#1 New York Times bestselling author Kelley Armstrong delivers a fun romantic comedy about a woman writing under a male pseudonym and the man she hires to play the role in public.
Daphne McFadden is tired of rejection. After submitting her manuscript to dozens of agents, she's gotten rejection after rejection, and now it's time for something drastic. And so, Daphne submits her manuscript again… under a man's name.
Imagine her surprise when it sells for big money at an auction and soon becomes a publicity darling. Only she needs a man to play her super macho alter ego Zane Remington. Enter Chris Stanton, who absolutely looks the part of a survivalist and has a talent for pressing her piss‑me‑off‑I‑dare‑you buttons while somehow being endearing at the same time. But Chris has a few secrets of his own, including the fact that he's really an accountant who has no idea how to chop wood or paddle a canoe. When Daphne's book becomes a bestselling sensation and they're forced to go on tour together, Daphne finds herself wondering if this city‑boy geek is exactly what she needs to push her to claim her dreams.
Title : Finding Mr. Write
Author : Kelley Armstrong
Format : eARC
Page Count : 368
Genre : contemporary romance
Publisher : Forever
Release Date : June 25, 2024
Reviewer : Hollis
Rating : ★ ★
Hollis' 2 star review
Listen, this one is on me. As usual. But even knowing I had likely outgrown Armstrong as an author (despite her being what is probably my most-read and [once upon a time pre-unhauls] my most-owned) I thought.. a romcom? Sure, why not. And I blame this purely on the Read Now option on NetGalley. You got me. You got me. And now here we are.
This was overwhelmingly just mostly fine. But it was also annoying in a variety of low-level ways. Sure, the reality of female authors being automatically labeled YA, being paid less (even sometimes despite previous success), facing more rejections, receiving less funding for marketing, and, well, you get the point, that's the obvious annoyance. So watching an author circumvent those issues by creating a pseudonym, and a male one at that, wasn't the bad part. Nor was said author hiring someone to handle the interviews not only to maintain the charade but also deal with the social interactions required to be known and in public to support the book itself. It could've been a fun concept.
But. I didn't like the characters. I felt a lot of things just weren't well fleshed out or felt kind of.. dumb. And in addition to the bouts of miscommunication that we dodged around a few times, I just felt this suffered from the recent issue of being too.. nice. Too over-explainy. Too considerate. Which isn't to say I don't want some of this or, rather, I don't want to feel these things happening in romances. But there's a way to do it that doesn't feel.. obvious.
Also, this suffered badly in the romance areas. These characters were daydreaming of relationships and logistics for said relationships before they'd even kissed. And then we went from, like, one kiss, and then fast forward like 40% to.. randomly shoehorned in graphic-ness. It was kind of a mess.
And don't even get me started on the "villain"-esque element.
I may decide to one day revisit my old paranormal favourites but I don't think I'll be venturing into anything new by this author anymore. The last few results have proven to be the rule and not the exception and I'm finally throwing in the towel. So, yeah, I should've known better. This was on me. And, as always, your mileage may vary.
** I received an ARC from NetGalley and the publisher (thank you!) in exchange for an honest review. **
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