Just One of the Guys by Kristan Higgins

Skeptic scale: ♥♥♥♥

Awwwwwwwwwwwww (how many w's am I allowed). God this woman is SO good at dialogue. And her h's are always so wonderful.

I loved, loved, LOVED that the h was tall, strong, kickass and good at sports. I love that she beat everyone at running and could defend herself in various physical and other situations. I like how Kristan Higgins always has her heroines doing stuff they love. And that there's always an adorable poochie in the story who plays a "main character" role. She always makes her ladies this awesome, full people, with hobbies and interests and SO much more than a whiny little where's-my-man type. 

As always my only "complaint" about KH's stuff is that I'm just a quivering mass of yearning and I want more together-time for the h&H. But they only ever really get together AT THE VERY END. But that's the ticket, I guess. To make us want him as bad as the h does. So bad you almost can't TAKE it anymore. 

Somehow all the little plot holes and occasional irrationality of the H's actions never quite matter. For example, KH is such a magician, I simply ACCEPT the fact that the H never, NEVER acts on his apparently deep feelings for the h - we're talking radio silence for the better part of a decade. 

Why, was the phone broken that whole time? You can't write an email or a letter, buddy? NO INTERACTION AT ALL AND WE'RE SUPPOSED TO BELIEVE YOU LOVED HER THE WHOLE TIME???? Sigh. But we do. KH makes sure we bloody well believe it all. Because she's a genius.

Re-read.

Side note on the re-read: So... I knew a moment (a mere NANOSECOND, really) of panic at the HEA here...A comment on another blog got me thinking...Why doesn't the hero just move his (hot) ass and do something about his apparently deep, abiding love for her? He never really makes the first move whenever they look like they MAY get together. He actually pursues (or is pursued by) other women when the h is perfectly unattached and available. He seems sort of passive a lot of the time. Like he waits for her to make a declaration before he actually FINALLY does something decisive. And even then until he finds out she IS unattached for reals, he was going to keep mum about it!? WTF?? Come on dude. Reach out and grab the girl. Just earn a man point, will you!!?? 

Anyway... KH fan-girl that I am, I can't straight out CRITICIZE the H - or be impartial in any way. But I will say that this element of his beta-ness is somewhat less than awesome. Argh. It hurts too much! Don't care. Still loved the book.

I Do (But I Don't) by Cara Lockwood

Skeptic scale: ♥♥♥

She: Junior wedding planner with a terrible hag of a boss

He: Firefighter

Conflict: Hmmm... not really sure it was a conflict. More like a "omg, I really like him, does he like me too?" Cue: series of misunderstandings that keep H & h apart for much of the story.

What I liked:
1) This is the exact kind of book publisher blurbs call "beach reads" and that's exactly what it was - lighthearted, easy peasy fun where I didn't have to think too hard

2) This is a weird thing to call out, but I really liked the fact that the story was set in a city other than NYC/LA or Generic Small Town in the Heartland. Instead, it was set in Austin, Texas - a nice sized, interesting city that we don't get to see all that often in these books. The NYC/Generic Small Town thing always leads to these caricatures of Big Bad City Gal/Perfect Wonderful Heartland Folk that have begun to really irritate me. And the Big City romances always show this bitch/career woman pairing that I find tiresome and unfair to career woman, nay ALL women. So this was nice.

3) First person was used well. You get enough of an idea about the H because of their conversations and we were not at all left in the dark about his motives, wants and hopes. It was generally entertaining to get to see the romance unfold through her eyes. Having said that though, I need to mention that Kristen Higgins does such an amazing job of first person that everyone else's looks like watery porridge next to hers. Still it wasn't terrible.

What was meh:
1) What would you think if I told you that this was a story about a wedding planner who has a crush on this dude but it looks like she might be planning his wedding thereby making their love impossibly impossible? 

Right? Obviously. J-to-the-Lo co-opted this story and even if this book came out before the movie did (not sure if it did), the inescapable truth is that this is the image that popped into my mind the second I figured she was a wedding planner. Unfortunately, my regard for Ms. Lopez does not extend to her acting skills, so this was a terribly unfortunate image lurking around in the background.

2) You can't base an entire story on a series of misunderstandings. You just can't. I think readers just want more. When the entire "conflict  can be solved with a single conversation/voicemail, I feel like it's a little silly that the Scooby Doo stuff continues for so long. 

*Spoiler* In "I Do (But I Don't)" it's cute in the beginning but then the h & H spend a whole weekend together and it never once comes up that "hey pretty lady, I'm not the one getting married, here's my deal and we're free to get it on?" *End of Spoiler*

Lack of communication is bad for relationships. Dr. Phil would be so disappointed.

3) I thought it was weird but cool but then weird again that the hero is described as being Too Good To Be True (and what did our mom's tell us about things that look too good to be true?) Turns out that this hot, amazing dude is also SUPER nice is because he used to be fat. Oh, I know it doesn't say that explicitly! It's more like the h wondering, hmm HOW COME this guy is so awesome? And then she find out this fact about his prior chunkiness and then it all makes sense and she's like oooooh, he must be for real then. 

Shorthand way of saying he's nice because he was insecure once and doesn't inflict that shit on anyone else. You see? It's nice. But kind of also weird.

Final word: Nice, time pass book, with some amusing bits and and ok setting/premise. Just be warned that it's pretty heavy on the cliched storylines and characters, but I didn't hate myself after reading it.