Nun Too Soon

de Lissa Sharpe - SmartyPants Romance (à paraître le 18 avril 2024)

Résumé : Helen is just your normal, everyday librarian who writes romance novels on the side… except she also happens to be a former nun, new to life outside the order and to the dating scene. Helen isn’t just a virgin in her 30s– she’s never had a boyfriend, never kissed anyone, never even so much as held someone’s hand. Becoming a nun was always her path, until it wasn’t anymore, and trying to forge a new path in life has been…tricky.What isn’t tricky?

Her unrequited crush on the handsome library patron that Helen and her friends have affectionately nicknamed ‘The Red Unicorn’ -- a man who loves to read, looks great in glasses, and has red hair, aka Helen’s dream man. But the idea of dating is still intimidating, so Helen prefers to daydream about Thad from afar, turning him into her perfect romance novel hero.Thad is far from perfect, not like the smart, sexy librarian he’s been surveilling. Thad is a bounty hunter who’s determined to find Helen’s brother, Dean, and he’s certain Helen is the key to tracking Dean down. Thad never plans to approach Helen or insert himself into her life–until it becomes clear he’s not the only one looking for Dean.

The other people after him are bad news, and Helen’s going to get caught in the crossfire if Thad doesn’t intervene. As Thad and Helen work together to find Dean, they actually get to know each other, soon realizing that the perfect, ideal versions they have of each other couldn’t be more wrong… but that who they are together might actually be just right.


Note : 4/5 ♥♥♥♥

Helen est bibliothécaire à Chicago, elle mène une vie tranquille plutôt banale, mais celle-ci va changer lorsque Thad débarque. D’abord client de la bibliothèque, il lui révèle rapidement qu’il est en réalité un chasseur de prime à la recherche de son frère. Celui-ci est dans le pétrin et d’autres personnes moins scrupuleuses pourraient se servir d’elle pour le retrouver.
Helen est déçue que son crush sur sa Red Unicorn (Thad est roux) soit basé sur un mensonge mais décide de l’aider dans ses recherches à la condition qu’elle vienne avec lui. Leur proximité forcée va déboucher sur une alchimie muy caliente.

Ce que Thad ne sait pas (de suite) c’est qu’Helen est une nonne réformée. Dans la vie civile depuis quelques années, Helen n’a donc pas encore eu de relations amoureuses. Et l’un de ses grands challenges de vie est de connaître l’amour (au sens propre comme au figuré).

Vue ce pitch de départ, j’avais quand même un peu peur que ça soit un peu beaucoup une romance catho avec de la morale chrétienne par-ci par-là à toutes les sauces. Bon heureusement c’est pas le cas. Helen évoque plus certain aspects de son éducation dont elle a encore du mal à se détacher en lien avec ses problématique d’aujourd’hui : la te connexion avec sa féminité, la perception de son corps, son pouvoir de séduction sur Thad ^^. Et ce qui est plutôt cool, c’est qu’Helen va se donner des challenges à elle-même sans forcément prendre Thad en compte dans ses paramètres.

Thad de son côté va avoir beaucoup de chemin à faire car il ne part pas avec des bons points au début : toute sa famille est dans le business de la chasse à la prime et celle-ci a même fait l’objet d’une tv réalité. Il a une vision des gens hyper stéréotypée, pour lui personne n’est jamais totalement honnête, et tout le monde a un double discours et veut le berner ou obtenir quelque chose de lui. Et pour les femmes c’est encore pire, il balance quand même pas mal de remarques sexistes… il n’imagine pas qu’Helen n’a aucune arrière pensée pour le doubler quand elle insiste pour l’aider à retrouver son frère. Comme il va bien tomber de haut.

Heureusement pour les lecteurs, Thad et Helen sortent un peu des clichés de leur archétypes de personnages et nous donne à lire une romance roadtrip sympatique.

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Helen is a librarian in Chicago, she leads a quiet, rather ordinary life, but this will change when Thad arrives. First a customer of the library, he quickly reveals that he is in reality a bounty hunter looking for her brother. He is in trouble and other less scrupulous people could use her to find him.
Helen is disappointed that her crush on her Red Unicorn (Thad is a redhead) is based on a lie but decides to help him in his research on the condition that she comes with him. Their forced proximity will lead to a muy caliente alchemy.

What Thad doesn't know (right away) is that Helen is a reformed nun. In civilian life for several years, Helen has not yet had romantic relationships. And one of his great life challenges is to know love (literally and figuratively).

Given this initial pitch, I was still a little afraid that it would be a bit much of a Catholic romance with Christian morality here and there in every way. Well fortunately that’s not the case. Helen talks about certain aspects of her education from which she still has difficulty detaching herself in relation to her current issues: the connection with her femininity, the perception of her body, her power of seduction on Thad ^^. And what’s pretty cool is that Helen will give herself challenges without necessarily taking Thad into account in her parameters.

Thad for his part will have a long way to go because he doesn't start with good points : his whole family is in the bounty hunting business and it was even the subject of a TV show. He has a hyper-stereotypical view of people, for him no one is ever completely honest, and everyone has double talk and wants to fool him or get something from him. And for women it's even worse, he still makes a lot of sexist remarks... he can't imagine that Helen has no ulterior motive for double-crossing him when she insists on helping him find her brother. How deep he’s going to fall.

Fortunately for readers, Thad and Helen break away from the clichés of their character archetypes and give us a nice roadtrip romance to read.