Cute romance, annoying secondary characters
I was really on the fence about this book, but ultimately I had to go ahead with a 3 star rating. I just spent too much of the book annoyed to go any further than that.
That’s not to say I didn’t like parts of the book. I actually did like our heroine Maddie. She’s a smart girl, is in business for herself, she can be funny at times. I also totally get her insecurities, she was a geeky girl when she was young, ignored, made fun of, overweight, so she carries the scars of that with her. And that she’s suddenly in business with her high school crush who basically didn’t know she existed and now may have feelings for her, well I mean of course it’s understandable that she would have some issues with that.
As for our hero, Mauro, I liked him okay. He is a stand up guy. He’s a firefighter, a good brother, a good son, it’s hard to really find a flaw in the guy. He’s looking to settle down and he has his sights set on the beautiful girl he never knew existed when they were in high school together. Honestly I didn’t have super strong feelings about Mauro.
All that aside, the secondary characters killed my enjoyment in this book. Maddie’s best friend Lauren, ugh. She is so invasive, and I think the author intended for it to be cute or endearing but it made me hate hurt, and it really feels like the way she steamrolls over Maddie, well that she’s less of a friend and more of a jerk. Mauro’s brother Luca, I wanted to punch in the face, the way he just trashes his brothers apartment, invited people over to a place that isn’t his, eats and drinks his brothers food, he just feels so disrespectful. Especially with both Mauro and their other brother make it clear he needs to stop and he doesn’t. And don’t even get me started on Cailin, the widow of Mauro’s fellow firefighter. I mean ugh. Maybe if there had only been one maybe two characters who annoyed me it wouldn’t be so bad, but all three really just killed it for me.