Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's for giving me an ARC. All thoughts and opinions are my own
So Charlotte Stein has been on my radar for a while now. She's friend ly with some writers and reviewers I follow (Okay, semi-stalk) on Twitter and she writes romances with plus-size leads. I even remember when she announced this book and mentally adding it to my TBR.
So imagine my surprise when the stars aligned and I got an ARC for this book.
Y'all, this book. I'm not even going to tease it. It's a 5 stars for me and probably my favorite romance I've read this year. This book had me in my friend's DM yelling about it for a week. It's been a while since I've read a book that's just had me giggling and smiling like a menace as I read.
While the book wears its Ted Lasso inspiration on its sleeves, I was definitely reminded of Gilmore Girls' Luke Danes. The perpetual scruff, the terse man who lectures while he fixes whatever problem he encounters, the secret playfulness, it's there and it had me swooning.
I've seen a few reviews saying this book has "too much banter", which is a valid opinion, my response to that is "Jokes on you, I grew up on Cary Grant movies and 'Gilmore Girls'". While the banter can go on a bit, it's completely understandable that these two joke as much as they do.
When we first meet them, Mabel and Alfie seem worlds apart but we soon learn how similar they grew up and how their trauma has impacted them. Their conversations are fun and lightning-fast because this is the first time they've been able to be themselves in their full glory, These two are constantly bantering because they get to play for the first time in goodness knows how long.
The book is told entirely from Mabel's POV. I definitely missed the experience of seeing events through his eyes but Stein is so good at conveying what he's feeling. Even through Mabel's biased lens, every gesture, word, and stare is just loaded with meaning and feeling and ugh, THIS BOOK!!
(That said, if Stein ever decides to give us a snippet or epilogue through Alfie's POV, hook me up. I need it)
Admittedly, sometimes Mabel's thought process can be a little frustrating because she chalks a lot of their moments up to "Oh, he's such a good friend" and baby girl, y'all passed that a minute ago. Still, when you've spent your life surviving off crumbs, a full meal can feel frivolous and too good to be true.
The ending feels a little rushed to me and I wish we could have gotten more of our couple's Happy Ever After but I adored this book. One of my favorite reading experiences this year.
TW: Alcoholic parents, abusive parents, fatphobia, fandom culture, sexual content
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