True love does not run smooth in this intriguing but uneven romance.
A successful executive agonizes over whether to tell her boyfriend that she suffers from a deadly disease in this topical romance.
When marketing and events whiz Brooklyn Monti begins dating Kai Rahimi, a handsome, divorced stockbroker, she conceals a major part of her life. Brooklyn has Huntington’s disease, a neurodegenerative illness that killed her birth mother. Raised by loving parents after her birth father put her up for adoption, Brooklyn has additional emotional baggage. Shortly after she was diagnosed with Huntington’s, her college boyfriend, Adam Williamson, attacked her. Despite the fact that Adam, a star football player, never faced major consequences for his abuse, Brooklyn graduated and created a successful event planning company. But she never found love until Kai paid for her coffee at an airport. As her relationship with Kai intensifies, Brooklyn develops loving bonds with his mother and 5-year-old son. But she also faces challenges posed by Kai’s volatile former wife and Adam’s reappearance in her life. Adam threatens to tell Kai about Brooklyn’s diagnosis if she does not participate in a documentary about the athlete. As Brooklyn and Kai approach their one-year dating anniversary, he gives her a key to his house and implores her to be vulnerable with him. Yet Brooklyn remains silent about her illness, even when Adam appears at her workplace and tells her business partners that she has Huntington’s. Will Brooklyn continue to keep her secret from Kai, even if it costs her true happiness? Brooklyn’s struggles to build a romantic relationship while dealing with a life-threatening diagnosis are compelling. But Hutchison’s dialogue is stilted and sometimes cringeworthy. In Brooklyn and Kai’s meet-cute at the airport, Kai seems creepy, not charming, when he comments on her butt and “nice figure” minutes after meeting her. Later he says, without irony: “Give me a chance to show you how a man loves a woman.” The plot also veers into implausibility at several points. Although Adam put Brooklyn on life support with broken bones and nerve damage, it does not appear that he was ever arrested. Brooklyn somehow conceals her Huntington’s from her business partners—and close friends—for seven years even though they observe her slurred speech, facial tics, and twitching limbs. A main character’s body also vanishes without explanation.
True love does not run smooth in this intriguing but uneven romance.Pub Date: July 25, 2022
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Running Wild Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 25, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Through palpable tension balanced with glimmers of hope, Hoover beautifully captures the heartbreak and joy of starting over.
The sequel to It Ends With Us (2016) shows the aftermath of domestic violence through the eyes of a single mother.
Lily Bloom is still running a flower shop; her abusive ex-husband, Ryle Kincaid, is still a surgeon. But now they’re co-parenting a daughter, Emerson, who's almost a year old. Lily won’t send Emerson to her father’s house overnight until she’s old enough to talk—“So she can tell me if something happens”—but she doesn’t want to fight for full custody lest it become an expensive legal drama or, worse, a physical fight. When Lily runs into Atlas Corrigan, a childhood friend who also came from an abusive family, she hopes their friendship can blossom into love. (For new readers, their history unfolds in heartfelt diary entries that Lily addresses to Finding Nemo star Ellen DeGeneres as she considers how Atlas was a calming presence during her turbulent childhood.) Atlas, who is single and running a restaurant, feels the same way. But even though she’s divorced, Lily isn’t exactly free. Behind Ryle’s veneer of civility are his jealousy and resentment. Lily has to plan her dates carefully to avoid a confrontation. Meanwhile, Atlas’ mother returns with shocking news. In between, Lily and Atlas steal away for romantic moments that are even sweeter for their authenticity as Lily struggles with child care, breastfeeding, and running a business while trying to find time for herself.
Through palpable tension balanced with glimmers of hope, Hoover beautifully captures the heartbreak and joy of starting over.Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-668-00122-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2022
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
This slightly smutty monster romance feels more like a spectacle than a deliberately paced story.
A woman travels to Scotland to unravel her late father’s past and meets a grumpy Scotsman with his own secrets.
Keyanna MacKay was brought up by a single father who was always tight-lipped about his upbringing, so when he dies, she’s left with no family. Key decides that learning about his life before he left Scotland would be a good way of keeping his memory close and perhaps connecting with long-lost relatives. She discovers a grandmother and other extended family in Scotland, but they’re hardly welcoming. “I know who you are....And you shouldn’t have come,” are the first words her grandmother says to her. Lachlan Greer has little patience for the American he’s already written off as clueless. When he witnesses Key’s snubbing by her family members, his grumpy demeanor gives way to begrudging pity, and he starts helping her navigate the local community and try to build a bridge to her grandmother. At first, this book seems to be a contemporary romance with light magical undertones involving a family’s mysterious curse, but it quickly devolves into a monster romance heavy on shock value. While monster romance can be fun, it doesn’t work here. Key and Lachlan’s chemistry is bumpy, and the pace of their relationship as they go from disastrous first impressions to a happily ever after is all over the place. Ferguson tries to combine too many elements—including a grumpy-meets-sunshine pairing, a mystery with sensitive family dynamics, and the complicated logistics of falling in love with a cryptid—leaving several threads not fully resolved. The setting is the most positive element, with Scotland’s lush greenery providing the perfect whimsical background for hunting down long-buried family secrets.
This slightly smutty monster romance feels more like a spectacle than a deliberately paced story.Pub Date: Dec. 3, 2024
ISBN: 9780593816851
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
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