CBR16 Book 44: (Trust) Falling for You by Charish Reid

Page count: 145 pages

Rating: 4 stars

Nowhere Book Bingo: A novella

Smart Bitches Summer Bingo: The Great Outdoors   

Yolanda Watson tries her best to be an engaging and motivating English professor, she is well-liked by both her colleagues and her students. However, writing grant applications are not her strongest suit and she is upset that she lost out on a generous grant that could have helped a lot of her disadvantaged students.

Samuel Morris knows he's not popular, and doesn't particularly try to be either. He believes in working hard, following rules and taking things seriously. He's aware that Yolanda seems to dislike him, but doesn't really know it's because he was awared the grant she had also applied for, which he also needed the grant to help many of his own disadvantaged students. On his part, he finds Yolanda both exasperating and confounding, and wishes she'd be on time for committee meetings and show signs of taking issues seriously occasionally.  

Now the two of them are forced to share a cabin while on a team-building retreat in the woods of Wisconsin. Not only that, the people who share a cabin are Team-Building Buddies for the whole retreat and are supposed to do a lot of different bonding activities together. Samuel is a neat freak, Yolanda is chaotic and messy. Can they endure a week together? How long before their dislike turns to like, and possibly lust? And will Yolanda, very much a city girl, survive challenges like grasshoppers, spiders and even bears?

It can be tricky to write a satisfying romance in a novella, since you have a lot less space and time to get the characters together. Since Yolanda and Samuel are already coworkers and know each other, to a certain extent, they already have an established connection. Then there's the forced proximity, and various challenging situations where one of them has to help or assist the other, and since this is a small scale story without too much drama, it's not like there needs to be a third act breakup or some sort of grand gesture for them to get together. It's very quickly established that their dislike of each other comes mostly from them being very different people, and once they get a chance to talk and get to know each other better, those differences don't really matter. Over the course of the novella, Yolanda helps Samuel relax and let go a bit, while he helps her get more focused and organised (and promises to help her improve her grant applications in the future). 

This novella has been on my TBR list for a while, and seemed like the perfect choice when the Smart Bitches Summer Bingo had a square for "The Great Outdoors". Since the Nowhere Book Bingo had a square for "Novella" this worked as a two-fer, which is great.  The only other Charish Reid I've read is The Write Escape (also for the Nowhere Book Bingo, clearly Reid just writes books that fit that challenge well) and I like both stories, although the one set in Ireland is probably more to my taste than this one (like Yolanda, I'm not very comfortable outside in nature). Based on the two stories I have now read, I'll probably be moving some of my other Charish Reid books higher on my TBR. 

Judging a book by its cover: This is a pretty cute cartoony cover, although I'm pretty sure the woods described in the novella are nothing like the weird tall and strangely spaced beech trees on here. I especially like the bear peeking out from behind the bush in the background (IYKYK). 

Crossposted by Cannonball Read                                                                                       

CBR16 Book 15: "The Write Escape" by Charish Reid

Page count: 291 pages

Rating: 3.5 stars

Nowhere Book Bingo: A book with a BIPOC author and main character

CBR16 Sweet Books: Cozy

In very short order, Antonia Harper has lost her job and discovered that her fiancée was cheating on her, very shortly before the wedding. The honeymoon was supposed to be in Ireland, and Antonia decides to travel there by herself. Her spiteful ex has cancelled their original reservations, but she rents a cottage to stay in instead. With nothing else to distract her, Antonia decides to make a stab at writing more of the romance novel she's been dreaming of completing (but never had time for, what with her busy job as an editor and trying to plan a wedding). She isn't exactly happy with men in general at present, but the handsome professor in the cottage next door is making her reconsider her wish to be alone.

Aidan Byrnes is a literature professor who is finding his job difficult at the moment. He's rented a cottage in the little town of Tully Cross to get some peace and quiet and to finally have the time and focus to complete an important academic paper. He first runs into Antonia in the tiny supermarket nearby and is both surprised and delighted to discover that she is staying in the cottage next to his. Still slightly weary of romantic entanglements after his girlfriend dumped him a year previous, Aiden nevertheless can't stop thinking about Antonia, who he discovers is not only gorgeous but clever, educated, and funny as well.

What starts out as a bit of a holiday fling begins to turn serious pretty quickly. Neither Antonia nor Aidan were expecting to meet anyone, let alone start falling for them in the sleepy village of Tully Cross. Yet Aiden has a job at an Irish university, and Antonia's life is back in America. Can their fledgling romance turn into something more permanent, with an entire ocean between them?

This is my first novel by Charish Reid and it was fun, but not exactly a perfect read. I really liked Antonia and Aiden as characters, both apart and together. Both are hard-working and devoted to their jobs (but obviously Antonia is unemployed for much of the book since she loses her job early on). Antonia is also very close to her family, especially her sister, which made it difficult when they clearly weren't enthusiastic about her upcoming wedding. I would love to read a sequel novel about her sister.

The majority of the book is set in Ireland, and while I'm sure Irish villages are very quaint and welcoming, it seems like a slightly exaggerated ideal of the place. No one is unpleasant, racist, or rude. I understand that those aren't exactly things that you would want in a fluffy escapist romance, but from my experience, not all small-town folk anywhere are open-minded and whole-heartedly welcoming to any strangers, certainly not those with darker skin colours. 

This was a quick breezy read, and I liked it a lot. There were a few things that annoyed me a bit, but nothing serious enough for me not to want to read more of her books. Firstly, Antonia is obviously using her vacation in Ireland to work on her romance novel. At one point, Aiden uses her computer and can't help himself from reading what she's written. Considering how unsure she is of her writing and how personal a book manuscript can be, this felt like he was reading her journal. When she eventually discovers what he's done, she seems to forgive him very quickly. SPOILER! Antonia also seems able to relocate her entire life to Ireland on very little notice, to be with a guy whom she's known for less than two weeks. Good to know that it's that easy to make a major life change when you finally meet the hot guy you decide is Mr. Right.

Judging a book by its cover: I really like the visible joy on the faces of both of the cover models here. This is exactly the sort of novel that would have a jewel-toned cover with cute cartoony characters on it now, and I'm not sure that trend is as great as publishers think it is. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read