Title: Two Nights to Forever (Orchard Hill #2)

Author: Rebecca Crowley

Date of publication: 11 April 2022 

Genre: Contemporary romance, Jewish romance

Author's links:

My rating: 4 stars

This is another cozy romance by an author whose books I generally enjoy and this one was very soothing for me to read in rough times.

This is contemporary romance with two Jewish MCs who are not very strict in practicing their religion but still observe the Jewish holidays and traditions in one form or another.

Eve is someone who longs to belong and to be loved (carrying the trauma of being given up for adoption at birth); Saul is struggling to find his place in the family business, feeling left out/unwanted. I loved seeing both MCs finding their footing, discovering who they are and what they want in life.

The focus in the story was very much on the internal struggle of fitting in, of being confident in your choices and I found it all very relatable. Both Eve and Saul were successful in their profession, had great loving families but still a sense of lack and loss and something missing.

There was strong chemistry between them right from the start but their professional relationship and current life goals made it nearly impossible to be together. The romance was passionate and tender with underlying strong friendship, understanding, admiration for the achievements of the other.

The story came off as a bit heteronormative and traditional with a focus on family. I wished we saw Eve's adoptive parents on page, not only hearing her praise for them. Focusing only on her relationship seeing her birth mother and her new family felt odd to me.

It's a happy making story, low conflict, offering an overly optimistic world view but I didn't mind it. I was happy with the accents in the business aspect - support of local community, women-led business, ethical business practices.

CW: adoption, difficult relationship with birth mother, bullying in school (in the past)

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Title: Shine a Light (Orchard Hill #1)

Author: Rebecca Crowley

Date of publication: 30 Nov 2021

Genre: Hanukkah romance, holiday romance

Author's links:

My rating: 4 stars

This is a lovely and tender Hanukkah romance and I greatly enjoyed it. I usually go for high drama, high angst romance and this is very much the opposite and it still worked great for me.

I have enjoyed some of this author's previous football romance and was excited to read her take on holiday romance. I was curious to read something that was not about Christmas but about Hanukkah and they way it is celebrate.

I liked both MCs, two young Jewish people dealing with their own issues. There was a lot of focus on loss and grief which I didn't expect but also think it was beautifully handled. It did bring tears to my eyes, so visceral was the sense of loss.

In a lot of way this is a small town romance, rather focused on traditional values of family and community with no hint of queer people even existing, something I am not too happy about.

I did like the exploration of what having a community around you means - the support but also the meddling and memories and pressure. We see supportive families but also the burden of their expectations. There were no major conflicts, romantic or otherwise, the tension was brought about by some unfortunate circumstances and miscommunication.

It is a festive, heart-warming, deeply hopeful and happy making romance. A perfect holiday read to dissipate the cold and darkness of the winter outside.

CW: loss of a parent to cancer, fire, road traffic accident,

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The assignment has a deadline, but does their relationship?

After almost ten years dodging bullets as a foreign correspondent, Asher Brody is struggling to find his place back in the U.K. – and in his family-run newspaper, the London Phoenix. He’s intent on proving he’s as committed as his brothers, even if it means putting on a suit and posh accent to investigate a high-ranking executive at an upscale retreat.

Ada Hunter wasted years trailing her ex-boyfriend, only for him to turn his back when her documentary career finally took off. Now she’s beating her own path, and it’s taking her all over the world. To secure funding for her next project, she takes a risky job with the Phoenix posing as broody-sexy Asher’s fake girlfriend – too good to be true.

They plan to spend a few days pretending to be a couple at a country estate before going their separate ways. But when bad weather strands them in the countryside, temptation develops into something more and the line between fantasy and reality becomes dangerously blurred. 

This is the second book in the London Phoenix series and I enjoyed it much more than the first book. I found the conflict more believable and really liked both MCs.

It starts pretty similarly to book 1 but this time the accidental hook-up was interrupted before it actually happened and led to some fake dating and surprise, surprise, love. 

There is an element of forced proximity in the romance and it worked really well for me. I liked how the MCs worked to get their goals and in the process helped each other.

Ada was pretty certain who she was, she had reasons not to want a relationship and to focus on her career at that time. Asher seemed to be at a different stage in his life, he wanted stability and permanence after years being a reporter in the field and after a painful break up with his ex. 

There was a reversal of the traditional roles here - the woman was confident and self-assured and didn't want a relationship; the man was having his doubts about who he was and what he wanted (a serious committed relationship, being settled in one place). He had to repeatedly remind himself that it was a fake relationship and they had a specific goal in mind, there was no room for feelings. 

The story reached a point where I knew one of them had to make a compromise and I wasn't sure who it would be and honestly, I didn't know whom I was rooting for to do it. I'm very happy with the ending where they found the right balance for things between them to work out in the long term. 

I liked the relationship between the three brothers, how they worked together in the newspaper and all the glimpses we got of them trying to be closer to each other, sticking together after the death of their mother, continuing some family traditions and establishing new ones of their own. 

Title: Insider (London Phoenix #1)

Author: Rebecca Crowley

Genre /Tropes: Contemporary romance, journalist investigation

Release Date: 22 August 2019

Author's links:

Website / Twitter / Goodreads

My rating: 3 Stars

Blurb

Review 

This is the first book in a new series, the heroine is an ER doctor, the hero - a journalist working to uncover corruption in the hospital where she works.

I would describe this as an explosive start of a new series. I love this author's football series (Atlanta Skyline), one of my favourite contemporary romances of all time. I had high expectations of this series but sadly, they were not quite met. This was a nice romance but ultimately unremarkable. I felt it lacked depth, the characters were underdeveloped and some of the conflict felt forced to me. it could be just that I have come to expect so much more from Rebecca Crowley, it all appeared  lackluster to me. 

Things start off with an off-the-charts anonymous hook up between the MCs which leads to initial distrust by both of them - neither being sure the other isn’t pursuing a hidden agenda. 

They each had their baggage and were reluctant to start a relationship but it all felt forced to me. There is an irresistible chemistry between them but I didn’t particularly like the vibe ‘not-like-other girls/guys’ I got throughout the story. There attraction and deep connection happened right away and I didn’t really buy it, there was nothing to show why they were so attracted to each. I could understand his reasons to some extend but felt she was overreacting and projecting her fears onto him till the very end.

The conflict of him lying/withholding information from her was quickly overcome and then when the black moment of their break-up happened, it felt completely out of place for me. Her reaction to something he did (rather didn’t do) seemed over-the-top and completely illogical. I never got fully invested in the characters and their issues. Both of them seemed melodramatic and their reactions didn’t appear genuine to me.

I was not really convinced their relationship will work out. There was nothing major wrong in their story, it was all minor details which didn’t work for me and in the end I was not sold on their HEA.

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LOVE’S A CALCULATED RISK

Atlanta Skyline’s benched goalkeeper Brendan Young would have been happy to ride out the end of his contract after his gambling addiction was splashed all over the news media. Instead, his teammates’ injuries have unexpectedly put him back in the game. A new face in his weekly Gamblers Anonymous meeting provides another surprise spike — of pure attraction. Why is Erin Bailey, former world champion women’s soccer player, at this meeting? And why can’t he stop thinking about their red-hot one-night stand? 

Six months ago, one reckless night in Vegas ended with Erin in Brendan’s bed. She’s sworn off dating athletes, especially those whose reputations could destroy her new career as the Championship Soccer League’s Director of Ethics and Advocacy. But the secret they share — and the crazy heat they generate — makes it impossible to keep her distance.

Both have choices to make about the future, but no matter how steeply the odds are stacked against them, walking away could be the riskiest move of all.

This was such an interesting, engrossing story and I absolutely loved it.

It's the third in the series and my second by this author and I have come to love her complex characters and the unusual take on sports romance. In this case we have a goalkeeper at the end of his career, his reputation ruined by a gambling scandal. And the heroine is a former pro footballer player herself, trying to further her career in the Championship soccer League but also boost women's soccer as much as she can. The cicumstances put them in opposite ends, turning them into enemies but ones with burning memories of a hot one-night stand between them and a shared secret (they both love gambling). 

Brendan was an amazing character and loved him so much. He is a bit of a loner, hiding so much from everyone - teammates and family, so lonely despite his success. I found the way he dealt with his anxiety and compulsive thoughts through focusing on sports statistics and placing bets on games really fascinating. 

He was on his way out of the soccer world and and his focus was fully on the post-sports future, new life, different goals. All this made him reluctant to start anything with Erin despite the chemistry between them. I read him as on the ace spectrum, the one-night stand they had was an exception for him rather than the rule and he was really not comfortable with a friends-with-benefits arrangement. I felt he was not interested in sex unless there were some romantic feelings involved and they were they on his part from the start and he just wanted to avoid the hurt the inevitable break-up would cause him.

Erin, oh Erin was fabulous. She was the opposite of Brendan - outgoing, outspoken, more sexually adventurous than him, definitely the one doing the chase rather than being wooed. She came off as pushy at times which I didn't like very much but she did try to come up with a solution that would work for both of them and in the end she did in a way. 

Like Brendan she is a gambler, though of a different kind. For him this was a way to deal with his anxiety and hyperactive mind, while for her it was a way to decompress and deal with stress. In different ways they both needed gambling to survive teh current turmoil in their lives, it was an escape which while financially profitable for him was otherwise disastrous for both of them.

Brendan's outlook on his gambling was something I have not read before. I felt he got better hold of his anxiety issues and found some calm after getting together with Erin. In my reading it was finding the partner he had been looking for and generally moving towards a situation that caused him less stress that helped Brendan cut down on his obsession with soccer statistics and betting. At the same time I have this tiny bit of worry that it might be interpreted as a love-cures-all solution and would have liked a stronger statement to the opposite in the text. On the other hand, Erin starts therapy for her gambling addiction which brings some balance to the story and treats addiction as a serious issue which requires professional help to deal with.

On the plus side I liked how Brandon and Erin made things work between them, neither giving up their dream but finding a compromise - more travel, some adjustments to his and her plans for the future in order to make room for their plans.

There was a plot twist towards the end which I found unnecessary and annoying. The journalist threatening them and the sudden change in the attitude of her boss and the way he came through as a saviour for them both in the end didn't sit well with me. I felt it took away the agency from Brendan and Erin to solve their issues/determine their future on their own. 

Overall, I enjoyed this romance a lot. We get two complex characters working through their differences in order to be together, making compromises and finding common ground for their future which is one of my favourite things in romance.