Scan barcode
A review by bookish_notes
Angels in the City by Garrett Leigh
3.0
I hate to say it, but maybe I don’t love Garrett Leigh’s books like I used to. The Slide/Rare, Misfits, and Blue Boys books? LOVED. But lately, I’m just not finding that connection with the characters I’m used to with her books? The story and the characters seem to hit that romance beat to the point where I finished this easily enough, but I feel like it lacks the full emotional journey I would expect.
This book is relatively low angst compared to what I’m used to love from her, but some trigger warnings for this book still would have been nice. In typical Garrett Leigh fashion, the characters have unnecessary tragic, or just sad, backstories.
Trigger warnings include mentions of sexual assault experienced as a teen, mentions of sexual assault of an employee in this book, family member dying in a car accident before the story begins, and family member one of the MCs is not close to dies in this book.
This book is about two very, very rich men - both billionaires? One is a maybe millionaire?? Not entirely sure exactly but they certainly don’t have any concerns when it comes to money. This book is told from alternating third-person POVs. There’s Englishman Jonah Gray, head of his own startup ad agency (his business is in his parent’s building). And working across the hall for a tech business, is Russian Sacha Ivanov. And this book doesn’t let you forget it.
I would like to mention this is the third book I can recall that mentions a character from Russia as “the Russian”. And it’s not just the one time. But many times throughout. It’s mentioned that Sacha moved to the UK and has been living and working in the country for 11 years yet everyone only ever seems to refer to him as “the Russian”. I know the author included a dedication/mention at the beginning this went through a sensitivity read by someone who is Russian, but maybe they were too polite to say it so I will. It’s weird, borders on insensitivity, and authors need to stop doing it. The character should be more than him being Russian, you know?
The story does have fake dating in it, but it’s not really anything? If you blink, you miss it. Jonah and Sacha meet for the first time in an elevator and when it breaks down, Jonah winds up inviting Sacha as his date to his parent’s holiday party. The fake dating aspect is just for Sacha to meet Jonah’s parents and that’s over with pretty quickly? So if you’re looking for more of a fake dating trope book, I don’t think this is it.
I think Jonah and Sacha are great enough characters but we don’t really KNOW them, or see them coming together long enough, and then the book is over. They spend most of the book navigating a friends/not friends vs friends with benefits situation. The last chapter does work as an epilogue of sorts but it feels like the story gets cut short before you ever really see them together as a couple.
This book didn’t take me long to read but I definitely wanted MORE. We never did find out more about Sacha and where his family money is from. How many siblings does Jonah have?? We will never know. There were sex scenes that felt unnecessary and more like because the author felt like she had to put them in? They didn’t add much and I winded up skimming through them. The work situations and day-to-day life at work took up too much time away from us knowing the characters? It was just mostly boring to read the corporate work bits. Does Jonah’s best friend Lilly have her own book? Does Nico, Jonah’s employee and friend? Love when authors introduce characters but give me no indication they’ll get their own books.
This is an okay holiday-themed book, in that the Christmas season takes place during this book. There’s just a lot that feels like is missing from this story for me even though I liked the characters.
This book is relatively low angst compared to what I’m used to love from her, but some trigger warnings for this book still would have been nice. In typical Garrett Leigh fashion, the characters have unnecessary tragic, or just sad, backstories.
Trigger warnings include mentions of sexual assault experienced as a teen, mentions of sexual assault of an employee in this book, family member dying in a car accident before the story begins, and family member one of the MCs is not close to dies in this book.
This book is about two very, very rich men - both billionaires? One is a maybe millionaire?? Not entirely sure exactly but they certainly don’t have any concerns when it comes to money. This book is told from alternating third-person POVs. There’s Englishman Jonah Gray, head of his own startup ad agency (his business is in his parent’s building). And working across the hall for a tech business, is Russian Sacha Ivanov. And this book doesn’t let you forget it.
I would like to mention this is the third book I can recall that mentions a character from Russia as “the Russian”. And it’s not just the one time. But many times throughout. It’s mentioned that Sacha moved to the UK and has been living and working in the country for 11 years yet everyone only ever seems to refer to him as “the Russian”. I know the author included a dedication/mention at the beginning this went through a sensitivity read by someone who is Russian, but maybe they were too polite to say it so I will. It’s weird, borders on insensitivity, and authors need to stop doing it. The character should be more than him being Russian, you know?
The story does have fake dating in it, but it’s not really anything? If you blink, you miss it. Jonah and Sacha meet for the first time in an elevator and when it breaks down, Jonah winds up inviting Sacha as his date to his parent’s holiday party. The fake dating aspect is just for Sacha to meet Jonah’s parents and that’s over with pretty quickly? So if you’re looking for more of a fake dating trope book, I don’t think this is it.
I think Jonah and Sacha are great enough characters but we don’t really KNOW them, or see them coming together long enough, and then the book is over. They spend most of the book navigating a friends/not friends vs friends with benefits situation. The last chapter does work as an epilogue of sorts but it feels like the story gets cut short before you ever really see them together as a couple.
This book didn’t take me long to read but I definitely wanted MORE. We never did find out more about Sacha and where his family money is from. How many siblings does Jonah have?? We will never know. There were sex scenes that felt unnecessary and more like because the author felt like she had to put them in? They didn’t add much and I winded up skimming through them. The work situations and day-to-day life at work took up too much time away from us knowing the characters? It was just mostly boring to read the corporate work bits. Does Jonah’s best friend Lilly have her own book? Does Nico, Jonah’s employee and friend? Love when authors introduce characters but give me no indication they’ll get their own books.
This is an okay holiday-themed book, in that the Christmas season takes place during this book. There’s just a lot that feels like is missing from this story for me even though I liked the characters.