Uncomfortably regressive.
A woman and two young children move to a small Alabama town to make a new life.
Kelly Jenkins is the temporary guardian to Todd and Daisy, the young children of her best friend who died of cancer a year ago. Their dad left the children with Kelly and took off for parts unknown. Kelly loves the kids and does her best to care for them, but after losing her job in the city, the only job she can find is in the tiny town of Blue Moon, Alabama. Her new job is to revive and restore the drive-in movie theater, which has been in disrepair for decades. The drive-in is adjacent to the pecan groves of town recluse Seth Morgan. He’s been living quietly after the death of his young daughter in a bicycle accident, too consumed with grief to engage with the townspeople. Kelly’s new boss gives her a box of old VHS tapes to teach her the history of the movies, and coincidentally, Seth owns the only VHS player in town. The two bond together in a sweet, chaste romance while planning a fundraiser for a new projector for the drive-in. When Todd and Daisy’s father returns, Kelly and Seth try to convince him that they would be better parents to the children. Author Dailey died a decade ago, and this novel penned by a ghostwriter reads as though it was pulled out of a time capsule. Even in the context of romance, the plot is dated and old-fashioned; for example, Susan Elizabeth Phillips' Dream a Little Dream (1998) centered a similar story about saving a drive-in. The book has a traditional, conservative view of parenthood and what constitutes a family. Every big problem is fixed with a pat, easy solution.
Uncomfortably regressive.Pub Date: April 25, 2023
ISBN: 9781420153613
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Zebra/Kensington
Review Posted Online: Feb. 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2023
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
Light on plot and heavy on bolstering traditional gender norms as the ultimate goal for both men and women.
A Seattle woman meets a Chicago businessman as she flies home from a visit to a friend, and her small act of kindness blossoms into more.
Maisy Gallagher is barely making ends meet. With her father’s unexpected death a few years earlier, she dropped out of nursing school to help out in the family’s jewelry store, working with her uncle. Her older brother, Sean, also moved back home so he and Maisy could help their mother and their 10-year-old brother, Patrick. When Maisy offers a ride to a rude businessman who sat next to her on the plane, she’s just operating on the kindness her grandmother instilled in her. That businessman, Chase Furst, turns out to be an incredibly wealthy banker; he’s flown into Seattle to make funeral arrangements for his mother, to whom he hasn’t spoken in years. Sparks fly in this gentle and predictable romance that leans heavily on long-distance and class-divide tropes. As with many of the author’s books, Christianity and the characters’ reliance on God’s will—as they wait and see what happens next—play a large part, as do traditional gender roles where women cook, clean, and only work in paying jobs until they have children at home to take care of. The author does offer a lighter touch when it comes to the painful ways alcoholism can destroy family relationships, with an understanding of the regret that can weigh on every family member.
Light on plot and heavy on bolstering traditional gender norms as the ultimate goal for both men and women.Pub Date: April 28, 2026
ISBN: 9798217091676
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
