During a recent podcast with Molly O’Keefe, I learned about this novella, and really, who can resist the bundle of title temptation that is The Navy SEAL’s Rebel Librarian? Not me, that’s for sure.

I really liked this story. Alas, it suffered from one of the major hurdles of novella-ing in romance: the hero and heroine didn’t know each other prior to the start of the story. That’s a lot of progress to make in a short time frame, and in my experience, the novellas that work best for me as a reader are those where the main characters knew each other before the start of the story. Maybe they were childhood friends or went to the same school, or they were loosely connected via siblings or circles of acquaintance — whatever. The prior history allows the current developments to rest on some sort of foundation.

When the main characters don’t know each other at the start, there’s a lot of getting-to-know-you that both the characters and the readers have to do and like I said, there’s not a lot of pages to get that done. In this case, I think the progress from “hey, that person is kinda hot” to “we should totally be a THING, right? Obviously,” was about 85% effective.

Jack Powell is hanging out in the library of the local college where he takes classes when one of the librarians, Erin Kent, notices him. To be more specific, he’s not exactly hanging out – he’s napping. Erin is making a circuit of the library, noting who is doing what and where, and who has left rubbish for her to collect (answer: darn near everyone, good Lord people, have you NO respect or clue? Apparently not). Erin is getting over a divorce which left her confidence a little cracked, since her ex-husband did a slow manipulation maneuver over many years convincing Erin that her dreams were impractical and not “their” dreams and goals, which were more important. She’s figuring out who she wants to be now, and what older, still secret desires of her own she wants to pursue – a post-divorce bucket list of sorts. Among these things: sky diving, buying a motorcycle, and dating.

In Jack, she finds the possibility of all three. She’s ferociously attracted to him, and after he proves himself to be a sort of kind-hearted badass by helping her pursue the purchase of the motorcycle she wants (and not the model the dealer thinks she should have), she decides to invite him home. They take a rain-soaked trip to Bonetown on the counter just inside her back door – that’s not a euphemism, btw: they didn’t get past the back door before destination: Bonetown. Theirs is meant to be a casual fling, and for the first few encounters, Erin doesn’t even know his name – another major risk she’s both scared and thrilled to be taking.

Jack is out of the Navy because he’s struggling with PTSD and a physical tremor in his hands. He’s taking classes on a temporary basis while he tries to figure out what’s up with this tremor. He’s in town on a temporary basis while he figures out his next move, which is probably overseas as an independent contractor. Everything about his presence in town is temporary, which makes him an ideal fling for Erin, who is only beginning to take steps outside of her established routine and boundaries. So Jack can help her skydive – piece of cake for him, really. He can help her learn how to master her new, ferociously badass motorcycle. And he is more than happy to take spontaneous and not-so-spontaneous side trips to Bonetown and the surrounding area.

The things I liked:

• Jack is dealing with mental and physical health issues, and in the course of the story he visits a therapist, talking at length about what he’s doing to try to help himself. I loved that the portrayal of mental health care was matter of fact and painfully honest, both in that Jack knew he needed to do it, and hated that he needed to do it. He’s upset about his problems, and honest enough to know he needs help with them.
• His research paper, the one that brings him into the library to begin with: examining recent treatment protocols for PTSD. Jack has a kind of quiet, unmovable strength as a hero that is nuanced and so interesting to read about.
• Erin is determined to take back her own life, and the voice in her head that tries to talk her out of it? Her ex-husband’s voice. Which of course makes her more determined to shut him up.
• Both characters are managing different types of disappointment and frustration, and they do so like grown ups and I loved it.
• They approach their attraction as intelligent adults without angst or mind games. The basis of the story is that new relationship which is meant to be temporary – and of course it’s not going to be because it’s a romance novella – and I appreciated how honest they were with one another. There’s a lot of honesty in this novella, both between the characters and within the characters’ interactions with their changing selves, which I really, really liked.

So what were my issues?

One, the black moment arrives abruptly, and after the more methodical and deliberate development of their relationship, the OH SHIT THINGS WENT WRONG IN A HURRY LIKE WHOOOOAAAAA DAMN was jarring.

Plus, it was telegraphed in advance to the point where I knew what was going to happen, and I was almost at the point in the story where I thought my guess was wrong because there wasn’t enough room for That Thing to happen. Then it did and my first thought was, “How is this going to be resolved in enough time that there’s space for the recovery and the HEA and the rest of those parts?” There wasn’t really enough room for the black moment, the resolution, and the ending. In addition, Jack’s life before his arrival in town and the potential of where he’s going afterward were developed in the story; Erin’s life was portrayed in a much more limited way, focusing mainly on the present and the recent past.

As a result, the ending felt rushed to me, cramming too much into too little space. I wanted more – which is part of the danger of a novella. Sometimes, it’s not quite enough, as was the case here. I wanted more of Jack, more of Erin, more of what happened next.

Ending aside, I really enjoyed reading this novella, and recommend it for fans of hotter contemporary romance. Erin and Jack don’t get into anything that defies gravity (the only thing they do while skydiving is jump out of a plane – sorry) or seemed outlandish, but the degree to which Erin was breaking out of her own limitations made the sex scenes with Jack that much hotter.

And really, I haven’t met many people who can resist that title. The story inside comes very, very close to living up to the promise of it.