anna4 's review for:

Knives, Seasoning, & a Dash of Love by Katrina Kwan

3.0

hopeful fast-paced

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

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I recently read a lot of books that were written in first person, so seeing this was in third person, was a real delight!

It was also very much in favour of the characters, especially for Alexander and especially in the beginning, because that 3rd person brought the grumpiness of him so much more to light.

I liked the characters, the setting was nice, the general plot & subplot too AND there was no 3rd act breakup, which I definitely loved.

However, I had a couple of issues with the book.

The pacing, while generally fast, was at the same time inconsistent throughout the book and not very clearly to follow from a reader’s standpoint. The story was moving from day to day and suddenly it seemed like we skipped several weeks without any sort of hint and? Idk, felt weird.

The relationship between Eden & Alexander developed veeeeery quickly and very suddenly, similar to the friendship between her and the other chefs. Again, I feel like the story skipped several weeks without making the reader aware, so it felt like one day they met and the other they were best friends.

The tone and in parts the language were inconsistent throughout the book. I feel like the author tried to bring in some humour or some sort of cute couply stuff into this, but for me it felt just off. Alexander started calling Eden “sweetheart” out of the blue and that just didn’t make sense for him as a character to do so.

Similar case with the language during sex scenes. 

It just was off.

I was also missing a certain structure. Rather than a natural development of everything. First, the romance, then Alexander’s subplot, then Eden’s subplot, then the happy ending for everyone.

This could have been better handled.

I saw that the author had other books coming out, which sound interesting, so I will keep an eye out for those!

Thank you Random House Canada for providing this book for review via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.