The only reason this book is a B instead of an A is that Julie Anne Long wrote one of my top-five romances of all time, and until she writes a book that makes me feel that phenomenal again, I am unfairly docking her points. Yes, I know it's unfair, but oh god I loved that book.
This book is the second in her contemporary series, set in a charming small-town in the West. I grew up in a small town, so I have a lot of feelings about how it's often made out to be charming and wonderful; I appreciate that Julie Anne Long has made it clear that a lot of people want to leave Hellcat Canyon. In particular her heroine in this book, Glory Greenleaf, is from the kind of small-town family I recognize. Single-parent, financially disastrous, brother in jail, barely scraping by keeping a job, but that's just sort of how life is. Glory is a very talented singer and songwriter, and everyone thought she was going away to be successful, but her family has pulled her back. That feels incredibly real to me.
A lot less of the book is spent on her love interest, Eli, whose name I had literally forgotten and had to go look up. He's the local sheriff, and of course they grew up together, and of course they were madly in love, until of course he had to arrest her brother (his best friend) and send him to jail.
It's a really lovely romance, and Glory gets to live her dreams and love her family. I liked it a lot. (Could I do without the "she's pregnant" epilogue? Yeah, probably. I'm so tired of romance novels tacking on a "she's pregnant" epilogue. THERE ARE OTHER WAYS TO HAVE A HAPPY FAMILY. But whatever.)
Grade: B
#90 in 2016
No comments:
Post a Comment