An often captivating story that’s equally heartwarming and sexy.
In Harlow’s romance, when circumstances force a young woman back to her hometown after 10 years away, she finds herself reexamining abandoned friendships and lost love.
The book opens during Mila Ferguson’s last days in the small town of Hart’s Landing, where she recently graduated high school. She finally works up the nerve to kiss her longtime crush, Everett McKean, who stops by the bakery where she’s working, only for them to be interrupted by an explosion that sets the store ablaze. Believing herself responsible for the destruction, Mila leaves her quaint town and loses touch with her three closest friends, as well as Everett. Ten years later, Mila is living in Brooklyn, New York, and working as a botanical illustrator. Her mom calls to tell her that she’s having double hip-replacement surgery and will need her help afterward. Despite their turbulent relationship, Mila reluctantly agrees to come home, but from the moment she arrives in Hart’s Landing, she’s assaulted by memories from her childhood, including her abandonment by her father and her mother’s relentless pressure. She also runs into Everett everywhere. Their mutual attraction hasn’t abated, but Mila is reluctant to pursue Everett because she’s only in town temporarily and healing from a divorce. Even so, she can’t seem to resist his charm and devotion. As the two grow closer, she also tries to reconnect with former friends. Harlow mainly tells the story in chapters from either Mila’s or Everett’s first-person perspectives, and it’s an engaging tale, despite some unanswered questions. For example, the story of Mila’s third lost friend remains unresolved, as if forgotten, and the author never makes clear why the whole town is so thoroughly caught up in the mystery of a single workplace accident from 10 years ago—especially when they all seem to agree on the culprit. Mila’s fraught relationship with her mother also largely goes unexplored. Still, the chemistry between Mila and Everett jumps off the page, and Harlow renders the steamier scenes well; the main characters, as well as Hart’s Landing itself, are thoroughly lovable.
An often captivating story that’s equally heartwarming and sexy.Pub Date: May 12, 2026
ISBN: 9781682816660
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Entangled: Amara
Review Posted Online: March 23, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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.
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