All You Need is Love (Love in the City #2)

Melissa
Baldwin
Genre: 
Contemporary

ROMANTIC COMEDY:  CJ Evans has started over. She used to be Candace (Candy to her ex-fiancé). Her home-based business of selling essential oils is blossoming (no pun intended!). A near-fling with a new guy named Dylan, while on vacation in Florida, is showing signs of promise. He and a friend want to go into business with her. When Dylan calls to invite her to New York to explore the partnership possibilities, she jumps at the chance.

Her relationship history, however, is still a dark cloud over her. Months of therapy have helped her overcome her confidence and self-esteem issues—somewhat. She never did get along with her mother, so she more or less ignores her, until Mom announces that her new boyfriend is CJ’s ex-fiancé’s father! 

This story reads more like a diary than a novel, since the reader is totally immersed inside CJ’s head. We get to know her well. Very well. But this also slows the pace to the point where the reader says, “Okay, great, now just get on with the plot.” The story, although not categorized as such, reads more like a YA coming-of-age novel, with a less mature viewpoint than one might expect. Humor is not a major element for this “romantic comedy.” We don’t get to know much about Dylan, since the majority of everything one sees and hears is through CJ's lens. This works with some novels, but with this one, it falls flat. Again, an extremely unique premise, which definitely shows promise that the author’s sense of creativity will allow her more freedom to shine in future novels.

FS Brown