This fake relationship contemporary romance stand-alone received a 4/5 stars for me. It was in two PoV with heavy interior narrative.
Here’s my live comments while reading:
Briana is a doctor in an ER who deserves the promotion as chief but the newbie doc who has already been nicknamed ‘Dr. Death’ has decided to run against her for the promotion. It doesn’t help that her divorce is almost final, her younger brother is having health issues and her best friend moved away. If she doesn’t get the promotion, she’ll have nothing to keep her going.
The second point of view is from Jacob Maddox (AKA Dr. Death) in a narrative that’s also in first person past tense. He is having the worst work week of his life at this new hospital and his social anxiety isn’t helping him meet new coworkers. On top of that his ex just dropped the expected bomb that she’s engaged… to his brother. He has to act like he’s okay with it for his family’s futures sake.
So the plot is being set up that Jacob might be an anonymous kidney donor for Briana’s younger brother. And I bet my entire TBR pile that Jacob will bring Briana to his brother’s wedding.
At page 57 I need to take a break. There’s so much negativity and depressive feelings in both points of view. It’s just shit show after shit show going on without anything to look forward to. Yeah, it’s quite realistic, but almost too much and not serving as the escape I need from books.
The social anxiety part is a bit stressful to read about since I’d like to avoid those feelings when I dive into a story.
Alrighty… chapter 8 starts the note correspondence. Is this how the title of the book comes into play? Will they be writing instead of interacting? Not my favorite style to fall in love with a couple.
Honestly they’re still both unlikeable for me right now. Yes, they both are probably marvelous (fictional) people who care a lot about xyz, but I’m not connecting with either yet. The hopeless feeling is easy to relate to but doesn’t draw me into wanting to be around them or interested in them.
Ugh. Again, the social media info is spot on contemporary but just gives me icky vibes. I don’t want to read about zombie scrolling and internet dating and their awkwardness associated with sending someone a DM. All that stuff sucks in real life.
At the halfway mark “Yours Truly” is proving to be a fast read, probably due to the short chapters. They’ve both admitted to themselves about starting to fall for the other person but both of them feels like an almost-obsession & kind of hard to grip onto. Plus we didn’t see all the evidence of this since the middle point is a summary of “the last few weeks” and how little by little they’ve gotten to like each other more. But we missed those moments as the reader.
The author is laying their false internal stories on thick, where they’re completely stuck in their assumptions which is a little frustrating but realistic. Once someone is determined that something is true their false ego self rarely gives them a chance to break out of that psyche.
“While she was cradled in my arms, she muttered something about teleporting.” … the best like so far.
Alright so the second half went even faster than the first. Honestly Briana was a bit annoying for me to handle. Yes, authentic and realistic, but ugh. It was hard to go through her internal monologue. Probably because of my own issues.
I’m glad they had a happily ever after.
Spoilers:
It seemed a bit far fetched that she was friends with Amy. also why does every happily ever after in romcom need a pregnancy? Yes I have children and love them but I don’t want the precedent set that kids are what makes a relationship work long term.
Cassie Swindon 