#CBR13 Book 10: "Act Your Age, Eve Brown" by Talia Hibbert

Page count: 320 pages

Rating: 5 stars

Eve is the youngest and seemingly flightiest of the three privileged Brown sisters. She's always felt like the odd duck in the family, neither as focused nor as intelligent as her two older sisters and completely unable to settle on anything for very long. When she abruptly closes down her wedding planning business after one single event (a generally very successful wedding, that nevertheless descended into some chaos after Eve took it upon herself to liberate all the doves that the bride had wanted, and was left with a large bill to reimburse the animal wranglers), her long-suffering parents have had enough. They demand that Eve get a job, any job, and hold it down for at least a year. They'll freeze her trust fund payments until she can prove herself thusly. Deeply frustrated with herself and the whole situation, Eve goes driving and ends up a bit lost.

Jacob Wayne needs to hire a new chef for his B&B asap, after his previous one won the lottery and popped off to Scotland with her boyfriend. None of the candidates he's seen so far live up to his exacting perfectionist standards, and no matter what his best friend (the local pub owner) tries to do to persuade him of each candidate's virtues. Jacob knows he's not easy to work for or with (his autism makes it difficult for him to casually interact with people), but he's not willing to settle when it comes to the quality of his B&B's food. Eve comes barrelling in, soaked through because of a sudden rainstorm, with no apparent resume, and applies for the job. It takes him about two seconds to conclude that she's 1) wholly inappropriate for the job and 2) that he finds her inexplicably and incredibly attractive. After a series of unfortunate events lead to Eve backing into Jacob with her car and breaking his arm, she feels that she pretty much has to stay around to help him with the running of his B&B until he is better, even though she finds him insufferable and robotic and he finds her unreliable and chaotic.

This wouldn't be a very good romance if our protagonists didn't overcome their initial antipathy towards one another and found some common ground. Because of Eve's many different attempts at a career over the years, she turns out to actually be really good in the kitchen. While her charm and bubbly personality don't really do anything for Jacob, to begin with (she did land him in the hospital with a broken arm and a minor concussion, after all), she seems to be a big hit with the guests at the B&B and aptly handles not just the various breakfast orders, but baking for the afternoon teas. Jacob's not exactly thrilled to discover that she's living in his spare room, but despite his suspicions and misgivings, has to admit that Eve is a good cook and that she throws herself into helping with the housekeeping and other duties in the establishment while Jacob recovers. 

Having been presented with Jacob's big pile of handwritten employee handbooks (that he never really intended for anyone to read), Eve comes to understand how important order, a clear system and predictability is for Jacob. She has no problem with his neurodiversity, having grown up with sisters who are clearly both also on the spectrum. Over the course of the story, Eve comes to realise that her own struggles are also due to her being on the autism spectrum, without ever having been diagnosed as such in the past. She finds a connection and acceptance with Jacob that she's never felt in her own family, for all that her sisters love her deeply. 

Take a Hint, Dani Brown was one of my very favourite books last year, and I was very eagerly expecting this third book in the series, despite having found Eve a bit annoying as a supporting character in her sisters' books. I needn't have worried, however, because once I got to read about Eve as the star of her own book, I came to love her just as much, if not more than both of her unusual sisters, since Eve, despite having grown up in a wealthy and loving family, always felt like a failure and the black sheep. She needed my love more, if you will. 

As well as having a wonderful pair of protagonists, who start out as short-term enemies, this romance has a great cast of supporting characters, from Jacob's best friend and said friend's formidable twin sisters (all three characters will be the stars of Hibbert's next romantic trilogy, and I am super excited), to Jacob's aunt, who ended up raising him and his brother after his parents just really abandoned them on her doorstep. Eve's two sisters and their lovely boyfriends also make appearances, of course, as does her colourful grandmother and yoga teacher/wife. I feel like we didn't really get a sense of the Brown parents until this book, and while I understand their frustration with Eve, feel like they could maybe have made a bit more of an attempt to get to know their youngest in a more in-depth way rather than just wash their hands of her temporarily. 

Because 2021 seems determined to constantly challenge me, this is so far the ONLY book I have been able to finish, all month. I can already see myself revisiting it often. I am so happy I have discovered Talia Hibbert as an author, and hope that some of the earlier books of her career can help break me out of my extended reading slump. This was a great read, and I heartily recommend it to anyone wanting a good romance to take their minds off the seemingly never-ending pandemic.

Judging a book by its cover: I don't love this cover as much as I did the one for Take a Hint, Dani Brown, but the whole series has adorable covers, in very pleasing colours and has made me at least partially rethink my antipathy to the cartoon trend that is so popular now. For these books, the covers really fit. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read.  

#CBR11 Book 42: "The Bride Test" by Helen Hoang

Page count: 320 pages
Rating: 4 stars

From Goodreads:
Khai Diep has no feelings. Well, he feels irritation when people move his things or contentment when ledgers balance down to the penny, but not big, important emotions—like grief. And love. He thinks he’s defective. His family knows better—that his autism means he just processes emotions differently. When he steadfastly avoids relationships, his mother takes matters into her own hands and returns to Vietnam to find him the perfect bride.

As a mixed-race girl living in the slums of Ho Chi Minh City, Esme Tran has always felt out of place. When the opportunity arises to come to America and meet a potential husband, she can’t turn it down, thinking this could be the break her family needs. Seducing Khai, however, doesn’t go as planned. Esme’s lessons in love seem to be working…but only on herself. She’s hopelessly smitten with a man who’s convinced he can never return her affection.

With Esme’s time in the United States dwindling, Khai is forced to understand he’s been wrong all along. And there’s more than one way to love. 

This novel has an unusual and interesting concept for a story. There is the autistic hero - which you don't see too often in romance. The only book I can remember reading with one was The Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie, which I really didn't like much at all. Obviously, in Helen Hoang's previous novel, The Kiss Quotient, the heroine is on the autism spectrum. Khai, the hero of this book, is the cousin of Michael (the hero of The Kiss Quotient). 

It's very difficult for me to say how authentic Khai is as an example of someone on the autism spectrum, but since this is an #Ownvoices story, and the author became really huge with The Kiss Quotient, I cannot imagine she hasn't done her research properly. While Khai frequently struggles with social interaction, he's clearly not someone to really be pitied and he's clearly doing excellently business wise. One of the things I like about the book is that we never actually have it confirmed just how wealthy and successful Khai is, it's all just hinted at.

We also have an immigrant heroine, from a very poor background, in a situation that veers closely towards the arranged marriage trope. Esme (this is the Westernised name our heroine gives herself, because her favourite Disney movie is The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Her Vietnamese name is given as M. From now on I will refer to her as M/Esme.) works at a cleaner at a fancy hotel. She lives with her mother and grandmother, as well as her little girl, and everyone (except the child) has to work hard to make ends meet. The amount of money Khai's mother is willing to pay her, even if she never makes a match with her son, is staggering. M/Esme would be able to secure a much better life for her child and extended family, especially if she gets a job while in the States (which she insists on, as she doesn't want to be useless and a burden). M/Esme also has a vague hope of being able to track down her own father, who may or may not be connected with Stanford university in some way.

There are huge cultural and social differences between the main couple. The whole book is pretty much nothing but misunderstandings from either side. Yet while something like that could annoy the crap out of me in a different book, here it's entirely understandable, as the couple are separated by background, culture, language - one of them is neuro divergent, the other is desperately trying to rise above her lack of education and impoverished background. Early on, M/Esme lies and claims to have a background in accounting, because a successful, handsome man like Khai couldn't possibly come to love her if he knew she was just a hotel maid. She works diligently not just to learn English as perfectly as possible during her stay, but also starts taking evening classes to make the lie a reality.

M/Esme is the real star of this story, she's such a fierce, wonderful, determined heroine. Even when she's desperately poor, she has morals and while she keeps her daughter a secret from Khai's mother and Khai himself for much of the book, she feels so guilty about it. She also makes it clear early on that she is not a prostitute and that Khai needs to be a willing suitor, she's not going to lie and manipulate him, just because Khai's mother wants him to get married. It made me sad that M/Esme always took pretty much every misunderstanding between her and  Khai as criticism of her and her background, but also served to make her all the more determined to make something more of herself.

I would say that more important than the actual romance in this book is M/Esme's journey of self discovery. Her learning to appreciate her self worth, that even if she's a poor, uneducated single mother from a small Vietnamese village, she deserves respect, love and happiness. She works so hard to make herself something, setting an example for her daughter. The sections where she thinks about her little girl or talks to her over the phone, broke my heart a little bit.

Is it always going to be like this when I read or watch TV and movies now? Because I have a child of my own, I'm going to find stories of motherhood and especially mothers sacrificing for their children, so incredibly painful. M/Esme has recurring nightmares about her daughter's father (who has a rich wife) showing up and taking the little girl away from her. She really has no choice but to leave her daughter for a few months, but I still found it difficult to read about, in a way I can't remember feeling before I had a little boy of my own.

In the afterword, Ms. Hoang says this story is inspired by her mother, who came to America after the Vietnam war and worked tirelessly to create a future for herself, her family and her future children. I cannot imagine a better tribute to what sounds like a very impressive woman. Hoang also confesses that M/Esme wasn't initially meant to be the heroine, but the third in the love triangle who lost out, so to speak. I'm so glad she changed her mind and the story, because while Khai was perfectly fine, M/Esme is who made the entire book for me.

Of the two books Ms. Hoang has written so far, this is now my favourite. The next book in the series is going to be about Khai's non-neuro divergent brother, who plays an important supporting part in this one. I don't think Helen Hoang has proven herself worthy of my pre-order list yet, but if her third novel is as satisfying, she won't be far off.

Judging a book by its cover: There seems to be a trend at the moment for a lot of "mainstream" contemporary romance to be packaged with illustrated covers, which sometimes works better than others. It can sometimes come off as a bit too twee, but I really like this one. The warm yellow background, the woman intently studying. The whimsical aeroplanes and their trails across the page, with the most prominent making a heart-shape. It makes me happy to look at and that's not a bad thing at all.

Crossposted on Cannonball Read.

#CBR10 Book 52: "The Kiss Quotient" by Helen Hoang

Page count: 336 pages
Rating: 4 stars

Stella Lane loves mathematics and equations and is extremely good at her job, which involves creating algorithms to predict customer purchases, It makes her highly valued by her employer and she makes more money than she has any idea what to do with. Stella has Asperger's, which means she's on the Autism Spectrum, and has not had a lot of success when dating in the past. She believes this is her fault (it's not, she's clearly dated some total loser creeps). So when her mother declares that she would like grandchildren, Stella tries to methodically figure out how to get better. How does one practise dating? Hire a tutor, of course.

Stella engages the services of escort Michael Phan. Half Vietnamese, half Swedish, Michael works as an escort every Friday night to help pay for his mother's medical bills (a side of his life he keeps completely secret from his family). He has a rule that he never sees the same woman more than once, but Stella isn't like most of his other clients and he is intrigued by her offer to teach her how to succeed in a romantic relationship, even though he's a little taken aback by her lesson plans (complete with boxes to tick once she's completed an objective).

Soon, what began as a business arrangement becomes something more emotional, but both Stella and Michael have baggage that make it difficult for them to fully commit to the other. Can they move past the negative experiences of their pasts to find a future together?

I've seen The Kiss Quotient mentioned on a lot of romance review blogs, both on "Can't wait to read" lists and generally very favourably reviewed. It's rare enough that romance feature South Asian characters, or feature a positive portrayal of sex work, but neuro-atypical characters are even fewer and far between. Way back in 2011, I read Jennifer Ashley's The Madness of Lord Ian Mackenzie, which features a hero who is Autistic, and I seem to recall that was a pretty big deal at the time. That book didn't work for me at all, for a number of reasons, but since this one came so highly recommended and I wanted to cannonball on something hopefully good, I picked this up.

Earlier this week, Smart Bitches, Trashy Books featured a guest review from a woman who is also Autistic and absolutely loved this book, because she recognised so much of her own life in it. In her afterword, the author explains that it was while doing research for this book that she discovered that she herself in fact had Asperger's, and that it can manifest very differently in men and women. Because so much of the research and literature is about men, it can be more difficult for women to be diagnosed. Hence Ms Hoang was a grown woman when she realised that she was neuro-atypical and that there was a good reason for all her little "oddities".

Stella believes herself to be cold and unlovable. Because of her previous bad dating experiences, she thinks kissing is "like a shark getting its teeth cleaned by a pilot fish". She's not a virgin, but has never had an enjoyable sexual experience. So it should come as no surprise that one session, even with a considerate and very seasoned escort, is not going to make her comfortable with intimacy. She's very wary of being pitied and doesn't want special allowances made for her, so she's adamant that Michael not find out about her diagnosis. Even as their relationship progresses, Stella believes that all their stumbling blocks are because of her, because she doesn't know about Michael's emotional baggage.

Michael's father is not a nice guy. He was clearly a serial womaniser, but Michael's mother kept forgiving him the cheating, until one day he stole all their savings and ran off. Then Michael's mother got cancer and if Michael hadn't stepped up, his family would have lost their home and dry cleaning business. No one in his family knows that his mother didn't have insurance, and that Michael has been working as an escort every Friday for the last three years to pay for her treatment. After he got a particularly obsessive client who started stalking him, he introduced the "one night" only rule, which he goes back on once he meets Stella and is intrigued by her proposal. Michael is the only man in a large family of women. Because he is handsome and charming like his father, he believes that he too is only one bad judgement away from becoming a user and a manipulator. Once his relationship with Stella develops, he believes himself completely unworthy of her, not just because of his escort job, but because she's tons smarter than him, from a wealthy background, is much more highly educated and makes a ton of money. He's not threatened by this in the slightest, in fact, he's super impressed by her, but can't possibly see a future for her with someone as unworthy as him.

Michael's low self esteem and worries about turning out like his dad are in fact much more detrimental to their relationship than Stella's sometimes strange behaviour and insecurities about her condition. While I very much enjoyed the book, the time it took him to understand just how good he and Stella could be together and how totally NOT his dad he was, made me annoyed. I also wish Stella's co-worker, who clearly doesn't even notice her until she's dating someone else had been less of a creep, but these stories do tend to need a villain, right?

Fun fact, as I don't watch K-dramas at all, I had to google Daniel Henney (apparently Michael looks a lot like him). As a mental image for the hero, it certainly worked well. If you want to read an enjoyable romance with a kind of gender-swapped Pretty Woman storyline, featuring a neuro-atypical South Asian heroine working in STEM, this is the book for you. I'm already looking forward to Ms Hoang's next book, which will feature Michael's Autistic cousin.

Judging a book by its cover: I like this cover, with the teal background colour. While I don't necessarily like people kissing on my book covers, it works for me here because the characters are drawn, not in a photograph. They're also stylised enough that the depictions in no way ruin my mental image of what the characters in the book look like. Not sure I like the yellow font for the name of the book, but that's a minor niggle.

Crossposted on Cannonball Read.