This RITA® Reader Challenge 2017 review was written by Mandi. This story was nominated for the RITA® in the Mid-Length Contemporary category.

Here is Mandi's review:

So basically, this is your typical vows-never-to-love-again widower father meets ex-rodeo princess turned ex-famous movie star turned wheelchair-using recluse story. Unnecessarily complicated backstory aside, I had surprisingly high hopes for this book. I mean, how often do you actually find a book on Amazon with a 4.9 out of 5 rating–much less a series romance? Unfortunately, due to its lackluster plot and problematic main characters, the book didn’t even meet my relatively low expectations, much less my high hopes.

The book started out well enough, and, before I had even finished the first quarter of the book, I had already written a not-quite-glowing-but-still-positive review in my head. However, the more I read the more annoyed I became. After the initial setup the story itself seemed to crawl with minimal plot development and underwhelming conflict. It definitely felt like the story was stretched out in order to hit the required page mark for a mid-length contemporary.

However, this book’s greatest sin was the main characters. Please note, I didn’t say characterization. I am referring specifically to the main characters. Some of the secondary characters were fairly well done. I first realized there were problems with the hero and heroine when I realized that I was more interested in the hero’s brother and his fiancé’s interplay/story.

The most unfortunate thing is that there was so much potential here as the heroine, Mallory, had such a rich backstory to mine from–and I’m not referring to her ex-starlet past. To be fair, I do appreciate how the book portrayed the wheelchair-using heroine as a strong person. It was refreshing to not have this type of character portrayed as a victim in need of rescuing. I just found her to be somewhat unrealistic, flat, and inconsistent.

To be fair, again, at the time that I was reading the second half of the book I was also dealing with my six month old who was dealing with not-yet-pneumonia. So I was admittedly cranky. But rather than serve as an escape, the inconsistency associated with the main characters in the book just annoyed the crap out of me.

The scene where the heroine realizes she loves the hero is a perfect illustration of why. There had already been a big-to-do earlier in the book about how the heroine’s situation had increased her empathy:

Mallory smirked. “You know what’s strange? Ever since this—” she gestured toward her lap “—I have a much harder time seeing other people unhappy. Almost like…”

“You can feel their pain?”

“Maybe.”

“That’s hardly surprising…. Considering how hard you’ve worked to regain your own equilibrium, it’s no wonder you’re more empathetic.”

But, despite our heroine’s empathy super power, the fact that she put another person’s feelings before her own was how she discovered she was in love.

…glad he couldn’t see the tears brimming on her lower lashes. Not for herself, though. For him.

Which could only mean one thing—

Yep, she was in love, all righty. In a way she’d never been before. In no small part because she’d never known a man like this before. Well, poop.

Unfortunately, the book was riddled with such inconsistencies. Even more unfortunately, I couldn’t get past those inconsistencies enough to actually enjoy the book. However, as I do appreciate the positive, if inconsistent, portrayal of the heroine, (and the fact that most readers probably won’t be as cranky as me) I would give it a grade of C+