Stuck with You
by Fortune Whelan
Release Date: April 5, 2022
Publisher: Tule Publishing
Book #1 in the Dorseys of Conception Bay series
Number of pages: 279
Kindle Edition
Source: ARC from publisher
Contemporary Romance
Ages 13 and up
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They’re both starting over. Fate’s determined they do it together.
NHL all-star Clark Dorsey is still at the top of his game, but he’s done with hockey. The night of the championship, Clark announces his retirement and returns to Seattle to spend time with his sick brother and figure out his next move. He needs to unwind, but his interfering brother sets him up by renting half of their shared condo to a beautiful, opinionated and fascinating woman.
Nurse Leena Lopez is done with the spotlight. When her whirlwind fairy tale romance ends in a cheating scandal, Leena’s suddenly broke, alone and hounded by paparazzi in a new city. Desperate to put down roots, Leena says yes when a patient offers her the condo he shares with his Canadian hockey star brother. She can ignore the teenage crush she had on Clark Dorsey—he won’t even be in town.
But Clark arrives and they’re both thrust back into the headlines they’ve been desperately avoiding. Can they figure out how to be alone together? Do they want to?
Strap in, this is going to be a roller coaster. That’s because the writing of this story was a roller coaster. This is a new-to-me author and, it seems, this may be their first published book. The idea of this story is wonderful and the characters are great, but the story was just all over the place.
Things started off somewhat interesting with how Clark and Leena meet. There was definite chemistry and it was, in a way, a meet cute x3. At the same time, there was a bit of confusion about what the heck happened to Leena when she was a teenager. Plus, the stuff referenced regarding Clark and hockey and the Stanley Cup really made me think this author doesn’t know anything about the NHL. I understand artistic license, but the inaccurate things were in no way vital to the story. They could have been left out or, even better, researched a bit better so it all made sense. And, quite frankly, second meet cute moment, dragged on far too long. The reader knows what is going to happen, so there is no reason to prolong everything.
As much as I liked the characters themselves, the story really didn’t start engaging me until more than a third of the way through. There were be points that were definite highs that kept me hanging on throughout.
Unfortunately, there were a lot of issues that I could list out here, but that would be cruel and unnecessary. A lot of the issues could have been overlooked if this story had flowed better and didn’t feel so disjointed throughout.
I wish this author well and feel she can surely grow as a writer. With the help with some much better editing, her story ideas could soar.
2 stars
**I received an ARC of this book courtesy of the publisher. All opinions expressed in this review are my own and given freely**
All In Good Time 