Smart and with emotional depth, this is a cut above the romantic comedies that flood the market every summer.
A charming debut about a young woman, the troublesome men in her life and the dog she gets to replace them.
Savannah should be happy that her two closest friends are getting married. Janie (really more like a sister, Savannah grew up on Janie’s family estate—her mother was the housekeeper) is marrying Peter, Savannah’s best friend from college. The only problem is that Savannah has been nursing a secret love for Peter for years. Savannah is racked with guilt; lusting after Janie’s new husband isn’t part of her life plan. When Peter almost makes a drunken confession of love to Savannah on his wedding night, and when Janie’s mother offers Savannah a six-figure check to leave the married couple alone, Savannah embarks on a bender with surprising results. Drunk and watching a Rin Tin Tin marathon, she decides she needs a dog to fill the void and orders over the Internet a $6,000 German Shepard from Slovakia. When he arrives, he is enormous, highly trained (Savannah has to learn his Slovak commands) and a bit too high-strung for condo living. She takes the newly christened Joe to Dr. Alex Brandt, a young, ruggedly handsome vet who takes a shine to Savannah. If this were all, there would be little to distinguish it from the well-worn territory of light romances, but Larkin complicates things in interesting ways. Savannah becomes increasingly class conscious—as the housekeeper’s daughter, Savannah has endured a lifetime of letting Janie get her way, of Peter’s parents disallowing him from dating lowly Savannah—and now in a budding relationship with down-to-earth Alex, Savannah is beginning to question what kind of strange triangle she, Peter and Janie formed. As Peter and Janie become more demanding and unhappy—they’re not used to life without Savannah to fix things—they begin to jeopardize the good thing she’s got going with Alex. Maybe Joe will save the day.
Smart and with emotional depth, this is a cut above the romantic comedies that flood the market every summer.Pub Date: June 10, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-525-95171-1
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: Dec. 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2010
With frank language and patient plotting, this gangly teen crush grows into a confident adult love affair.
Eleven years ago, he broke her heart. But he doesn’t know why she never forgave him.
Toggling between past and present, two love stories unfold simultaneously. In the first, Macy Sorensen meets and falls in love with the boy next door, Elliot Petropoulos, in the closet of her dad’s vacation home, where they hide out to discuss their favorite books. In the second, Macy is working as a doctor and engaged to a single father, and she hasn’t spoken to Elliot since their breakup. But a chance encounter forces her to confront the truth: what happened to make Macy stop speaking to Elliot? Ultimately, they’re separated not by time or physical remoteness but by emotional distance—Elliot and Macy always kept their relationship casual because they went to different schools. And as a teen, Macy has more to worry about than which girl Elliot is taking to the prom. After losing her mother at a young age, Macy is navigating her teenage years without a female role model, relying on the time-stamped notes her mother left in her father’s care for guidance. In the present day, Macy’s father is dead as well. She throws herself into her work and rarely comes up for air, not even to plan her upcoming wedding. Since Macy is still living with her fiance while grappling with her feelings for Elliot, the flashbacks offer steamy moments, tender revelations, and sweetly awkward confessions while Macy makes peace with her past and decides her future.
With frank language and patient plotting, this gangly teen crush grows into a confident adult love affair.Pub Date: April 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-2801-1
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2018
Heartfelt and funny, this enemies-to-lovers romance shows that the best things in life are all-inclusive and nontransferable...
An unlucky woman finally gets lucky in love on an all-expenses-paid trip to Hawaii.
From getting her hand stuck in a claw machine at age 6 to losing her job, Olive Torres has never felt that luck was on her side. But her fortune changes when she scores a free vacation after her identical twin sister and new brother-in-law get food poisoning at their wedding buffet and are too sick to go on their honeymoon. The only catch is that she’ll have to share the honeymoon suite with her least favorite person—Ethan Thomas, the brother of the groom. To make matters worse, Olive’s new boss and Ethan’s ex-girlfriend show up in Hawaii, forcing them both to pretend to be newlyweds so they don’t blow their cover, as their all-inclusive vacation package is nontransferable and in her sister’s name. Plus, Ethan really wants to save face in front of his ex. The story is told almost exclusively from Olive’s point of view, filtering all communication through her cynical lens until Ethan can win her over (and finally have his say in the epilogue). To get to the happily-ever-after, Ethan doesn’t have to prove to Olive that he can be a better man, only that he was never the jerk she thought he was—for instance, when she thought he was judging her for eating cheese curds, maybe he was actually thinking of asking her out. Blending witty banter with healthy adult communication, the fake newlyweds have real chemistry as they talk it out over snorkeling trips, couples massages, and a few too many tropical drinks to get to the truth—that they’re crazy about each other.
Heartfelt and funny, this enemies-to-lovers romance shows that the best things in life are all-inclusive and nontransferable as well as free.Pub Date: May 14, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5011-2803-5
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2019
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