Reviews with content warning for Outing - The Falling in Love Montage

1 review

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny sad tense medium-paced

3.0

I was excited about this one because I haven't read many romance books where the main character is cynical and doesn't want a relationship. And as a cynic who doesn't believe in true love, I related to Saoirse a lot.

Reading this was refreshing because of how different it is from many of the previous romance books I've read. Both characters deal with their own issues and take their time revealing them to each other. And from the beginning, you know that it's a short, fleeting summer love and ⚠️ slight spoiler ⚠️ they don't end up together which I thought I'd hate but I ended up admiring.

Saoirse's cynicism comes from both having had her heart broken and the fact that her mother has dementia and her fear of inheriting it and not being able to remember the people she loves. I really felt for her and it's such a difficult feeling to explain and navigate.

I have very mixed feelings about the ending, part of me appreciates that it stays true to Saoirse’s cynical outlook on love, and the fact that they don’t up together at the end sets a good example of the way the author described love throughout the book. That love doesn’t always have to last forever, that you can love someone, and regardless of how long or how short the relationship lasts, you can learn something from the experience and have that love to remember forever. However, another part of me was hoping that despite all of that, they’d end up together because they were adorable together 🥹

This has the Insta-love trope which I’m not the biggest fan of but I can make an exception for a cute sapphic couple, and it was slow and dragging sometimes in the middle but other than that, I feel like my perception of love has changed and as the author intended, I've learned from it and will carry the memory of Saoirse and Ruby with me 🩷

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