A heartfelt, charmingly self-aware ode to romance.
A romance author reenacts popular tropes with her best friend to help cure her writer’s block, not knowing he’s been head over heels for her since Day 1.
Mia Brady is at a professional standstill. The TV adaptation of her bestselling romance series has become a huge success, and now she has to write another book—the long-awaited friends-to-lovers romance that will give two favorite characters their happily-ever-after. The only problem? Based on her own dating history, Mia doesn’t believe friendship can lead to something more. Losing a solid friendship is a blow she’s not willing to experience again, which is why she’s never gone there with her best friend, Gavin Lane. But now she’s got some serious writer’s block, and if she doesn’t finish her book by the deadline, the show’s writers will craft their own ending. Knowing she owes it to her fans as well as herself to finish the story her way, Mia asks Gavin to help her with an experiment to get her creative juices flowing—reenacting iconic romance tropes to see if one of them sparks a plot. It would be a great idea if it weren’t for the fact that Gavin has been nursing a crush on Mia since the day they met nine years ago. As the two BFFs role play through the classics, tropes like workplace romance and forced proximity suddenly begin to feel a lot more weighted. Blumberg’s latest is irresistibly fun, and the sweetness of the story is exemplified by Mia and Gavin’s slow-burn romance, which never moves into territory that’s too emotionally heavy despite the characters’ struggles with vulnerability and commitment. While the pacing is a little uneven, the dual-point-of-view structure is imperative to the book’s success; the reader needs Gavin’s tender, unyielding belief that he and Mia can weather anything as a counterweight to her constant wavering. It’s also hard not to be won over by a story that so cleverly wields its meta-awareness of the genre, which results in some of the book’s best and most swoonworthy moments.
A heartfelt, charmingly self-aware ode to romance.Pub Date: Aug. 12, 2025
ISBN: 9781335016577
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Canary Street Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
A romance that could have used significant rethinking.
Childhood friends, almost-sweethearts, a misunderstanding, and a funeral.
Blair Lang and Declan Renshaw were best friends who went on one date before a disagreement and an accident sent them in different directions after high school. Now Blair is back from college to be with her great-aunt Lottie, who’s dying, and to support her single mother in small-town Seabrook, California. Finding a job at a coffee shop puts her in the path of her former boyfriend, since he turns out to be its owner. Can the two get past their mistakes? The novel uses the popular second-chance romance trope, but Pham fails to energize it through interesting characters. Blair’s grief over her great-aunt’s death and her plan to help her mother are overshadowed by internal monologues about her feelings, the way her friends aren’t paying attention to her, and the novel she plans to write. Declan’s distinguishing characteristic, besides being a former high school quarterback, is his skill at building birdhouses. Unsurprisingly, the couple doesn’t have much chemistry; when they embrace, their “bodies meld like…memory foam.” The wooden characters, unusual word choices (“conglomerate of pedestrians,” “litany of plants”), and odd turns of phrase (“tension melting from his eyebrows like butter melting in a warm pan”) are almost enough to obscure the lack of plot development. What passes for stakes is easily defused when Blair comes into an inheritance that saves her from working as a consultant at Ernst & Young in New York—so she can write a romance novel.
A romance that could have used significant rethinking.Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781668095188
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2026
Two hot people confronting their trauma, making passionate love, and solving violent crimes! ’Nuff said.
A heartbroken man lusts after his therapist while seeking revenge on a drug kingpin and his enforcer.
Mitch Haskell’s wife, Angela, died two years ago of an apparent suicide, but Mitch has always believed the scene was staged. Certainly, she would never have willingly left their young son, Andrew, behind. Consumed with a thirst for vengeance, Mitch—a former Marine and undercover agent with the Drug Enforcement Administration and currently a police detective—is struggling with alcohol dependency and uncontrolled rage. Andrew is living with his in-laws, who are making not-so-subtle suggestions that they might apply for permanent guardianship if Mitch can’t get it together. So his boss and best friend, John Bowie, mandates that he go into therapy, which puts him in the path of sexy Dr. Dylan Reede. Within a few days, Mitch makes a connection between two new murders and the death of his former partner; finds a big clue that points to the truth about Angela’s death; goes undercover as a homeless man; takes on a vicious drug cartel; and obnoxiously bullies Dylan with a charm offensive that leads them inevitably to bed. While Mitch seems to lean into the stereotype of the ex-soldier/cop with deeply buried trauma who believes that the ends justify the means—at least in law enforcement—Dylan offers the strength and sweetness to help him start breaking down his walls, allowing herself to be vulnerable in turn. Is passionate sex enough to ground a relationship and a family for the long term? For these characters, and the breakneck speed of this thriller, it’s as good a foundation as any.
Two hot people confronting their trauma, making passionate love, and solving violent crimes! ’Nuff said.Pub Date: March 17, 2026
ISBN: 9781538743027
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: Dec. 11, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
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