This is my first Hildred Billings read but it won't be my last. The title and circumstance of the book infers erotica but this story has plenty of romance and is also about coming to grips with ones own internal struggles.
The leads are Raquel, a forty-three year old woman, fairly established in her career but with no long-term partner to speak of after her heart was broken in college and Lisa, a twenty-three your old woman that's just getting started in her life. I liked both characters quite a lot because they felt realistic and Billings did a good job providing the points of view for each of them. She also jumps into the plot right away which I was happy about.
Because of the situation there were some squicky moments and that's not due to the leads being forty-three and twenty-three. It's more because Lisa holds a secret and her behavior is questionable at times. The secret is pretty easy to guess in the first chapters of the read so I'm not sure if it was meant to be a twist (I doubt it) and Billings did us the favor of confronting the issues that made me uneasy later in the book. This secret, though, also hangs over the plot so we know a dooms day is pending.
Raquel also is so hung up on her first love from twenty years ago that her ex, though not in the picture at all, practically acts as a third leading character.
What could've been a colder book ended up being warmer because Billings explored the characters and made their emotional connection real. I wouldn't say the two have stellar communication across the board or that some common tropes weren't used but, for the most part, Lisa and Raquel do communicate which makes the romance more of a refreshing read.
I was fairly satisfied by the end of the book with how the author chose to resolve things but your mileage may vary.
I like that Raquel wasn't a svelt model with a perfect body. She's a confident woman in her forties but she also has some curves and weight. Both her and Lisa have some physical imperfections and, personality-wise, have complimentary strengths and weaknesses.
Raquel is also Latina so there's some diversity in that respect.
This is another imperfect book I've read in the last week where there were some problems but the story was written strong enough to compel me to turn the pages. The plot was different and there were some good positives to put this around 3.7 stars for me, rounding up to 4.