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A review by smwojcik
The Comeback Tour by Joelle Speranza
3.0
Overall: 2.5/5 stars
“The Comeback Tour” was a quick romance that starts with Cailin, a recently divorced VP-level publicist getting the chance to go on tour with Jax Slater, member of an infamous boy band, who is going solo after many years out of the spotlight. Cailin was a huge fan of the boyband back in the day, and what do you know, Jax takes an immediate liking to her. I love the idea of the plot but the style just did not do it for me. The storyline has such potential, but ultimately it was just okay..
The novel is decently written but there were many parts that the dialogue just did not seem natural or how real people speak. The conversations are awkward and sometimes cringe-y, and the first half of the story used dialogue to clumsily info-dump background details.
Adding to the awkwardness is the pacing. The background plot was far too detailed and it takes a significant chunk of the book (around 25%) for the main characters to even meet! With love-at-first-sight romances you are banking on quick chemistry development: you really can’t dedicate that much time to details that don’t ultimately impact the success of the characters. And unfortunately, I just didn’t feel the chemistry like I was supposed to.
I also got the feeling that I was missing things throughout the story; a little more discussion on how much time has passed would be beneficial. There were some timing questions where I was very unclear on how many days/weeks had passed and the context of the plot did not help to clear things up. I felt that only two days had gone by when the author actually intended for weeks, which matters a lot when discussing whirlwind romances and relationship development. Relationships that blossom quickly over a short period can be done, but if a lot is happening off the page it makes what we do see of the relationship seem really false and surface-level, and thus not effective as a storyline.
The “Trash the Dress” interludes feel out of place and do not further the central romance at all. Cailin references how “important” the group is to her, but she barely participates in their chat group. I understand now that the author’s first work was “Trash the Dress” and that’s what inspired this novel, but it seems like it was put in after the fact and is pretty irrelevant.
Lastly, Cailin and Jax show that their relationship really is still in its infancy in the third-act-breakup. I hate the third-act-breakup! It drives me insane. There is almost always a better way to convey conflict and tension other than this! And further, Cailin literally runs away from a PR situation, which makes absolutely no sense considering her VP level job in public relations and managing crisis communication. It was very contradictory and we got no indication prior to this point that she would react this way and it was really off-putting. Ultimately, OF COURSE it’s all a huge miscommunication/misunderstanding (which is also my least favorite trope! ) and was so easily rectified by simply communicating.
This novel does have potential. I really liked the idea of the story line, and it’s a guaranteed HEA, which you can see just from the tone and plot points. Even though I struggled to get through the first half of the story, it does pick up steam near the end. The ending is satisfying and I do love a good future epilogue that ties up things in a nice little bow!
I received an advance review copy for free from Book Sirens, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.
“The Comeback Tour” was a quick romance that starts with Cailin, a recently divorced VP-level publicist getting the chance to go on tour with Jax Slater, member of an infamous boy band, who is going solo after many years out of the spotlight. Cailin was a huge fan of the boyband back in the day, and what do you know, Jax takes an immediate liking to her. I love the idea of the plot but the style just did not do it for me. The storyline has such potential, but ultimately it was just okay..
The novel is decently written but there were many parts that the dialogue just did not seem natural or how real people speak. The conversations are awkward and sometimes cringe-y, and the first half of the story used dialogue to clumsily info-dump background details.
Adding to the awkwardness is the pacing. The background plot was far too detailed and it takes a significant chunk of the book (around 25%) for the main characters to even meet! With love-at-first-sight romances you are banking on quick chemistry development: you really can’t dedicate that much time to details that don’t ultimately impact the success of the characters. And unfortunately, I just didn’t feel the chemistry like I was supposed to.
I also got the feeling that I was missing things throughout the story; a little more discussion on how much time has passed would be beneficial. There were some timing questions where I was very unclear on how many days/weeks had passed and the context of the plot did not help to clear things up. I felt that only two days had gone by when the author actually intended for weeks, which matters a lot when discussing whirlwind romances and relationship development. Relationships that blossom quickly over a short period can be done, but if a lot is happening off the page it makes what we do see of the relationship seem really false and surface-level, and thus not effective as a storyline.
The “Trash the Dress” interludes feel out of place and do not further the central romance at all. Cailin references how “important” the group is to her, but she barely participates in their chat group. I understand now that the author’s first work was “Trash the Dress” and that’s what inspired this novel, but it seems like it was put in after the fact and is pretty irrelevant.
Lastly, Cailin and Jax show that their relationship really is still in its infancy in the third-act-breakup. I hate the third-act-breakup! It drives me insane. There is almost always a better way to convey conflict and tension other than this! And further, Cailin literally runs away from a PR situation, which makes absolutely no sense considering her VP level job in public relations and managing crisis communication. It was very contradictory and we got no indication prior to this point that she would react this way and it was really off-putting. Ultimately, OF COURSE it’s all a huge miscommunication/misunderstanding (which is also my least favorite trope! ) and was so easily rectified by simply communicating.
This novel does have potential. I really liked the idea of the story line, and it’s a guaranteed HEA, which you can see just from the tone and plot points. Even though I struggled to get through the first half of the story, it does pick up steam near the end. The ending is satisfying and I do love a good future epilogue that ties up things in a nice little bow!
I received an advance review copy for free from Book Sirens, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.