The Dead Romantics

A refreshingly fun, energetic novel about a romantically disillusioned, blocked romance writer whose beliefs about love are transformed by a handsome ghost.

Ashley Poston’s fun, lighthearted novels for young adults offer a blend of magical realism infused with wit and romance. Geekerella is a clever send-up about what happens when a nerdy Cinderella-type attends a Sci-fi convention. In Heart of Iron, a princess in outer-space must find her way back home with the help of lovable misfits.

 

The Dead Romantics, Poston’s first book for adults, a romantic comedy, centers on Florence Minerva Day, a smart, snarky millennial who is nursing a broken heart and suffering from writer’s block. Florence is emotionally on the skids. Having published a romance novel that received a less-than-stellar reception, downtrodden Florence became an assistant-turned-ghostwriter for Ann Nichols, one of “romance’s greats”—a well-established, popular author who hasn’t left her home in Maine for the five years that Florence has been the secret source behind her writing success. In the midst of her depression, Florence is floundering, too turned off by love to write about it and meet a looming deadline--already extended three times--to finish and deliver Nichols’s next book to the new editor at her publishing house, Benji Andor. The handsome hottie is cold and no nonsense. He totally unnerves Florence by threatening legal action if the new Nichols book isn’t turned in asap.

 

Amidst Florence’s intent to finish the manuscript, she runs into her ex, also a writer, a man who stole the story of Florence’s own life—personal secrets she shared with him about her family and their funeral home business and how Florence interacts with ghosts--and turned her story into a book that sold at auction for a million dollars. Weary after seeing her successful, user-ex again and faced with the impending writing deadline, Florence’s life further tailspins when she is summoned from her home in Hoboken, N.J., back to Mairmont, South Carolina to deal with the devastating sudden death of a family member. Being back in a place she longed to escape suddenly resurrects the past and elicits the presence of a handsome ghost who wrenches Florence from her rut and upends her beliefs about love.

 

Romance, chaos and ratcheting complications are central components to Poston’s refreshingly fun, spunky romcoms—and The Dead Romantics is no exception. The beauty and charm of Poston’s storytelling continues to make miraculous happy endings out of the messes from which ordinary people often find themselves embroiled.

 

The Dead Romantics by Ashley Poston

Berkley (Penguin Books), $16.00 paperback, 368 pages, 9780593336489

Publication Date: June 28, 2022

To order this book on INDIEBOUND link HERE

 

NOTE: To read this review as published on Shelf Awareness for the Book Trade (May 3, 2022 ), link HERE

 

NOTE: To read a condensed version of this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (July 1, 2022), link HERE

Iona Iverson's Rules for Commuting

An uplifting, immensely entertaining novel about how strangers on a commuter train becomes unlikely friends via a shared near-death experience. 

In the world today, many people tend to live anonymously, in their own personal microcosms. However, in Iona Iverson’s Rules for Commuting, British author Clare Pooley brings people together--strangers--in such a fun, spirited way that it’s bound to spark readers to expand their worldview.

 

This endearing novel, told from the points of view of an ensemble cast of vividly drawn characters, starts on a London commuter train. At the center of it all is Iona Iverson, a vibrantly quirky, 57-year-old magazine advice therapist--an observant creature of habit with job security issues--who leaves Bea, her significant other, and sets off to work with her beloved French bulldog, Lulu. Every day, Iona and Lulu sit in the same carriage--usually in the “seventh aisle,” seat “number three”--as the train traverses ten stops over 36 minutes from Hampton Court to Waterloo Station. In her mind, Iona assigns clever pet names to the seasoned commuters with whom she daily co-exists, but never speaks to. This includes “Impossibly-Pretty-Bookworm” and “Mr.-Too-Good-to-beTrue.” The other passengers, likewise, do the same—Iona is referred to by one as “Rainbow Lady” and another as “Crazy Dog Woman.”

 

One fateful day, a man who doesn’t normally ride the 8:06 a.m. train--whom Iona bills as a “Smart-But-Sexist-Manspreader,” who talks too loudly on his mobile phone and refers to his wife as “the ball and chain”--boards Iona’s carriage. He dresses exquisitely but has his look “ruined” because he displays an “extraordinary sense of entitlement which only really comes with being white, male, heterosexual and excessively solvent.” When he starts choking on a grape from his fruit salad, the normal, everyday order of the commute is upended. A medically capable oncology nurse, Sanjay--who has the hots for the “Impossibly-Pretty-Bookworm” but lacks romantic confidence--performs the Heimlich maneuver on the “Manspreader.” Sanjay’s heroic, life-saving act serves as a catalyst that suddenly transforms the travelers from strangers into friends. Over the course of the story, the soul-filled truth of each person connected to the near-death experience is revealed. The stereotyping of appearances can be very deceiving.

 

As in her previous novel, The Authenticity Project, Pooley’s grasp on the constraints and longings of the human condition proves immensely entertaining. Readers will be charmed by this uplifting, hopeful story rife with tender insights. Traveling with Iona Iverson is a literary journey well worth taking.

 

Iona Iverson’s Rules for Commuting: A Novel by Clare Pooley

Pamela Dorman Books (Penguin Books), $27.00 hardcover, 352 pages, 9781984878649

Publishing Date: June 7, 2022

To order this book on INDIEBOUND link HERE

 

NOTE: To read this review as published on Shelf Awareness for the Book Trade (April 14, 2022 ), link HERE

 

NOTE: To read a condensed version of this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (June 6, 2022), link HERE

 

Pets of Park Avenue

A fun, endearing rom-com about how an estranged couples’ dog reunites them, forcing them to reconcile their feelings for each other. 

Stefanie London delivers a hearty helping of dogs and romance in her endearing second novel, Pets of Park Avenue.

Scout Myers, a 26-year-old New Yorker, works for a premiere pet social media and talent agency run by her successful best friend, Isla, the winning protagonist from the first book in the Paws in the City series, The Dachshund Wears Prada. When Scout is tasked with doing a makeover of a socially connected Bichon Frise for a photoshoot, things accidentally go awry—the dog’s cottony-white coat is suddenly transformed into hot pink. Scout, in a bind, is left no choice but to ask her ex, Lane, if she can borrow his Bichon--Twinkle Stardust, “Star”--a well-behaved near lookalike to serve as a stand-in. Lane and Scout had a whirlwind romance and marriage that flopped five years before. The two never officially divorced. What starts as a one-shot-deal to borrow “Star,” soon reunites the former lovers. Lane--a Big Tech genius who runs a multi-million-dollar company--still has a soft spot for Scout, who left him after only one month of marriage because she felt she could not measure up to him and his ideals. Lovable “Star” serves as a bridge in this smart, sexy rom-com that unravels the couples’ challenging personal pasts and explains why things soured between them. Can they make amends?

 

London’s likeable characters resonate with hidden depths as she mines their hearts to deliver a fun, revealing story that will have readers rooting wholeheartedly for love--and dogs--to conquer all.

 

Pets of Park Avenue: Paws in the City (Book 2) by Stefanie London

HQN: Original Edition, $15.99 paperback, 366 pages, 9781335498199

Publishing Date: December 6, 2022

To order this book on INDIEBOUND link HERE

 

NOTE: This review is a reprint and is being posted with the permission of Shelf Awareness. To read this review on Shelf Awareness: Reader's Edition (January 20, 2023), link HERE