visitors who couldn’t interest him less. Not even the sweet, enthusiastic tourist in the corner who blushes every time he looks her way…
Two weeks in Alaska isn’t just the top item on Zoey Caldwell’s bucket list. It’s the whole bucket. One look at the mountain town of Moose Springs and she’s smitten. But when an act of kindness brings Zoey into Graham’s world, she may just find there’s more to the grumpy local than meets the eye…and more to love in Moose Springs than just the Alaskan wilderness.

The Tourist Attraction introduces us to the split-personality town of Moose Springs, Alaska — a quirky little town set amidst magnificent mountains, which both relies on its high-end luxury resort for economic survival and detests all outsiders.

Graham is rude and gruff, but you just know there’s a heart of gold underneath it all, and he falls head over heels for Zoey, despite his no-tourists rule. After an awkward incident in which Zoey thinks she’s about to get murdered by a chainsaw wielding maniac (don’t ask), Zoey and Graham find themselves repeatedly thrown together, and of course, sparks fly.

The setting is charming and sounds beautiful. While Moose Springs is fictional, from the description, I can’t help picturing it as based on Girdwood, a small-ish town that’s home to the beautiful Alyeska Resort.

The romance is cute and somewhat predictable, but chapters that delve into the corporate machinations of The Montgomery Group (which owns most of the town’s property) left me cold. (Cold! ‘Cuz it’s Alaska!) Zoey’s best friend Lana Montgomery is her host during her Alaska getaway, and Lana is one of the Montgomery family’s chief businesswomen and heir apparent — and while Lana seems like a good person, there’s perhaps too much focus on the business dealings for my taste.

There’s an appealing cast of supporting characters, a beautiful setting, a few moose wandering through, and some small-town hijinks. Also, a perfect border collie who is blind, has an extensive wardrobe, and is the most beloved dog in the entire town. The book as a whole is absurdly cute, and is a nice mix of romantic fluff and emotional connection.

Title: Mistletoe & Mr. Right
Published: 2020
Length: 400 pages
Rating:

How the moose (almost) stole Christmas.
Lana Montgomery is everything the quirky small town of Moose Springs, Alaska can’t stand: a rich socialite with dreams of changing things for the better. But Lana’s determined to prove that she belongs…even if it means trading her stilettos for snow boots and tracking one of the town’s hairiest Christmas mysteries: the Santa Moose, an antlered Grinch hell-bent on destroying every bit of holiday cheer (and tinsel) it can sink its teeth into.
And really…how hard could it be?
The last few years have been tough on Rick Harding, and it’s not getting any easier now that his dream girl’s back in town. When Lana accidentally tranquilizes him instead of the Santa Moose, it’s clear she needs help, fast…and this could be his chance to finally catch her eye. It’s an all-out Christmas war, but if they can nab that darn moose before it destroys the town, Rick and Lana might finally find a place where they both belong…together.

In the 2nd Moose Springs book, it’s about six months later, Zoey and Graham are bonkers in love, and Lana Montgomery takes center stage. Lana has been visiting Moose Springs since childhood and has been mostly tolerated by the locals, but her plans to build luxury condominiums and revitalize the local economy are being met with hostility by the townsfolk, who resent her intrusion and the likelihood of even more tourists messing up their lives.

Lana ends up falling for Rick, the owner of the local pool hall, who is equally smitten. There’s a silly subplot about a moose who hates Christmas decorations, but mainly it’s about Lana and Rick deciding to have a holiday fling, then realizing that their feelings go much deeper.

I hate that the synopsis and the book itself keep referring to Lana as a “socialite”. What does that even mean? Yes, she’s a gazillionaire, but she’s a businesswoman heading up her family’s corporate investments in Alaska, not just some flighty rich person attending lavish parties.

This is an opposites-attract plot for sure, since Rick is not rich, polished, interested in “society”, or used to luxuries. But, he falls for Lana, the feeling is mutual, and they have great chemistry and some pretty goofy adventures.

I did feel extremely angry at this book when, toward the end, it feel into a romance trope I hate — the “I’m breaking up with you despite being in love with you because I’ll only hold you back” plot device, which is just, ugh, so emotionally unfair and manipulative. So you know better than the other person what they really need? Yuck.

Of course, there’s an HEA, because hey, this is a romance, not real life. And I enjoyed it enough to want to keep going!

Title: Enjoy the View
Published: 2021
Length: 352 pages
Rating:

A grouchy mountaineer, a Hollywood starlet
And miles of untamed wilderness…
What could possibly go wrong?
Former Hollywood darling River Lane’s acting career is tanking fast. Determined to start fresh behind the camera, she agrees to film a documentary about the picturesque small town of Moose Springs, Alaska. The assignment should have been easy, but the quirky locals want nothing to do with River. Well, too bad: River’s going to make this film and prove herself, no matter what it takes.
Or what (literal) mountain she has to climb.
Easton Lockett may be a gentle giant, but he knows a thing or two about survival. If he can keep everyone in line, he should be able to get River and her crew up and down Mount Veil in one piece. Turns out that’s a big if. The wildlife’s wilder than usual, the camera crew’s determined to wander off a cliff, and the gorgeous actress is fearless. Falling for River only makes Easton’s job tougher, but there’s only so long he can hold out against her brilliant smile. When bad weather strikes, putting everyone at risk, it’ll take all of Easton’s skill to get them back home safely…and convince River she should stay in his arms for good.

Enjoy the View feels pretty different from the previous two books, since most of the action happens outside of Moose Springs, on the (very scary) nearby mountain Mount Veil.

Easton is a familiar character, good friend to Graham and Rick, a huge mountaineer who doesn’t say much, but — as we see here — has a heart of gold and untapped emotional depths. When Easton encounters River, he doesn’t recognize her from her movie career — he just sees a strange tourist walking down the side of the road with a suitcase. He doesn’t realize that by stopping to offer assistance, he’s interrupting a shot for her movie. Oops!

River’s Hollywood career seems to have stalled. At the ripe old age of 29 (!!), she’s not being offered great roles any longer, and she’s turned her attention to producing and directing. She and her trusty crew have been hired by the Alaska tourism board to make a movie about Moose Springs, but unfortunately, the tourist-hating town wants nothing to do with them and impedes their filming at every turn. With no other options, they turn to the big attraction outside of town — Mt. Veil, the intimidating mountain that only the most skilled climbers can successfully summit.

Of course, River needs a guide, and of course, Easton is the man assigned to her climb. As they work together, their attraction deepens into an emotional connection. River is feisty and argumentative, Easton is quiet and strict when it comes to his safety rules, and they clash incessantly — but we just know that beneath it all, they’re falling in love.

I enjoyed reading about the climb and how scary it is, but I pretty frequently wanted to give River a good shake. She repeatedly ignores Easton’s rules and ends up endangering herself and others because of it. Somehow Easton keeps forgiving her, and I assume we’re supposed to find River’s rebelliousness charming and a sign of her independence, but her actions seem downright foolhardy at some points. I would not be nearly as forgiving as Easton, never mind falling in love!

As is typical of this series, there’s cute banter, some adorable wildlife (including a memorable marmot), and lots of breathtaking scenery. I wish the familiar characters from the town had bigger roles in Enjoy the View, but even in their brief appearances, it’s fun to see Graham, Zoey, and Easton’s sister Ash.

Enjoy the View is a fun way to end a three-audiobook binge!

Wrapping it all up…

This is clearly not a series that’s meant to be taken too seriously. It maintains a casually funny tone throughout, even when there are more emotional moments taking place. The town of Moose Springs is full of small-town quirky personalities, and the setting makes it really fun.

My two main complaints are:

1 – The male leads are cookie-cutter outdoorsy-loner types with a soft, gushy intererior. There’s really not much to distinguish them apart from their different occupations and physical builds (although they’re all versions of gorgeous, muscular hunks who look great in flannel). Really, I found Graham, Rick, and Easton to be fairly easily interchangeable (although, I admit Graham’s humor does set him apart to some extent). Not to say that I don’t like them, just that there’s not much distinctive about them.

2 – A more serious complaint is that there is just no Native representation, and that bothers me. Yes, these are fluffy romances, but the books seem to present Alaska as being populated strictly by the above-mentioned flannel-wearing white outdoorsmen. This omission is pretty glaring and is an irritant throughout the books.

Complaints aside, I have to admit that these books are addictively fun, with lots of silly misadventures and cute scenarios. And who can resist big, gruff men becoming marshmallow soft as soon as they fall in love?

I see on Goodreads that book #4 (no details or title provided) is due out sometime in 2022. Hmmm, who will the romantic focus be for whatever tourist wanders into town next? Easton’s sister Ash? Resort owner Jax? I guess we’ll have to wait to find out.

But will I read it? You betcha!

10Jul2021

Book Review: While We Were Dating by Jasmine Guillory

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: While We Were Dating (The Wedding Date, #6)
Author: Jasmine Guillory
Publisher: Berkley
Publication date: July 13, 2021
Length: 336 pages
Genre: Contemporary romance
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via Netgalley
Rating:

Two people realize that it’s no longer an act when they veer off-script in this sizzling romantic comedy by New York Times bestselling author Jasmine Guillory.
Ben Stephens has never bothered with serious relationships. He has plenty of casual dates to keep him busy, family drama he’s trying to ignore and his advertising job to focus on. When Ben lands a huge ad campaign featuring movie star Anna Gardiner, however, it’s hard to keep it purely professional. Anna is not just gorgeous and sexy, she’s also down to earth and considerate, and he can’t help flirting a little…
Anna Gardiner is on a mission: to make herself a household name, and this ad campaign will be a great distraction while she waits to hear if she’s booked her next movie. However, she didn’t expect Ben Stephens to be her biggest distraction. She knows mixing business with pleasure never works out, but why not indulge in a harmless flirtation?
But their lighthearted banter takes a turn for the serious when Ben helps Anna in a family emergency, and they reveal truths about themselves to each other, truths they’ve barely shared with those closest to them.
When the opportunity comes to turn their real-life fling into something more for the Hollywood spotlight, will Ben be content to play the background role in Anna’s life and leave when the cameras stop rolling? Or could he be the leading man she needs to craft their own Hollywood ending?

Jasmine Guillory’s books are reliably romantic, intimate, and full of unusual characters, and While We Were Dating is no exception.

Our two main characters are Ben, an up-and-coming advertising executive (who, BTW, used to be a backup dancer — hot!), and Anna, an Oscar-nominated actress who needs her next movie to be the big breakthrough that will take her back to the Oscars and send her home with the prize.

When Anna agrees to star in the ad campaign Ben is leading, they’re immediately drawn to one another and develop an easy rapport. But it’s not until Ben offers to drive her all night to reach her family at a Southern California emergency room that they truly connect, spending the long car ride sharing secrets and dreams. Their intimacy becomes physical, and they’re both wildly attracted to one another — but neither imagines that this can be anything but a fling.

Later, Anna’s manager comes up with a plan: In order for the studios to see Anna as a big enough box-office draw to land that next crucial movie contract, she needs to be more in the public eye. He convinces her to go public in a fake relationship with Ben, making sure the paparazzi are on hand to capture their every private-but-public flirtation. Soon, they’re featured in People magazine and are walking the red carpet together, but Ben knows that once the premieres have ended, so will this relationship.

I enjoyed a lot about While We Were Dating. Anna and Ben are both well-developed, flawed people. Sure, they’re super hot, but they’re also vulnerable, each dealing with his or her memories and past painful experiences, cautious about who they trust and who they allow into their lives. They have an easy chemistry together, and their banter is adorable and flirtatious and very down-to-earth.

This author also tends to go outside the societal norms of beauty when it comes to her heroines, and Anna is depicted as both stunningly gorgeous and plus-sized. And honestly, I love that about her.

I’m not a huge fan of “Stars! They’re Just Like Us!” kind of stories, so the Hollywood magic is, if anything, a minus for me when it comes to books featuring glamorous stars and their love lives. Here, though, we see Anna’s family and her roots, her struggle to adjust to her new reality, the invasiveness of the paparazzi, the need to always be “on”, and it makes her feel relatable, even if the day-to-day of her life — with stylists and gowns and borrowed jewels — feels like something from another world.

The books in The Wedding Date series are all loosely connected, but don’t worry if you haven’t read the others. Familiar characters show up, and you’ll be happy to see them if you know who they are, but it’s not at all crucial to know their backstories in order to enjoy While We Were Dating (or any of the other book in the series.) Each book focuses on a new romantic pairing and can stand on its own just fine.

If you’re a fan of Jasmine Guillory’s books, you’ll definitely want to read this one as well. Even if you’re new to this author, this would make a great pick for beach or poolside reading.

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Buy now at Amazon – Book Depository – Bookshop.org

8Jul2021

Book Review: Incense and Sensibility by Sonali Dev

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: Incense and Sensibility
Author: Sonali Dev
Publisher: William Morrow
Publication date: July 6, 2021
Length: 400 pages
Genre: Contemporary fiction
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via Netgalley
Rating:

Yash Raje, California’s first serious Indian gubernatorial candidate, has always known exactly what he wants—and how to use his privileged background to get it. He attributes his success to a simple mantra: control your feelings and you can control the world.
But when a hate-fueled incident at a rally critically injures his friend, Yash’s easy life suddenly feels like a lie, his control an illusion. When he tries to get back on the campaign trail, he blacks out with panic.
Desperate to keep Yash’s condition from leaking to the media, his family turns to the one person they trust—his sister’s best friend, India Dashwood, California’s foremost stress management coach. Raised by a family of yoga teachers, India has helped San Francisco’s high strung overachievers for a decade without so much as altering her breath. But this man—with his boundless ambition, simmering intensity, and absolute faith in his political beliefs—is like no other. Yash has spent a lifetime repressing everything to succeed.
Including their one magical night ten years ago—a too brief, too bright passion that if rekindled threatens the life he’s crafted for himself. Exposing the secrets might be the only way to save him but it’s also guaranteed to destroy the dream he’s willingly shouldered for his family and community . . . until now.

As you might guess from the title — but not from the synopsis — Incense and Sensibility is a modern-day retelling of Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility. It’s also a moving, well-written, and engaging contemporary novel about love, pain, and healing.

I&S continues the loosely connected story of the Rajes, a wealthy Indian-American family living in the Bay Area. Previous books have focused on Yash’s sister Trisha (Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors) and his cousin Ashna (Recipe For Persuasion). In both of those books, Yash is a background character — the successful, driven brother who can achieve anything he wants. He’s the golden child, the one everyone believes will do great things.

He’s also haunted by trauma, although he doesn’t even realize this until events kick off in I&S. As the book opens, Yash is running a competitive race for governor of California, and his chances look good. He’s a man devoted to public service, who truly believes that he’s called to make life better for those who are suffering. While popular with many voters, Yash also encounters the racism you’d unfortunately not be surprised by due to his skin color and ethnicity. An attempted shooting at a rally leaves Yash lightly wounded, but puts his trusted friend and bodyguard Abdul into a coma that he isn’t expected to wake from.

Suddenly, Yash’s world is turned upside down. He feels tremendous guilt about Abdul’s sacrifice, and is overwhelmed by an anxiety attack when he attempts to go onstage at his next rally. With only months to go until the election, and with a growing lead in the polls, his family is desperate to “fix” him. And so they turn to a friend of Ashna and Trisha’s, India Dashwood, a yoga instructor and Reiki healer.

India lives with her mother Tara and her highly emotional sister China in the apartment above their yoga studio. They’re not well off, but they’re getting by, until Tara falls ill and India realizes they may not be able to cover her necessary medical treatments. On top of that, China is head-over-heels in love with a Korean pop star, but the woman she loves is deeply closeted and insists on secrecy. China sees a rosy future, but India is afraid that China will be hurt badly.

When Yash reenters India’s life, it’s ten years after they spent a magical, romantic night together in which they fell in love, but then parted and never reunited. India has never quite recovered from the pain of Yash’s disappearance from her life, but she also can’t turn him away when he’s obviously in such pain and in need of help. As she works with him on healing from trauma, old wounds reemerge and are finally confronted, and Yash and India’s feeling for one another resurface as well. But with the election his to lose, Yash has to make some big decisions about telling the truth and taking a stand, and India must decide whether she’s willing to risk the peace she’s found for the man she’s never gotten over.

Incense and Sensibility may look light and possibly even funny from the cover, but it’s really not. While there are some lighter moments, the book deals with very real trauma and pain, and the author isn’t afraid to show how the characters are affected by their pasts in damaging ways. At the same time, the characters really are lovely and sympathetic, and I loved getting to know the new characters introduced in this addition to the Rajes series, especially India, who is just wonderful.

As an Austen retelling, I found I&S to be very successful. Contemporary retellings of Austen novels are hard to pull off. With the classics’ focus on marriage, their themes can be hard to translate to a modern setting, and many of the retellings I’ve read feel like they’re trying too hard to shoehorn Austen’s storylines into a setting where they just don’t work.

Not so in I&S. Sonali Dev doesn’t hit us over the head with the Jane Austen references and plot points. While they’re there, they work organically, so the story would make sense and be appealing even without knowledge of the original. And while some characters’ storylines are a bit more obvious — for example, China as the Marianne stand-in is destined to have her heart broken — I was still taken by surprise by some of the twists and turns of the story, and that’s a good thing. Also, for what it’s worth, it took me a really long time to figure out who the Colonel Brandon character would be, even though it should have been obvious (I won’t say why, because spoilers!).

Incense and Sensibility is a terrific read, both as a standalone contemporary love story and as an Austen retelling. I can’t wait to find out which Austen novel the author will tackle next! I’m so enjoying the characters and their lives, and look forward to the next book so I can stay in their world.

And as a side note — India’s yoga practice and her approach to life have finally convinced me that I need to find a good yoga class!

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Buy now at Amazon – Book Depository – Bookshop.org

17May2021

Book Review: The Soulmate Equation by Christina Lauren

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: The Soulmate Equation
Author: Christina Lauren
Publisher: Gallery Books
Publication date: May 18, 2021
Length: 368 pages
Genre: Contemporary fiction/romance
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

Single mom Jess Davis is a data and statistics wizard, but no amount of number crunching can convince her to step back into the dating world. Raised by her grandparents–who now help raise her seven-year-old daughter, Juno–Jess has been left behind too often to feel comfortable letting anyone in. After all, her father’s never been around, her hard-partying mother disappeared when she was six, and her ex decided he wasn’t “father material” before Juno was even born. Jess holds her loved ones close, but working constantly to stay afloat is hard…and lonely.
But then Jess hears about GeneticAlly, a buzzy new DNA-based matchmaking company that’s predicted to change dating forever. Finding a soulmate through DNA? The reliability of numbers: This Jess understands. At least she thought she did, until her test shows an unheard-of 98% compatibility with another subject in the database: GeneticAlly’s founder, Dr. River Pena. This is one number she can’t wrap her head around, because she already knows Dr. Pena. The stuck-up, stubborn man is without a doubt not her soulmate. But GeneticAlly has a proposition: Get to know him and we’ll pay you. Jess–who is barely making ends meet–is in no position to turn it down, despite her skepticism about the project and her dislike for River. As the pair are dragged from one event to the next as the “Diamond” pairing that could make GeneticAlly a mint in stock prices, Jess begins to realize that there might be more to the scientist–and the science behind a soulmate–than she thought.
Funny, warm, and full of heart, The Soulmate Equation proves that the delicate balance between fate and choice can never be calculated.

When you pick up a new Christina Lauren book, you know you’ll get crazy good chemistry, unlikely pairings, great banter, and lots of clever plotting. The Soulmate Equation is no exception — yet another really fun modern romance with a few tricks up its sleeves.

Main character Jess, on the cusp of 30, spends all day, every day at a local coffee shop, working on her freelance statistics jobs alongside her best friend Fizzy, a successful romance writer. They use the free wifi, buy snacks and drinks every 90 minutes so they’re not just mooching, people watch, get work done, and enjoy one another’s company. And they always notice the arrival of “Americano”, the surly yet gorgeous businessman who arrives every morning exactly at 8:24, orders the exact same drink, and leaves without making eye contact with a single person.

Jess is getting by, but she has constant worries. She needs to keep and attract more clients to feel financially secure, and as the single mother of a 7-year-old, she’s only too aware of how precarious their situation could be. One dropped client could mean no ballet lessons for Juno, but one more could mean she’d be able to save for braces. Fortunately, Jess and Juno live in the same complex as Jess’s Nana and Pops, the loving grandparents who raised Jess, and their love and support makes a huge difference.

Everything changes one day when Fizzy learns that “Americano” is starting an online matchmaking business, which the friends just can’t believe. He is so stern and buttoned-up! Fizzy, being her usual effervescent self, stops him in the coffee shop and asks him, and while he says it’s not exactly a matchmaking service, he does leave a card and invites them to learn more. Never one to waste time, Fizzy insists that they go check out the office same day.

Lo and behold, “Americano” is actually Dr. River Pena, a geneticist and found of GeneticAlly, a company that uses DNA analysis to assess compatibility and match people biologically determined to be likely soulmates. It all sounds a bit crazy, but Jess is reluctantly fascinated by the statistics quoted during their presentation, and Fizzy just wants a chance for some reasonably good hook-ups. Fizzy submits a sample, and Jess eventually does too, after a day when she feels particularly down about how unchanging her life feels.

Things truly get crazy when Jess is urgently called back to the GeneticAlly offices. Her tests have come back, and she’s matched at a 98% compatible score, something never seen before. The company reps are thrilled, especially at the idea of the great press they’ll get ahead of the company’s IPO… all except Dr. Pena, who, it turns out, is Jess’s match. But how can this be? They can barely tolerate one another!

You can see where this is going, right? Jess agrees to spend time with River for the sake of the company, even though she knows the data must not be right. How can numbers predict who you’ll fall in love with? An even scarier thought for Jess is, what if the numbers really are true? Can science say you’ll fall for someone even when all first impressions say the exact opposite?

Watching Jess and River get to know one another and start to acknowledge their developing chemisty is quite fun. Jess is an amazing and responsible mother, so she’s very cautious about letting River into her life. Meanwhile, River is a serious scientist who’s never made time for love, but he’s staked his entire career on this company and absolutely believes in it — so if he denies that their results mean that they’re meant for one another, what does this mean for his faith in his own work?

The flirtation and courtship and physical attraction between these two is adorable, and I love how they each open up to one another, allowing the other person to see and understand their vulnerabilities, their past experiences, and their hopes and fears. They’re incredibly sweet together, and if you don’t melt during some of the scenes of River helping Juno with her homework, then you have no soul. (Too harsh? Sorry.)

One thing I always appreciate in Christina Lauren books is how smart and competent and professional their female characters are. Jess is a statistician — how cool is that? And it’s not just a throwaway. Not that I understand her work, but I liked reading about her projects, her thought processes, and how she applies her knowledge of data and statistics to understanding River’s work and GeneticAlly’s match results.

Fizzy is an awesome best friend, and I love that she’s a romance writer. There are a few lines about her work that made me think she’s standing in for the author duo and proving wrong (in the funniest way possible) every lousy, ill-informed comment about writing romances that they’ve ever been subjected to. Fizzy is funny and supportive and silly, and I’d love to read even more about her!

The Soulmate Equation is a lot of fun, and it’ll leave you with all sorts of warm, fuzzy feels. I read it over the course of two gray, drizzly days, and it made me feel like the sun was shining again! If you enjoy smart contemporary romance that feels authentic even when it’s funny, don’t miss this one!

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Buy now at Amazon – Book Depository – Bookshop.org

28Apr2021

Shelf Control #266: When You Read This by Mary Adkins

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Shelf Control is a weekly celebration of the unread books on our shelves. Pick a book you own but haven’t read, write a post about it (suggestions: include what it’s about, why you want to read it, and when you got it), and link up! For more info on what Shelf Control is all about, check out my introductory post, here.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

Title: When You Read This
Author: Mary Adkins
Published: 2019
Length: 400 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

For fans of Maria Semple and Rainbow Rowell, a comedy-drama for the digital age: an epistolary debut novel about the ties that bind and break our hearts.
For four years, Iris Massey worked side by side with PR maven Smith Simonyi, helping clients perfect their brands. But Iris has died, taken by terminal illness at only thirty-three. Adrift without his friend and colleague, Smith is surprised to discover that in her last six months, Iris created a blog filled with sharp and often funny musings on the end of a life not quite fulfilled. She also made one final request: for Smith to get her posts published as a book. With the help of his charmingly eager, if overbearingly forthright, new intern Carl, Smith tackles the task of fulfilling Iris’s last wish.
Before he can do so, though, he must get the approval of Iris’ big sister Jade, an haute cuisine chef who’s been knocked sideways by her loss. Each carrying their own baggage, Smith and Jade end up on a collision course with their own unresolved pasts and with each other.
Told in a series of e-mails, blog posts, online therapy submissions, text messages, legal correspondence, home-rental bookings, and other snippets of our virtual lives, When You Read This is a deft, captivating romantic comedy—funny, tragic, surprising, and bittersweet—that candidly reveals how we find new beginnings after loss.

How and when I got it:

I bought the e-book about a year ago.

Why I want to read it:

I happen to love epistolary and other types of non-traditionally formatted novels, and this book sounds terrific! I’m really curious to learn more about the blog posts left behind by Iris and how they affect Smith’s life moving forward. The book sounds very moving, although since it’s described as a romantic comedy, I’m assuming the focus is on finding love after loss.

What do you think? Would you read this book?

Please share your thoughts!

Literary Potpourri

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Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments or link back from your own post, so I can add you to the participant list.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

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Buy now: Amazon – Book Depository – Bookshop.org

25Apr2021

Book Review: The Intimacy Experiment by Rosie Danan

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: The Intimacy Experiment
Author: Rosie Danan
Publisher: Berkley
Publication date: April 6, 2021
Length: 336 pages
Genre: Romance
Source: Review copy courtesy of the publisher via NetGalley
Rating:

Naomi and Ethan will test the boundaries of love in this provocative romance from the author of the ground-breaking debut, The Roommate.
Naomi Grant has built her life around going against the grain. After the sex-positive start-up she cofounded becomes an international sensation, she wants to extend her educational platform to live lecturing. Unfortunately, despite her long list of qualifications, higher ed won’t hire her.
Ethan Cohen has recently received two honors: LA Mag named him one of the city’s hottest bachelors and he became rabbi of his own synagogue. Taking a gamble in an effort to attract more millennials to the faith, the executive board hired Ethan because of his nontraditional background. Unfortunately, his shul is low on both funds and congregants. The board gives him three months to turn things around or else they’ll close the doors of his synagogue for good.
Naomi and Ethan join forces to host a buzzy seminar series on Modern Intimacy, the perfect solution to their problems–until they discover a new one–their growing attraction to each other. They’ve built the syllabus for love’s latest experiment, but neither of them expected they’d be the ones putting it to the test.

In author Rosie Danan’s follow-up to The Roommate, the story focuses on Naomi Grant, who we meet as a supporting character in The Roommate. Here, Naomi takes center stage, and really, she’s a fabulous main character.

Naomi is a sex worker with an advanced degree — a former adult performer (aka porn star) who has shifted her career by becoming co-CEO of a wildly successful sex-positive online platform, Shameless. Naomi sees her calling as being a voice for sex-positivity and helping people experience love, intimacy, and sexual expression in ways that are fulfilling and empowering. However, her very public background means that she can’t get a teaching job at any of the local colleges, no matter where she applies.

Enter Ethan. After meeting at an education conference, Ethan sees Naomi as a potential partner for his project of bringing new members to his floundering synagogue. Ethan is a young rabbi (formerly a physics teacher) with energy, enthusiasm, and compassion. His synagogue, like so many, is largely populated by an older crowd, and without an infusion of members, it won’t be able to survive. Ethan hears Naomi speaking passionately about her goals in education, and approaches her with a proposition — to teach a course on modern intimacy, sponsored by his synagogue.

After some doubts, Naomi agrees. Naomi is a fearless, hard-edged woman who never backs down from a challenge, but she also remembers her early life as Hannah Sturm, a Jewish girl raised without much formal religion who abruptly left her past behind after a disastrous public shaming that left her with some deep-seated scars (and which directly led to her embracing the porn industry). Naomi can’t really believe that a respectable rabbi would want to be associated with her scandalous personal brand, but Ethan thinks it’s a perfect match.

Together, they build a curriculum for a seven-part series that covers everything from courtship and first dates, to satisfying sex, to how to break up. With each new lecture, the course draws more and more participants, but it’s not without controversy: The stodgy, traditionalist synagogue board members think associating their shul with someone like Naomi Grant is damaging to their reputation and goes against their core values, and give Ethan some increasingly dire warnings intended to push him to cut ties with Naomi. But Ethan, despite his warmth and patience, also has a backbone, and he’s not going to back down from what he believes is the right thing to do.

Needless to say, alongside their professional partnership, Ethan and Naomi have instant chemistry, and the more they work together, the more they realize that it’s not just physical. Yes, they’re wildly attracted to one another, but they also connect on a deeper level, and find that their feelings are growing in ways that neither expected.

There’s a lot to love about The Intimacy Experiment. First off, this book is way more Jewish than I would have expected! As someone who grew up around synagogues and JCCs, I was tickled pink every time there’s a mention of something I could relate to. It was really intriguing and surprising to discover how much the plot is driven by the very real challenge facing synagogues today — how to reach and engage unaffiliated Jewish young adults and bring them into organized religious institutions at a time when synagogues and religion may be viewed as ultra-conservative relics of the past.

Before starting the book, I felt a little uncomfortable with the idea of seeing a rabbi as a romantic lead, but I got over it! Ethan is smart, sweet, and compassionate, and his spiritual journey is described in very meaningful ways. And yes, there are sex scenes, but by the time the book gets there, I’d gotten to know Ethan as a person, not just as his title, and it didn’t bother me.

If you’re familiar at all with The Roommate, you’ll know that that book — while a great read — is also very explicit when it comes to sex. The Intimacy Experiment has sex scenes as well, but they don’t permeate the entire book they way they do in The Roommate. Instead, The Intimacy Experiment focuses on — as the title promises — intimacy, as we see the developing feelings between Naomi and Ethan and see how they apply Naomi’s lecture topics to their own relationship.

Beyond a really engaging plotline, The Intimacy Experiment has the clever and funny writing that the author excels at. While the book has heavier, more serious moments of introspection and processing earlier trauma, the overall tone is lightened up by the banter and frankness of its characters.

Also, and I can’t stress this enough, Naomi’s no-bullshit, no-shame approach is hilarious:

Naomi wondered how many women who got asked to be maid of honor used to fuck the groom, and on camera no less.

Ethan does manage to keep up, though.

“You don’t kiss like a rabbi,” Naomi said, her voice full of furious accusation, as she tugged him past the innocent bystander hunting for their lost keys.
Ethan focused on exhaling. “How many rabbis have you kissed?”
Naomi brought her fingers up to her swollen lips. “Evidently, not enough.”

While I really enjoyed this book, I did find myself annoyed by its use of the standard romance trope of miscommunication/bad assumptions — the point in the plot where a couple who are totally into one another end up fighting or breaking up because they misunderstand the other’s intent or feelings. Here, Naomi and Ethan each assume that the other deserves better, but don’t discuss it. For two intelligent, articulate, aware characters, it seems unrealistic and just there because a standard romance needs this type of plot element.

My other quibble with the book may stem from my own lack of knowledge, but in one scene, Ethan takes a selfie at an Oneg Shabbat at the synagogue following Friday night services, and in another, he has Shabbat dinner at his mother’s house, where a dish with butter is served alongside a dish with meat. Ethan is a Reform rabbi, and I grew up in Conservative Judaism, so I may be off-base, but it seems to me that a rabbi of any branch of Judaism would keep kosher and observe Shabbat. But, since the book seems to get so much right in its Jewish elements, I can’t help wondering if I’m just assuming things that aren’t universally true.

All in all, The Intimacy Experiment is a really enjoyable read, with an engaging romance and a surprisingly rich level of food for thought. Based on my experience with her two books so far, Rosie Danan is an author to keep an eye on!

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Buy The Intimacy Experiment at Amazon – Book Depository – Bookshop.org

Also by this author: The Roommate: Amazon – Book Depository – Bookshop.org

16Apr2021

Book Review: The Roommate by Rosie Danan

Posted in Book Reviews by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Title: The Roommate
Author: Rosie Danan
Publisher: Berkley
Publication date: September 15, 2020
Length: 352 pages
Genre: Contemporary romance
Source: Library
Rating:

House Rules:
Do your own dishes.
Knock before entering the bathroom.
Never look up your roommate online.
The Wheatons are infamous among the east coast elite for their lack of impulse control, except for their daughter Clara. She’s the consummate socialite: over-achieving, well-mannered, predictable. But every Wheaton has their weakness. When Clara’s childhood crush invites her to move cross-country, the offer is too much to resist. Unfortunately, it’s also too good to be true.
After a bait-and-switch, Clara finds herself sharing a lease with a charming stranger. Josh might be a bit too perceptive—not to mention handsome—for comfort, but there’s a good chance he and Clara could have survived sharing a summer sublet if she hadn’t looked him up on the Internet…
Once she learns how Josh has made a name for himself, Clara realizes living with him might make her the Wheaton’s most scandalous story yet. His professional prowess inspires her to take tackling the stigma against female desire into her own hands. They may not agree on much, but Josh and Clara both believe women deserve better sex. What they decide to do about it will change both of their lives, and if they’re lucky, they’ll help everyone else get lucky too.

You’d never know from the cover that this is one of the most explicit books I’ve read in ages.

Whoo. *wiping away sweat* *clutching my non-existent pearls*

When I read romance, I tend toward the warm and fuzzy, implied steaminess, sensual but not graphic end of the spectrum. When I picked up The Roommate, not having read anything about it but the first few lines of the synopsis, I was expecting something along those lines. Instead, what I got was a book that pushed me way outside my comfort zone — but that I ended up really liking anyway.

In The Roommate, we meet Clara, a 27-year-old recent art history Ph.D. who drops everything in her prim and proper and well-ordered life to take her lifelong crush up on an offer of a spare room in his LA home. Things do not go as planned. No sooner does he pick her up at the airport than he informs Clara that he’s about to hit the road with his band, and she’ll be rooming with a stranger he found on Craigslist.

Clara’s roommate Josh is sweet, a little goofy, very cute, and seemingly at loose ends, having recently moved out of the place he shared with his ex-girlfriend and on a nonspecific break from his work in the entertainment industry. Ho hum, another out-of-work actor, is Clara’s basic impression. But then Clara has lunch with her aunt Jill, who informs Clara that the roommate who keeps sending her goofy selfies is actually one of the hottest stars in the porn industry, Josh Darling.

Clara can’t refrain from looking up Josh’s work, and she’s pretty floored… and amazed… and turned on. And when he catches her in the act of checking out his videos, things get intense pretty quickly.

“I figured that since you’ve already seen me in in flagrante delicto, the embarrassment veil is lifted.”
Josh frowned. “Is that a fancy way of saying I gave you an orgasm? Because like I told you, that was no big deal.”

Meanwhile, Josh is a rising star in the industry (he prefers the term “adult performer” over “porn star”, thank you very much), but is stuck in a contract that takes complete advantage of him and denies him any autonomy or control in his career. He can’t even sell merchandise! The only thing he can do outside of his contract is voice-over work, which isn’t relevant in the world of porn… or is it?

Clara has an idea, and a trust fund to back it up. She sells Josh and his ex-girlfriend Naomi (also a highly successful adult performer) on the idea of creating a new subscription-based web platform — called Shameless — focused on women’s pleasure, featuring respectfully made, very hot videos with Josh’s narration offering tips and guidance encouraging exploration and enjoyment. Clara, as a very risk-averse, buttoned-up blue-blood born and raised in the WASP world of Greenwich, Connecticut, is totally up for being the silent partner, trusting in Josh and Naomi’s expertise and her own bankrolls to get the new project off the ground.

Shameless represented everything he’d ever liked about porn. A celebration of sex and pleasure that didn’t make any apologies.

Along the way, Clara is exposed to way more of the porn world than she’d ever expected, and is forced to step far outside her safe and conservative approach to life to ensure that the business will thrive. Also outside the safe and conservative zone? Her growing feelings for Josh, who seems to return her feelings — but how could a guy who has had countless sexual encounters with hot, experienced women ever be satisfied with someone ordinary like her?

Taking his clothes off tonight would test his ability to open not just his pants but his heart…

Clara is kind of a mess, despite her rigidity and love of order. She gets a Ph.D. in a field that she doesn’t really seem to be interested in pursuing, mostly to extend her time in school and avoid making hard decisions about her life, but also to satisfy family expectations for a respectable career. She’s uptight in so many ways (scared of driving, terrified of letting her family down or damaging the family reputation, obsessed with lists and rules), but she’s irresistibly drawn to Josh, and he’s just as drawn to her — despite the turtlenecks, overalls, and utter lack of chill.

There’s a subplot about the evil corporation which controls the porn industry and takes horrible advantage of the performers and crews who work for them — the company is called Black Hat, and how on the nose is that? Josh and Clara’s fight to bring down Black Hat is a bit too easy to feel at all realistic, but hey, this is romance, not crime drama.

As with any book in this genre, there’s a communications complication that nearly derails everything between Josh and Clara, as each one completely misreads the other, but again, this is a romance, and we just know there’s going to be an HEA.

I wish the wrap-up and epilogue had been clearer about Josh’s career. We know by the end that Shameless is wildly successful and that Clara, Naomi, and Josh have created a new, positive alternative to the sleazy side of the porn industry. That said, throughout the book, we understand from Josh that he really enjoys performing, but once he tries to get out of his contract with Black Hat, he is on a self-imposed performance break. So, my question is, does he go back to performing? I don’t think it would work in terms of his relationship with Clara, but at the same time, a big point of this book is that there’s no shame in enjoying sex and that the people who work in the adult entertainment field are creative, artistic, body-positive people who enjoy their work. So why should Josh stop something he enjoys and is good at? We’re left not knowing, and it kind of bugs me. I want answers!

As I said at the start, the sex in this book is very front and center and very explicit, so if that doesn’t typically work for you in fiction, you might want to skip this one. I’m not a prude, but I just happen not to gravitate toward graphic sex in fiction, so this wouldn’t have been a go-to choice for me if I’d known anything about it in advance. That said, the level of explicit sex makes a lot of sense in telling this story. The point that all people should be able to seek and give pleasure in whatever way feels right to them and that sex is a positive, enjoyable, natural part of life is really well articulated throughout the book. The sex-positive, body-positive messaging is great, and I appreciated the frankness and openness of the characters.

Also, the book as a whole as well as some of the banter is just funny, and we all need more of that in our lives, right?

“Do you regret it?” His voice came out unnaturally neutral.
“Absolutely not. If other people don’t like it, they can take a hike.”
Josh shook his head. “We gotta get you a millennial phrase book or something. Phrases like that are why telemarketers are always trying to sell you osteoporosis medication.”

I ended up really liking The Roommate, despite some of the unlikelier aspects of the plot ups and downs, and I really liked Clara and Josh as characters, as well as their undeniable chemistry. There’s a follow-up book that focuses on Naomi, newly released this month (The Intimacy Experiment), and yes, I’m going to read it!