Reviews

Paper Love by Jae

cedardleland's review against another edition

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emotional lighthearted slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

mischievous_monkey's review

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4.0

I enjoyed the pacing of this novel and the development of the romance. The descriptions of locales, events and people painted a mental picture and kept me interested without turning me off with an excess of detail. The narrator of this audible book did a decent job. I will definitely be listening to or reading this book again sometime.

bamruckus's review

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted 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? No

3.5

excellent_taste's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

Super cute and cozy little opposites attract workplace sapphic romance 

leah_haskett's review against another edition

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funny hopeful lighthearted fast-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? Yes

3.5

sil_the_lobster's review against another edition

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5.0

This is a stationery geek romance and I thoroughly loved it. It's well written and well paced, just as you'd expect from a Jae novel, but there's one novelty that especially delighted me: it's set in Freiburg, Germany, which is Jae's hometown, as I understand it. Now, I don't mind stories being set elsewhere but as I'm German myself, I'm always happy to every now and then pick up a book that's set in a surrounding I'm familiar with. I've been to Freiburg a couple of times and I saw it all very clearly as I joined Susanne and Anja - the 'Bächle', the Münsterplatz, the weekly market etc., and I loved it!

I hugely enjoyed the stationery geek-outs throughout the book because I'm a stationery geek, too. I love fountain pens and notebooks and I can spend hours and hours in shops like Paper Love, of which there are not enough, sadly. You can tell Jae loves all of this, too, her descriptions and details are spot on and a delight to read.

'Paper Love' is a perfect, easy holiday read that keeps you well entertained until the end - and I mean 'easy read' in the best of senses; it's not shallow or stupid at all. It flows nicely without major angst or nailbiting, although not all's well and sweet. There's misunderstandings and seemingly incompatible mindsets, there's brain vs. heart...in short, just the right amount of salt to make you enjoy the slow-burning romance even more.

Highly recommended. 5 of 5 stars.

lezreadalot's review against another edition

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4.0

“You can cook, and you can ink up a fountain pen. You might be—” She stopped herself before she could say, The perfect woman for me.

3.5 stars. I haven't read a Jae book in a while, and it felt so good coming back to this style of writing, with a good, character-driven, emotion-focused slow burn romance between two people who think they have nothing in common, but soon find out how untrue that it. It isn't quite enemies to lovers, but right off the bat. Susanne and Anja don't see eye to eye (literally; I love that Susanne is so much taller than her). Susanne moves to her uncle's small town to help out with his failing stationery store, and Anja is his loyal, long-time employee. The author really excelled at writing all those early parts of their relationship, when they're unsure and distrustful of each other, and then we see how those feelings slowly morph. They're both interesting mixes of traditionalist and modern, and it ended up working. Every new layer of mutual understanding, compromise and eventual attraction was really good. There were so many little moments that I was really smitten with, and I love when a subtle brush of hands or accidental touch can set me to grinning and blushing. I loved the friendship that they eventually cultivated, how it was written at every stage, and the smooth turn to romance. The stationery store aspect as a unique one, but very interesting, and while I couldn't connect with a lot about it, the characters' passion was well conveyed. There's also a really cute, bossy cat, and a fun side-relationship. I loved the small town setting and all the nuggets of German food and culture. I will say that nothing about the writing ever really struck me deeply, but I was still moved by the relationship, and their lovely chemistry.

Listened to the audiobook as read by Abby Craden; wonderfully performed as always. I can't critique her delivery of the German words, but they sounded pretty great to me. This was just so cute, and has me itching to read more of Jae's backlist.

cosmicwillow's review

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lighthearted fast-paced

3.0

this was cute! definitely not amazing and life-changing but it was super cute and a fun, lighthearted read. 

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ackerjohn's review against another edition

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hopeful medium-paced

3.5

shuadel's review

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3.0

Guilting family and characters as paper thin as the products they’re selling made this a slog