by Eric D. Lehman ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 2, 2016
A lyrical, lovely story of doomed romance that doesn’t overstay its welcome.
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Travel and history writer Lehman (Connecticut Town Greens, 2015, etc.) turns his hand to fiction in this short novel set in the City of Lights.
American William Byrnes has taken a teaching position at École Eustache, a private school in Paris, despite his abysmal French. However, he can’t escape the guilty weight of a past tragedy for which he tries to atone by leading a Spartan, lonely life, living in a school-provided apartment decorated with West African art by his Nigerian predecessor. He lives on oatmeal, rice, and strong tea, stubbornly oblivious to the delights of the city. That changes when his boss, Monsieur Cygne, tasks him with reading Émile Zola’s 1873 novel The Belly of Paris and sends him to Librarie Anglais Rose, an English-language bookstore owned by beautiful Massachusetts expatriate Lucy Navarre. She insists on adding to his reading list—including works by Arthur Rimbaud, Charles Baudelaire, and Honoré de Balzac—and soon the two are spending leisurely Saturdays exploring the Paris that William has ignored until now. Though she has an absent French husband and he wears a wedding ring, they become emotionally intimate, eventually trading painful secrets. Overall, this slim volume contains little incident, instead sketching the two characters as they connect to both the city and each other; at one point, for example, Lucy’s gray eyes remind William of “the Seine after rain, or the winter sycamores of the Champ-de-Mars from a distance.” Indeed, Lehman’s brevity is his strength, as drawing out the story might have ruined its quiet pacing and intensity. Toward the end of the book, Monsieur Cygne asks William what he’s learned about French literature, to which he answers, “I would say it is about the inevitability of loss”—and so is Lehman’s tale.
A lyrical, lovely story of doomed romance that doesn’t overstay its welcome.Pub Date: Aug. 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-938846-92-2
Page Count: 104
Publisher: Homebound Publications
Review Posted Online: Aug. 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Christina Lauren ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 10, 2018
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
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by Christina Lauren ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 14, 2019
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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