I’m giving myself permission to write very short comments on books, so I don’t freeze up and write nothing. I’ve actually been enjoying some romance again! My thanks to the menopause subreddit. š
Love Lessons by Sarina Bowen. Book who-the-hell-knows of the “Brooklyn Bruisers” series.
I hate the “teach me to be sexy” plotline so much, I almost skipped this completely. But the relationship is drawn with a light touch and some good banter that made it fun.
Downsides: So tired of all the former couples crowding around in this series. To be fair, it’s not all, but it’s still a lot.
Upsides: I liked that the determinedly ordinary Joe ,tough guy hero has fabric sensitivity — perfect for the fashionista heroine to help him with. He’s also dyslexic and it’s not a big plot point.
Unfortunate: The hero’s last name is Crikey, and every time I read it I thought of a line from the Bonzo Dog Doodah Band: “Oh crikey, you rotter. Don’t punish me.” (Which actually fits so well, perhaps Bowen is a Bonzo fan?)
A Gift of Luck by Sarah Wynde. Book 5 of the Tassamara series.
A letdown. Really implausible plot leads to half the book being a Disney World travelogue for the wealthy. Very little spark between the two leads and a overdrawn stereotypical villain. And a whole lot of former couples hanging around! The blurb says “A little ghost story, a little mystery, and a lot of romance” and “a little mystery” is the only true part.
Cry For the Moon by Anne Stuart. Standalone.
One of her older, kinda bananapants Harlequin romances, though certainly not as weird as some. Some parts haven’t aged well, but the chemistry between the main characters is on point.
A Willful Woman... 
Silent Flames by Cate C. Wells
by willaful(FYI: This is fourth in a multi-author “dark romance” series. I thought the first one was okay but didn’t bother with the second or third, and that wasn’t an issue at all. They seem to happen pretty much concurrently.)
The reviews for this book are fascinating. Aside from the inevitable ones saying “no way in hell will I ever read a book with a cheater hero” — which Wells is wisely extremely upfront about, but they’re still pissed at her š — most of the negative ones are from people who really wanted to read a very typical book about a cheater hero and how much he suffered and groveled, and they weren’t satisfied. Whereas I thought it took the usual trope and enhanced it in a very satisfying way.
Happily married wife and mother Cora plans to surprise her adoring husband Adrian with a family visit — but she’s the one who’s surprised when she catching him having sex with another woman in his office. That’s hardly the worst of it though. Instead of an explanation and fervent apologies, Adrian reveals that everything she thought she knew about their marriage is a sham. He never loved her, he only married her for children, and he has complete legal control over their custody. And because she signed a pre-nup, he thinks she knew all of this already.
But there’s a lot Adrian doesn’t know about Cora either. Especially that she’s been driven to a breaking point before, and when she breaks, she breaks hard.
The real surprise: this is a romance about two people with severe, unacknowledged trauma, and the destructive things they do because of it. Especially Cora. Cora is a freaking mess. (It’s rare to find a romance heroine with such legitimately severe mental health problems, and I honestly loved that.) But when she stops living a lie and starts letting her crazy out, something else happens: they start to know each other and their relationship becomes real for the first time.
I guess there isn’t a typical “grovel”? I didn’t really notice because I was happy with the reworking of their relationship to become real and honest. And Adrian constantly demonstrates how much he really does care about Cora, which would be my particular dealbreaker in romance.
On the negative side: Uber-powerful billionaire romance, ugh. There’s some old skool Evil Other Woman drama, a bit too much repetition, and a little too much reliance on the idea that Cora despite everything is a perfect mom who would never do anything to hurt her children. Mental health problems don’t work like that, in my experience.
There are also significant emotional changes in both of them that we see only though the pov of the other character, and though it works pretty well, I would have enjoyed seeing their own emotional realizations. Perhaps this is why some readers felt it was lackluster in the redemption department.
But on the whole, I enjoyed it a lot–especially given that it was a total Id read that still let me feel very smart for being able to appreciate it. š
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