Book 2 of Dana Wilkerson’s Throwback RomCom series is all about Randall Hamilton and Wendy O’Halloran. Friends who have the potential to become more. Wendy, however, is afraid that if she says anything that Randall might not be interested. He’s already admitted to her that he won’t kiss her because he wants to go slow, but how slow is slow?
I love the banter between Randall and Wendy. Everything about them is adorable and meets every requirement for sugary sweetness. I also loved the idea of them being friends and recognizing that there is the potential for more. Going beyond the friendship zone is scary. It's essentially putting your heart on the line and losing someone close to you if it goes wrong.
I also like the new characters and the depth they brought to the story. Some of them aren’t new to readers, as we did meet some in the previous novel. However, this time around those veterans were given more personality. I am interested to know if there will be a third novel, and exactly who that will follow. There were a couple of possibilities that I saw and would be interested to see what happens.
I did feel that I had to take a point off because I struggled with the beginning of the novel. It's established in the first novel, More Than Pen Pals, that Randall and Ash are victims of verbal and mental abuse. It is also established that Randall has YEARS of not very good coping mechanisms. However, when he subconsciously uses one, everyone in his life seem to “pile on” rather aggressively in my opinion. Maybe it's because I have my own traumatized male, have been through countless new versus old coping mechanisms, and it is 2023 (not 1988), but each time Randall was told off, I had to stop reading and take deep breathes.
I did feel that I had to take a point off because I struggled with the beginning of the novel. It's established in the first novel, More Than Pen Pals, that Randall and Ash are victims of verbal and mental abuse. It is also established that Randall has YEARS of not very good coping mechanisms. However, when he subconsciously uses one, everyone in his life seem to “pile on” rather aggressively in my opinion. Maybe it's because I have my own traumatized male, have been through countless new versus old coping mechanisms, and it is 2023 (not 1988), but each time Randall was told off, I had to stop reading and take deep breathes.
Overall, I rate this novel 4 out of 5 stars.
Comments
Post a Comment