GOING DOWN EASY

Two single parents struggle to transition their no-strings affair into a successful relationship.

Addison Sloan has been making monthly business trips to New Orleans, and on each visit, she has a sexually adventurous but emotionally safe hookup with bar owner Gabe Trahan. They don’t even have each other’s cellphone numbers! Gabe assumes they can turn their affair into a relationship when he learns Addison has moved to New Orleans full-time. Addison thinks Gabe will balk when he discovers she has a 5-year-old daughter, but Gabe has a 5-year-old son and he sees this coincidence as further proof that they are meant to be together. Nicholas (Cashmere and Camo, 2018, etc.) boldly starts at this transition point rather than at the beginning of their relationship, but it doesn’t always pay off. Addison’s decision to move herself and her daughter from New York to New Orleans is underdeveloped, and Gabe’s initial reaction to her news is offensively overbearing. Addison’s and Gabe’s feelings about parenting, both the joys and struggles, are portrayed with refreshing honesty; but the story of how they blend their families overwhelms their romance. The New Orleans setting is full of touristy details about beignets and jazz, but it’s disheartening to read a book set in this famously multicultural city that is populated with only white characters, including a scene where Gabe and Addison attend a ball at a plantation without even a glimmer of discomfort about its history.

This familycentric romance sells the couple short.