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I’ve read a few Ali Hazelwood books. Love, Theoretically, Love on the Brain, The Love Hypothesis, Check & Mate — I was expecting Not in Love to be in a similar vein, but unlike the others, which are all romances and usually contain a pretty awkward sex scene or two, this book needs to come with a disclaimer:: This Book is Pure Porn. That being said, the underlying story between the orgasms is a decent story of revenge, personal growth, and lots of obsession.

Rue Seibert works in food security science for a pioneer woman in the field who founded her own company, Kline, so the university she worked for wouldn’t own her patent. Now Rue is on the cusp of needing her own patent, just when a finance company swoops in a buys up Kline’s loan. Rue’s hero believes they’ve come in to destroy everything she’s ever worked for, so they are enemy number one. But when Rue recognizes one of the finance guys from a recent hookup, and she learns more about her boss’ history with them, the lines of her allegiance start to blur.

So let’s just jump into it and talk about the sex. This is by far the sexiest (as in literally so much sex) Hazelwood story I’ve read so far – but I haven’t read them all, so can’t say for certain it has the most. Please, enlighten me in the comments. There’s a lot of it. I know I already said that like eight different ways, but really, you need to prepare yourself. If you took away the explicit sex scenes, there may be nothing more than a novella length story in front of you. This is erotica territory.

I couldn’t help but feel bad for the two main characters, who pretty much treat sex as a biological urge and nothing more. They use a sex app (not a dating app) to find others who just want to use each other’s bodies for pleasure. They are both so detached from their feelings that that’s all they think they want or can offer someone else. I guess it did leave room for them to grow, but it was an ick for me. Sex is more than just a physical connection. Or maybe I should say sex should be more than just a physical connection. But maybe that’s my age showing? It was uncomfortable to read so much of it, and the way Eli was obsessed with Rue kind of gave me creepy-sex guy vibes. Sorry, not sorry.

One of the things Rue and Eli exchanged (other than copious amounts of bodily fluids) were all the dark pieces of themselves. Truths they’ve never told anyone before because of the shame it brings them. Similar to Hate Mail by Donna Marchetti (solid 5-Star book), I loved it. They spoke, and the other listened, and there was acceptance. The acknowledgement of their regrets and flaws and imperfect choices – it makes the connection they forge feel genuine. They’re not falling for an image of the other person they’ve built up in their own mind – they’re falling for the whole person. The real person. In that way, I found it very romantic. Then again, the same could happen in a platonic friendship, but since they’re fucking, like, all the time, let’s call it romance.

There are also storylines with themes of food scarcity, complicated family relationships, social struggles, and strong friendships. There’s some good stuff in there, you just have to wade through a lot of fornication to get there, because I’m not sure if you’ve heard yet, but there’s a lot of it.

Overall, it was a decent story. Everything that was promised had a satisfying payoff, and we get a happily ever after. If you like Hazelwood’s science-y style, you still get a bit of that, but the main course is real raunchy. It just wasn’t the one for me.

Details

Title:: Not in Love
Author:: Ali Hazelwood
Genre:: Erotic Romance
Publisher:: Berkley
Length:: 384 pages
Audio Length:: 11h 55m
Audiobook Narrator:: Callie Dalton & Jason Clarke
Audiobook Publisher:: Penguin Audio
Published:: June 11th, 2024
The Litertarian Rating:: 2-Stars

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Many romance novels are almost sickly-sweet, like candy. Bubbly and sunshine-y. You know the ones. Summertime Punchline by Betty Corrello is different. Its humor is drier, its romance less sure-footed than most. The characters may or may not be fated (I could argue both ways), but in the end, their love is chosen, not inevitable, and it gives the story a different flavor. Like a chocolate covered pretzel, maybe. A little salty. A little zing. A little something special.

Summertime Punchline Betty Corrello Book Cover

Delfina Silva-Miller is a stand-up comic on the edge of getting everything she’s worked toward for the past decade. Right on the edge – then she topples off, landing in the last place she ever wanted to be. In one fell swoop she finds herself jobless, single, and homeless (just a typical run-of-the-mill boyfriend-banged-her-roommate-the-day-she-quit-her-job situation). She still has a spot booked on an epic comedy festival in a few months, but suddenly, she can’t use any of the material she has about the asshat boyfriend, and nowhere to stay in the meantime. So, with her tail tucked between her legs, she makes her way down the Jersey shore, to the town of Evergreen, where she grew up. Trouble is, she ran away from that town kicking and screaming immediately after graduation with no plans to ever return. There was nothing for her there except her kind little Italian grandmother who raised her. Her mother died before she could remember, her father was a druggie drunk failure typa guy, and the boy she was in a near constant love-hate relationship with growing up never chose her when it counted. She returns to find Evergreen different from the decade before, but some things never change. Eddie is still around, her father got sober, her grandmother does weekly aquarobics, and incredibly, there’s an open mic night in a bar downtown that’s perfect for her to work on her new material (just guess who owns the place). She has to get a new set written – a great one – but being back in her hometown stirs up a lot of old hurts, and grown-up Del finds herself needing to heal old wounds before the jokes will flow.

Y’all know by now I’m a sucker for good writing, and damn girl – this one slaps. A few examples of lines I absolutely lust after:

My last shot to repot my lifelong dream like a grocery store houseplant and make it bloom.

The next morning, I left town before Evergreen had rubbed the sleep from its eyes…

It wasn’t like Eddie and I avoided the deep end; we’d met each other in the deep end.

Eddie trailed behind me, laughter winking in his eyes alongside the flickering multicolor lights that surrounded us.

[regarding families] It was arguing without any ill will; it was lunging like a python without dispensing any venom; it was lancing close to the jugular and pulling back at the last nanosecond, kissing your victim on the forehead as you slipped away.

The banter in this book is frankly unparalleled. I laughed out loud – often pausing to appreciate the genius & sometimes the sheer surprise of whatever retort came next. I can’t remember the last time I was so delighted by back-and-forth between characters. And not just once. Like, a dozen times. For that alone, I will treasure this book. For me, that goes a long way.

Now, the romance. Del and Eddie don’t have a linear insta-lovefest. They met at an age where being cool was more important than being genuine, and though they found authenticity and truth in each other occasionally back then, ultimately cool won out and they never could connect. Now as adults, their feelings are complex, and the details of their lives even moreso. The ties of their past are still there, maybe even stronger than ever, but is letting it draw them close again the right thing? Or will it end up pushing them further apart than ever before?

I appreciated the hesitancy in both characters to not only admit their feelings to themselves (let alone each other), or to give into temptations, and I think that’s a testament to how real these characters and their world felt. Some of the early flashback scenes annoyed me a little bit because it was interrupting a story I was quickly falling into, but ultimately, they helped to color the nuance of Del & Eddie’s relationship, which is far from typical. Their relationship is layered and complicated, and I really loved that it was their ‘complicated’ home lives that set them apart in their friend group and drew them together. Not unlike my husband and I.

The nuance was so vibrant that it was sometimes hard to grasp onto. Sometimes the characters would do or say something that didn’t exactly fit the puzzle of them I’d built in my brain up to that point. Maybe something about the timeline of when things were presented just had me tripping up a little bit sometimes.

I also wish some of the details were explored a little bit more somehow. Alfonso the little man who lives in their building. A good scene with Valerie and Del interacting (more than the little we were offered). More comedy? I was left feeling like there were maybe more loose ends that could have been tied up, at least a little more neatly in some cases.

Overall, I loved the book, and it will live proudly upon my shelf for a long time to come. It’s smart, surprising, complicated, and ultimately hopeful. A summertime romance with some punch – and punchlines. Pick this one up if you’re in the mood for a snarky, complex romance with some painfully realistic throwbacks to high school side-character energy.

Details

Title:: Summertime Punchline
Author:: Betty Corrello
Genre:: Contemporary Romance
Publisher:: Avon
Length:: 320 pages
Audio Length:: 9h 24m
Audiobook Narrator:: Joy Nash
Audiobook Publisher:: Harper Audio
Published:: May 21st, 2024
The Litertarian Rating:: 5-Stars