This was probably the fastest he’d ever fucked something up. Dragging Cherry into his life felt like dragging a princess off to his lair. He was almost certainly the dragon in this fairytale. [p. 99]
Cherry Neita is thirty years old, has a decent job, is proud of the way she looks (she's Black, tall and extremely curvy) and really can't be bothered with relationships. When she meets Ruben Ambjørn -- well, when she barges into his meeting with her colleague -- she's impressed by his good looks and general demeanour. (Ruben's first thought is 'I have to have her'.) They go on a date; things get a bit heated in an alleyway; the paparazzi show up; and Cherry finds herself fake-engaged to a minor European royal with a chequered past and some major hangups.
I liked the body positivity in this, and the sex scenes were steamy and well-choreographed, but instalove is not really my trope. I also felt there were a lot of unresolved plot threads (Ruben's awful ex; what happened to his (abusive) brother and (racist) sister at the end of the story; Cherry's sister's situation). The scenes in Ruben's home country did not feel as though they were set anywhere at all: no sense of place, or time of year. And I found the pacing very uneven, especially in the later chapters. But this might all be Just Me: I think I can sum up my mood while reading this novel by revealing that my major concern for much of it was the wellbeing of Cherry's cat Whiskey. Where does he sleep? Clearly not with Cherry.
This is one of Talia Hibbert's early novels: I found it flawed, and didn't enjoy it as much as (for instance) A Girl Like Her or Get a Life, Chloe Brown, but it's still entertaining, sexy and fun, with a happy ending.
For Shop Your Shelves Bingo, Summer 2023: purchased 26 MAR 2020, prompt 'BIPOC author'.
Fulfils the ‘body positive’ rubric of the 52 books in 2023 challenge.
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