Reviews with content warning for Gaslighting - Rafe: A Buff Male Nanny

I was really excited for this one and it fell short.

Things I liked:
- no third act breakup
- Rafe?? Super hot, super smooth, super cute
- the quiche scene? Yes absolutely
- the blurb on the cover was genuinely funny
- I enjoyed the beginning
- really cute and amazing mother-daughters relationship
- amazing, successful, single mother

Things I liked not so much:
- this book would’ve greatly benefitted from a round or two more of editing. There are typos, missing words, and grammatical issues that take away from a really fun story
- writing felt kind of flat at times, wish there as some more dynamic sentence structure
- forced back and forth dialogue to provide backstory and move the plot along
- scenes and chapters rarely felt complete
- would benefit from more show, less tell; pretty much everything was just told
- no transitions, scenes just felt kind of forced together
- definitely times where I was confused
- literally said “ha what” when all of a sudden it was three years later in the epilogue
- went way too fast for me

I overall just think it was underdeveloped. Conflicts were introduced and resolved on the same page, facts and moments that could’ve been developed really well were just mentioned in passing. I was left wanting more, but not in a good way, and I think most of these issues could’ve been resolved with more editing.

I will be reading Xeni, however. Rebekah did leave me interested in Xeni.

Content Warnings

thefatpaperback's review against another edition

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funny lighthearted medium-paced

5.0

I fell headfirst into this book, and I fell hard. I forgot what day it was—genuinely—and missed my therapy appointment. Didn’t realize I missed therapy until about 10 minutes after finishing the book. This book made me giddy and happy for Rafe and Sloan. It earns all the stars! So good!

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ruthiedr89's review against another edition

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funny lighthearted fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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sultrytartreviews'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? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

I read this because it was floating around bookstagram for a long time with many positive reviews. Turns out it was the most emotionally mature romance I've ever read. Rafe is the ultimate cinnamon roll template. But he also has lots of tattoos and rides a motorcycle. Sloan is a strong and ideal parent who balances her work and mom life. Seriously, the emotional intelligence is running wild in this story. What I liked was that they wanted to hold space for each other and make their relationship on realistic terms and expectations. And thankfully NO MISCOMMUNICATION. It was nice that the twin girls reflected real children, too. They acted age appropriate (for geniuses) and were adorable in their scenes. I had made the assumption that this book would be mega steamy and there was a lot of sex scenes considering how short it was. But, the emotional discussions were often more developed and longer than the steamy scenes. I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the Loose Ends series.

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