4 stars Overall, I am giving this collection four stars, because although a few of the books included rate five stars, the rest were not appealing to me. These are sweet romances and most of the characters depicted seemed very young. I received an ARC of this collection from one of the authors. 4-21-2021 The Last Single Girl - Bria Quinlan 5 stars No surprises to this story, but it's funny, sweet, and well-told and enjoyable. I liked it. Sarah is driven by a desire not to be the last single girl in her group of friends. As she tries dating a variety of men (losers) through a dating app, John is the one reliable man in her life. He witnesses a series of disasters with each man who comes to meet Sarah at his cafe and he commiserates with her. After a while, she starts to realize he is actually the best man for her, but she doesn’t know if he feels the same. To no one’s surprise, he does. 4-22-2021 Finding Faith - Bridget Baker 4 stars Another fun story in this collection. Mary is an accountant who has decided she will never have children. Luke is a widower with two young children. Told entirely from the POV of Mary, the plot explores her conflicting feelings because she is slowly falling in love with Luke AND his children. Turns out, her reasons for thinking she'd be a bad mother are completely unfounded. 4-20-2021 Fake Marriage to Her Best Friend - Kat Cantrell 5 stars This is a fun story which, through alternating POVs, explores the hopes and fears of Nomi and Malone, best friends who secretly desire something more but are afraid of risking their friendship. Dialogue is realistic and the characters are believable and relatable. There’s quite a bit of backstory for both of them—heartache from totally different causes. Malone is driven by a desire for revenge and a need to protect himself. Nomi is driven by guilt and regret. Nomi doubts herself while Malone has built up a wall around himself, vowing to never love again. Luckily, they are best friends so they are part-way toward overcoming both of their issues. 4-23-2021 The Right Resolution - Kristen Etheridge 2 stars This book was okay at the beginning, but I found it more and more of a chore to finish it. It became overly religious and sappy, and ultimately, predictable and boring. Meh. 4-24-2021 The (Not So) Perfect Day - Maggie Dallen 5 stars Ian and Ellie are best friends and in love with one another. Of course, neither of them is willing to admit to it, even to themselves. Ellie plans to marry Marcus and Ian is determined to support her decision, and neither of them is happy about it. The ending is predictable, but the journey is engaging. I enjoyed this one—the plot, the characters, the shared emotions, and the message. 4-25-2021 Jesse and the Ice Princess - Michelle MacQueen 3 stars Jesse and Charlotte (Charlie) are an unlikely pairing because Charlie’s father is the hockey coach and has explicitly forbidden any members of the team from dating his daughter. Dubbed the “Ice Princess” because she is a figure skater and inaccessible to the other students, it quickly becomes apparent that Charlie is unhappy because she loves hockey as much as figure skating but her parents have chosen what she can do and when. I understood they were seniors in high school, but I was shocked when it was revealed that Charlie was already 18. It was a wonder she hadn’t stood up to her parents sooner. I don’t think there can be too many spoilers in a book like this because it’s obvious Jessie and Charlie are going to end up together. There were a few things I found unbelievable, however. First of all, Charlie’s best friend Hadley had a crush on Jesse, but then she told Charlie she was passing her crush on to her. What? You don’t pass your crush to someone else. Suddenly, we’re to believe that Hadley no longer has a crush on Jesse and she’s cheering Charlie on to be with him? The second problem is that Charlie’s parents are presented as one particular way from the beginning, and then because of an outburst from Charlie (and a conversation Jesse has with her father), they suddenly change their entire outlook and become supportive of Charlie doing what she loves. And dating Jesse! I guess the biggest problem is that I had trouble relating to any of the characters. I had nothing in common with any of them, thankfully. I had empathy for them and I felt their struggles were realistic, but it didn’t tap into any of my emotions. April 25, 2021
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Elizabeth J ConnorWriter. Editor. Proofreader. Archives
September 2022
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