Flawed yet lovable characters shine in this celebration of human connection.
Desperate to reconnect with the perfect man she met on a plane, a woman hires a private detective with ties to her past.
Since a traumatic stalker incident a few years ago, casting director Sasha Cruz has pretty much become a shut-in, but when a new job opportunity sends her to Paris, she wants to open herself to the world again. On the flight, she unexpectedly bonds with the man seated next to her, sharing some of her deepest feelings. Though they talk the whole way, they never exchange names or numbers. Back in Brooklyn, Sasha seeks out Wesley Dane, the P.I. who caught her stalker, and asks him to track down her dream man. She hasn’t seen Wes since he worked on her case and is surprised that he now owns a barbeque food truck. Wes loved aspects of his investigative work but was never able to keep his emotions separate from the job, so he left that world behind. He agrees to one last case for Sasha—helping her find love feels like a full circle moment. But they both crossed some boundaries last time, and that old attraction reignites, leaving Sasha torn between the man meant to usher in a new future and the one who reminds her of her painful past. Sasha and Wes are messy, complex, utterly captivating characters in this engrossing, romantic story. Williams balances several plotlines and tones—from emotionally heavy and realistic to light and whimsical—but it works due to her constant focus on the irresistible connection between the lead characters. The book’s ending gets pretty chaotic as the mystery takes some wild turns that don’t feel necessary to the story but are still entertaining, and the happily-ever-after feels somewhat rushed, but on the whole this is an immensely satisfying love story.
Flawed yet lovable characters shine in this celebration of human connection.Pub Date: June 16, 2026
ISBN: 9781538770269
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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