Dough you love me ?

de Stacy Travis - Smartypants Romance (2023)

Résumé : First rule when returning to your hometown after storming out of sight: don't fall for the guy who broke your heart.

Julia Browne should know better than to kiss where she bakes. She's built a bread empire in California, and only plans to stay in Green Valley long enough to sell the family house.
She certainly won't spend any more time with Shane Meadows than she has to…and she will not let him draw her in with his soft blue eyes or level her with his handsome smirk of a grin.

The last this she wants is a temporary gig at Donner Bakery, baking sourdough side-by-side with Shane and clashing with his ego. And he thinks the sassy baker should take her fancy bread and go back where she came from.
But that's before they take a series of wrong turns on a road trip to look at wheat, leaving them stranded for the night. Out on the open road, neither of them can escape the sizzling attraction and old feelings that feel a lot more real this time around.

But life is complicated, and Julia's life in California might derail their second chance at love. Will they wake up and smell the sourdough?
They say you should leave the past in the past, but what if it's the winning recipe for love?

note : 3/5 ♥♥♥

Une romance sympathique mais pas exceptionnelle. J'ai trouvé l'intrigue facile et sans suspense, elle aurait nécessité d'être plus longue et plus élaborée.

Le début est trop rapide à mon goût. Ça aurait été peut-être bien de voir Julia dans sa vie a Los Angeles, avec ses problèmes de cheffe d'entreprise, sa passion qui est partie, ses difficultés à lâcher son job... Afin qu'on puisse bien voir la différence quand elle revient a Green Valley et qu'elle redécouvre le plaisir de faire du pain. De même pour les funérailles de sa grand-mère, on passe trop vite dessus.

Autre détail qui a commencé à me faire dire "je crois que j'ai compris maintenant" c'est que le héros est né avec une main malformée. Bon ok. L'auteur nous montre une héroïne qui n'en a rien à faire. Jusque là, ça va. Mais alors pourquoi mettre l'accent sur la main du gars a toutes les occasions ? Si l'auteur souhaitait nous faire oublier ce détail une fois dit, en parler tout le temps n'était pas la meilleure solution.

La romance est tout mignonne, mais on sait d'avance ce qu'il va se passer et j'ai trouvé que Shane manquait un peu de profondeur. Là encore, l'auteur a de bonnes idées mais j'ai l'impression qu'elles n'ont pas été assez creusées, qu'on est juste passé au-dessus.

Avec cette review on pourrait croire que je n'ai pas aimé ce livre, mais ce n'est pas le cas ^^ j'ai bien aimé que Shane soit un musicien professionnel, que Julia check la famille royale tous les matins comme sa grand-mère, le frère de Julia n'apparait pas souvent mais je l'ai trouvé très bien.

A nice romance but not exceptional. I found the plot easy and without suspense, it needed to be longer and more elaborate.

The beginning is too fast for my taste. It might have been nice to see Julia in her life in Los Angeles, with her problems as a business manager, her passion gone, her difficulties in letting go of her job... So that we can see the difference when she returns to Green Valley and rediscovers the pleasure of baking bread. The same goes for his grandmother's funeral, we pass over it too quickly.

Another detail that started to make me say "okay I got it" is that the hero was born with a malformed hand. Okay. The author shows us a heroine who thinks nothing of it. So far so good. But then why focus on the guy's hand at all times ? If the author wanted us to forget this detail once said, talking about it all the time was not the best solution.

The romance is cute, but you know in advance what's going to happen and I found that Shane lacked a bit of depth. Here again, the author has good ideas but I have the impression that they were not dug enough, that we just went over them.

With this review you might think that I didn't like this book, but that's not the case ^^ I liked that Shane was a professional musician, that Julia checked the royal family every morning like her grandmother, Julia's brother doesn't appear often but I found him very nice.


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