1.82k reviews for:

Camera Shy

Kay Cove

3.89 AVERAGE

funny lighthearted reflective medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

 ***These are my opinions, and all ratings are out of 5, with 1 being the lowest and 5 being the highest.

▶ Romance – 5
▶ Smut – 3.5
▶ Main Character(s) Enjoyment Level - Finn (4), Avery (4)
▶ Plot - 4
▶ Likes: their relationship & the threesome scene (not for the reason you think)
▶ Dislikes: the predictable plot twist
▶ Major Tropes/Genres: summer romance, curvy FL, plus size romance, friends to lovers
▶Trigger Warning (if any & sorry for forgetting any too):
‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⇒ Major Trigger Mentions: body shaming
‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⇒ Minor Trigger Mentions: slut shaming, alcohol, depression, mental health
▶ POV: 1st POV dual
▶ Format: Kindle
▶ Memorable Scene(s)/Moment(s): n/a
▶ Memorable Quote(s): ‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐Insecurity is evil.

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐I’m twenty-eight. By now, I’m sick of the mind games, paranoia, and jealous fights over nothing. I want a woman who is honest, earnest, and trusts me enough to just be real…

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐“You deserve better. You deserve a man who doesn’t think being with you is settling.”

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐“Apologizing about your body is ridiculous. Please don’t ever do that for me or for anyone else, okay?”

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐“But it’s not like I can shrug off the insecurities. The pain and shame have seeped into every pore. I’m terrified for the rest of my life, every time I look in the mirror, I’m just going to hate what I see.”
He wipes the loose hairs away from my forehead and tucks them behind my ear. “Men need to be more careful with the women they love.” He tilts his head, his expression full of pity. “They have no idea the damage they can do.”

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐Finn looks right into my eyes and says, “If a man doesn’t give, he doesn’t get. End of story. Don’t waste your time on selfish assholes.”

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐you keep acting really protective. Like we’re actually dating. Why?”
Finn’s answer is simple. “Because it turns you on.”
I scrunch my brows. “What?”
He smirks. “Not just you. Most women.” He rubs up and down my thigh, the heel of his palm pressing against my skin so hard it begins to redden. “There’s something about a man who’s protective of his girl that just gets women all kinds of wet. This entire dinner has been foreplay, Avery.”

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐I thought I was being a good woman. Everything I did was to make him feel comfortable. He’s a slow-moving guy, so I learned to be patient. He’s impressed with a woman who works, so I built us a business from the ground up. He said he didn’t like materialistic, shallow women, so I didn’t spend my time and energy on that stuff. But here we are, four years later, and I don’t know who I am. I just know who Mason wanted me to be. And spoiler alert—being exactly who he said he wanted still wasn’t enough to keep him.”

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐Avery has nothing to be ashamed of and everything to flaunt. All my favorite parts of a woman are plentiful on her. There’s more to touch and squeeze, and I wish she knew how her body drives me wild.

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐“Good sex means being generous, but it means being selfish too. You have a right to enjoy this. Sex should be satisfying for you too.” Her face is stoic, but I find the single tear trickling down her cheek and wipe it away. “Promise me, right now, you’ll walk away from any man who doesn’t make your happiness a priority.”

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐But the problem with very long-term friendships is that sometimes you’ve excused the bad behavior for so long, you almost don’t recognize it.

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐The new thing I’ve learned this summer is that skinny girls have insecurities about their bodies too. Lennox has clothes she wishes she could wear, but she doesn’t have the chest or hips to fill them out.

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐He genuinely thinks you are one of the most intriguing and stunning women he’s ever met. The more you say that’s not true, the more you’re calling his opinion worthless.”

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐“The safe word is ‘stop,’ Avery. Just tell me, and I’ll listen. This is for you, so the moment you don’t like it, I’ll stop.”

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐“What else do you like that I don’t know about?” I’m almost scared to ask. “I don’t want you to feel like I can’t keep up.”
He tilts his head to the side and looks at me with pity in his eyes. “Keep up? You’re miles ahead, Queen. I’m happy. I am perfectly content with the way we have sex.”
“Perfectly content?”
“Yeah.” Finn gives me a kind smile and taps his nose. “You’re perfect.”
We’re quite clearly fixating on different words because he thinks perfect is a compliment, but I know exactly what content leads to. It’s boredom, dissatisfaction, and after four years getting proposed to and then immediately dumped while you cry into a messy, crumbled pile of chocolate cake. I’ll be damned if I fall in love again just to start over at thirty-four.

‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐“So what, Finn? She’s not ready to move her entire life after knowing you for what? Nine weeks? Deal with it. If you think she’s something special, make it work. Do long distance and take the time to prove yourself. You’re not your dad. She’s not your mom. Stop boxing everybody into good guys and bad guys. That’s not how life works. People are messy. People make mistakes. Some people are worth just going through shitty dumpster fires with because there’s something great on the other side.”
▶ Overall Enjoyment: 4
‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐ 1 star: dislike, don’t read, disappointing
‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐ 2 stars: had potential, liked a few things, some redeeming points, overall okay
‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐ 3 stars: enjoyable but most likely won’t remember much about it in the future, possible love-and-hate relationship with the book
‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐ 4 stars: very good, would recommend, re-read worthy potential
‎ ‎ ‎ ‎ ⭐ 5 stars: favorite, re-read worthy, will always recommend, amazing, possibly life-changing
▶ Review (may contain spoilers): I absolutely adore Finn and Avery, and especially their relationship. This book wonderfully executes lessons about loving oneself, being in love, and exploring love.

Loving oneself: It’s honestly disheartening to see some reviews calling Avery “whiny” or saying she needs to “grow a backbone.” The first quote I highlighted from the book perfectly captures both Avery’s struggle and the reality many of us face: insecurity doesn’t just vanish overnight. It’s something we have to actively work through. The fact that Avery chose to work on herself immediately after the breakup—instead of wallowing for months—shows strength, not weakness. And let’s be real, many of her concerns weren’t even about her mid-size body but about universal relationship doubts, like trying to match her ex’s pace and still getting left behind. That hit hard.

Being in love: There’s one gut-wrenching quote that completely floored me. It’s the one where Finn mentions how women love it when a man gets protective. That line was a slap in the face. It exposed how low we’ve set the bar, how we melt at what should be the bare minimum. It was unexpectedly eye-opening, and I felt seen and a little called out. 😅 I was not expecting to get schooled with Avery here…

Exploring love: As Avery explores outside the vanilla realm, there are two scenes that I want to commend. One is when Finn says that the safe word is “stop.” That should always be it. I feel like having other safe words diminish the importance of saying stop. It’s just like how “No” is a full sentence. Stop should be. Because it is. Second, the threesome scene. I loved how Finn made sure Avery truly felt comfortable. We could sense that Avery might not be ready, but she still tried and recognized and accepted that it wasn’t for her. Like Finn said (and one of my favorite quotes): “Sex should be satisfying for you too.”

Gawd, I love how consistent Finn is!

And to every “Avery” out there (myself included), Finn proves love, growth, and intimacy don’t require a spotlight to shine. Sometimes the bravest, most beautiful transformations happen when you’re a little camera shy. 
adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
lighthearted medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes
emotional funny hopeful inspiring medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

I’m giving this a 3.5 stars. The whole him teaching her s** cause she’s never been with a “real man” was a little cringy. But he definitely knew what he was doing
hopeful lighthearted medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: No
medium-paced
adventurous challenging emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted reflective sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

This book was a conflicting read.
Parts I really liked. But there were parts where I just didn’t want to continue the book.
The smut was pretty dang good, not crazily long or descriptive all the time but it was good smut.
There’s two main things that bugged me about this book, one of them being so minor it’s kinda silly.
1. Finn calls Avery Queen a total of 40 times. Queen is such an odd nickname to me and he used it soooo much. (I was tracking the amount of time he said it by tallying like it was a game.)
2. (This is the biggest issue) I get that this is a plus size story, that’s absolutely fine. But of fucking course the plus size girl doesn’t feel confident and gets called names cause obviously big girls can’t love themselves right?! (Sarcasm) it’s just frustrating the first book that I’ve read that the fmc isn’t a skinny goddess she’s RIDDLED with insecurity. Such bad insecurity that she doesn’t get her confidence until like the last 10 pages of the book! It was maddening to read. Like this Greek god of a man is DROOLING over her, is making her feel like ROYALTY, and openly admitting he REALLY LIKES her. And then she goes “he’s definitely too out of my league no way he can like me” like it was so infuriating. And not only that we don’t even know if she’s just slightly a curvier girl or actually plus size but my hunch is only curvier cause she corrects herself from saying little black dress to MEDIUM black dress. Which is fucking WILD to be like oh I’m so fat, people call me piggy n shit and you’re just medium?!
I can understand that this book was to boost confidence but it was done in such a gross typical way of portraying plus size as a terribly insecure, messy, junk eating mass it was hard to keep reading.
I did like the end. I did enjoy the way the book flowed.
If I blanked out and didn’t think about it much it was a good read.
tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes