This is one of those books that I devoured in less than 24 hours. Admittedly, 5 of those hours were spent in a waiting room at the emergency vet clinic (the dog is okay!!!) so I had a lot of time to read and a lot of need for distraction, but that doesn’t diminish the fact that I found this book incredibly readible and fun. It’s a romance that plays with all the romance-novel tropes, but in the most enjoyable way possible.
The premise of the book is that the main character, literary agent Nora, is the big-city, all-business girl who typically gets left behind when her boyfriend goes to live the Hallmark-movie reality of discovering a simpler, sweeter girl in a small town. In fact this has happened to Nora no less than four times — four previous boyfriends have gone on various types of business trips to backwoodsy places, fallen in love with the local baker or innkeeper or what have you, and dumped her.
And while Nora hates heartbreak, she doesn’t regret being that girl one bit. She loves her job, loves New York, loves her carefully scheduled and organized life. The only thing that can pull her out of it is her beloved younger sister, Libby. When Libby drags Nora on vacation to a picturesque small town full of quirky characters, Libby’s sure Nora’s going to fall in love with some handsome local carpenter or bartender. But that’s not exactly how things work out, and it’s so much fun watching as they do. Everything here is, in one sense, formulaic — we know who Nora’s love interest will be as soon as he steps onto the page, and the progress of the relationship, complete with its setbacks and obstacles, unfolds exactly according to romance-novel formula, but I just found the writing and the characters fresh, funny, and totally enjoyable, so I never minded the predictabilitly.
Compulsive Overreader 