This book started out good…
Sam is the frontman for a heavy metal band. He has a long-time girlfriend, but lately things between them haven’t been good, and the rockstar lifestyle is starting to wear thin. When Sam and his girlfriend break up, he takes it hard and decides a change of scenery is needed to get him over the heartbreak. So he buys a house two hours south of Denver, in a small town, away from everything.
As luck would have it, Sam’s new next door neighbor, Gracelyn, is a huge fan of his band. She’s also a good 12 years younger, and not the least bit worldly - the complete opposite of Sam.
It was easy to see why they would fall for each other. Grace has always had a crush on the lead singer of one of her favorite bands, and finding out he’s a nice guy in real life makes him all the more attractive to her. Sam, after a very unorthodox relationship and the major betrayal by his girlfriend, is in desperate need of the lightness and simplicity a life with Grace offers.
But when it got to the part where Sam and Grace are interacting, their conversations were written with all the comfort and ease of junior highers - that is to say, there was none. It was almost painful to read for several chapters, and for the second time in a row it seemed like a book I was reading was written by either two different authors, or one with a split personality.
This book also had a problem with over-explaining. At 36% we get the following sentence: “Here she was grocery shopping with a rock star, one who’d moved in next door a few months ago.” Uh, yeah, we got that already. Because we read about him buying the house and moving in (at 15%), and then meeting the family next door (at 19%). At 94%, we get “Emily, Clay’s svelte brunette girlfriend, opened the door...” Seriously?! Emily has been in the whole book! Our hero even had Thanksgiving dinner at her house and she explained the difference between a vegetarian and a vegan. Does the author think we are so simple minded that we can’t keep more than five characters straight? I’m not sure why that kind of thing rubs me the wrong way, but it just does.
And finally, there was this whole plot line with Sam’s ex-girlfriend, it needed the services of his lawyer, (I’m being spoiler-free here…), and it goes NOWHERE. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but this book could have used more drama and angst than just overprotective parents. The author set herself up with the ex-girlfriend to cause major problems. And it’s talked about twice, with no resolution. Maybe there will be a sequel. But if there is, I’m not sure I’ll even want to read it.
This wasn’t a bad book. For the most part it kept me engaged and wanting to know what was going to happen (which is how I decided on a three rating instead of something lower). Unfortunately, not much really happened, which made the story bland and ultimately, kind of uninteresting. Even the grand gesture at the end had me rolling my eyes (and I am a HUGE fan of the grand gesture). So much more time could have been spent showing them falling in love, dealing with the vast differences in lifestyles and where they are in life, and instead we got so much internal dialogue about why Sam shouldn’t pursue Grace and why Grace wouldn’t be someone Sam is interested in. I wanted so much more from this book, but instead it just fell flat.