February 2024 Romance Wrap-up

 Hideaway Heart - Melanie Harlow

This is the second book in the Cherry Tree Harbor series and follows Kelly and Xander. Kelly is also known as country music star Pixie Hart, but she's ready to have a break from the spotlight and spend some time alone in a cabin.  But her older brother doesn't want her to be alone, so he enlists the help of former Navy SEAL Xander to be her bodyguard.  Only problem is the cabin Kelly rented is tiny, there's only one bed, and the two can't stand each other ... at first. This was such a fun bodyguard romance and I loved seeing Kelly and Xander get together.  They seemed to immediately know how to poke one another's buttons but I really liked how both of them dropped their prickly exteriors.  I'm not the biggest fan of celebrity romances, but having Kelly be on a break from her regular life helped temper the celebrity part a bit.  I loved seeing the small town stuff through her eyes and how she valued the things that people living in Cherry Tree Harbor may take for granted. When they do finally get together, the pages were sizzling but there was also a lot of emotion from both of them.  There was a bit of a romantic suspense sub-plot but I would not call this a romantic suspense book.  It is always great being back with Harlow's small town characters and this was no exception.

Not Your Crush's Cauldron - April Asher

This paranormal romance is the third in the Supernatural Singles series and follows Olive and Bax.  Olive is perfectly content to live with her very set routines until one of her students challenge her to do her own assignment and step outside of her comfort zone.  Bax is a guardian angel and when his next assignment is Olive - his new roommate and long time crush - he knows this is going to get complicated.  But spending more time with Olive is not something he's going to pass up.  This was so fun and it was great to see the two characters who we haven't seen a ton of in the previous books.  I love a good "oops, my crush is now my roommate" moment but when Bax is assigned to Olive as her guardian angel, it brought that to a whole new level.  Asher got their whole opposites attract dynamic down perfectly where the seem so different on paper, but their personalities just mesh so well that is is obvious they belong together.  I loved how Olive was really the catalyst for a lot of the romantic growth between them and it really showed her coming out of her shell in many ways.  I loved learning more about this world and the guardian angel system was so interesting to me.  We get to see a good amount of the other characters as well, which is always fun.

Thanks to NetGalley and St Martin's Press for the ARC.  Publication date was February 13. 2024

Do Your Worst - Rosie Danan

This supernatural romance follows Riley and Clark.  Riley is working on expanding her family's gift as curse breakers by offering her services for hire.  Being hired for a cursed castle in Scotland seems like a great way to get her name out there but the only problem is the grumpy and skeptical Clark was also hired to work at the castle.  The two vow to be enemies, but somehow keep ending up in situations together and they get the sense that maybe there's another force bringing them together.  I loved the premise and supernatural elements of this, but I had a bit of a hard time with the characters.  I didn't quite buy that these two actually liked each other and found their weird bickering/hot-cold dynamic a little annoying to read.  I can see Danan going for an enemies to lovers/opposites attract dynamic but for me the constant back and forth felt like we were never making any headway.  They would be sworn enemies, then one would do something nice for the other so then they'd agree to a truce.  Until someone did something the next day that would make them sworn enemies again.  I thought Riley and Clark were both very interesting and well developed and I loved how they each had their own personal growth throughout this story.  However, they just didn't click for me as a couple by the end.

Headcase - Onley James

This is the fourth book in the Necessary Evils series and follows Asa and Zane. Zane is an aspiring crime reporter and he has a theory that Thomas Mulvaney and probably the entire Mulvaney clan are murderers. In the hopes of getting more evidence, Zane hopes to run into Thomas during a gala dinner.  Instead, he runs into Asa who immediately starts pressing Zane's buttons as entertainment.  But neither expect the evening to truly end where Asa offered - with him chasing Zane down through his mansion with the fun beginning when Zane is caught. When Zane gets too close to the family secret, Asa chooses to bring him into the fold.  This was yet another fun entry in the series and Zane's path into the family had a lot of similarities to Noah from book 1.  In the previous books, Asa and his twin Ari were never really seen separately but it was great to have the plot separate them so that we can get a really good sense of Asa's character.   Asa really came off to me as the most sadistic of the brothers we've met so far (and not just in regards to his bedroom proclivities).  Asa and Zane certainly have chemistry for days and I loved the way their insta-lust for each other momentarily made them forget their own goals for the night they met. While I don't doubt that  Asa and Zane are a good pairing, the ending to this felt more like a Happy for Now rather than a Happily Ever After (I think mostly due to the fact that Asa would bring up his twin Ari so that plot line felt a bit unresolved).  At this point in the series, over half of the brothers have found their person to be with so the inner circle 

TW/CW: The investigation in this book is based on a real internet game where the players usually eventually commit suicide. Zane is very close to this topic so the discussion of suicide is frequent in the book. 

Praise - Sara Cate

This age gap, kinky read is the first book in the Salacious Player's Club series and follows Charlie and Emerson.  Emerson is the owner of the Salacious Player's Club - a kink club he co-owns and runs with his friends. He is also Charlie's ex boyfriend's father.  When Charlie shows up at his office to collect the security deposit of the apartment she shared with her ex, Emerson mistakes her for a new sub.  Once he realizes his mistake, Emerson is very apologetic and ends up offering Charlie a very vanilla job as his secretary.  But as the two work closer together and Charlie learns more about the kink world, the two end up forming a connection that can't be undone even if they wanted to.  This was such a fun, kinky read and a great first entry in a new series that I was immediately obsessed with. Cate does a fantastic job with the world building of the club as well as all the other side characters who will each have their own book in the series.  Emerson and Charlie are both very unique characters and I really loved the way they ended up together despite everything they had going against them.  I found this read to be lower angst than I was expecting given the tropes of age gap and ex boyfriend's dad. I loved the way kink was portrayed and how Emerson explained the more emotional elements to Charlie.  I didn't quite love Charlie as much as Emerson and it mostly came down to her relationship with kink.  In the kinky romances I've read where one MC is vanilla, they usually still have an inkling that they are kinky themselves or even have a list of kinky interests but have never acted on them.  Charlie came across very vanilla where she didn't even know some of the terms or acts and then she would jump in with both feet.  I would have expected her to be a little more hesitant or for there to be more of a ramp up in the kinky aspects as she expanded her experiences.  However, a lot of this exploration I was expecting was explained away by an evening of Charlie Googling.  All that being said, Cate does a great job of really selling the connection between Charlie and Emerson both in and out of their kink scenes and I'm so excited to have found a new romance series where I want to immediately read all of the books.  

Small Town Swoon - Melanie Harlow

This is the fourth book in the Cherry Tree Harbor series and follows Dash and Ari.  Dash comes back home to Cherry Tree Harbor in the hopes of finding himself for the next phase of his acting career.  Ari has been helping her parents run the family diner and the last person she wants to see is Dash.  The two have history going back to childhood, but Dash's rebuff of her feelings when she was a teen still hurts.  But they aren't teens any more, and when adult Ari and Dash get together, the chemistry is off the charts.  This was fantastic and I absolutely loved Dash and Ari.  As I said above, I don't love celebrity romances, but since Dash was on vacation from acting it didn't really feel like a celebrity book.  However, I did love the practical conversations about Dash and his career plans that I think are often overlooked with celebrities.  I was glad that we got past the incident from years ago pretty quickly which meant this was more of a friends to lovers than I was initially expecting.  Harlow does a great job (as usual) with balancing her character's career aspirations and love of their small town/families.  Dax and Ari are so compatible on just about every level and I really enjoyed how deep their conversations went into their career and life aspirations.  It really felt like their relationship is built on a super solid foundation and I fully believe these two will have a HEA.  We also see a lot of the Buckley family in this one which I absolutely loved.

Thanks to the author for the ARC.  Publication date is March 4, 2024