Love Felt Like This by Julia Olivia
Summary (from the publisher): A grumpy rock star and a joyful children’s show creator revive television magic in this cozy small-town romance.
Griffin Harvey lives his life in the spotlight. Reluctantly. The brooding famous singer-songwriter is on the cusp of composing his sophomore album . . . if only he could find the notes. But after gaining custody of his two-year-old daughter, the only music he’s writing is about shapes and counting to ten.
Enter Beverly, who lives her life in the background producing children’s television and laughter. Except joy is hard to find when her nonprofit loses funding. She sinks all of her savings to revive the children’s show by herself, but when her variety show appearance collides with Griffin’s, their banter and chemistry is caught on live television.
Suddenly, Griffin is singing a new tune. He needs a muse, and Beverly needs all the help she can get. With his secret daughter in tow, they hide out in her cozy mountain hometown, attempting to script, compose, and revive television magic. Their dynamic shouldn’t work. He’s all harsh tattoos and rough hands while she’s bright colors and gentle touches. Once their three months of work are done, they’ll return to their separate worlds. But what happens when it seems the true magic might be found in each other?
Review: Thank you to NetGalley, author Julie Olivia, and Berkley Romance for an ARC of this book, out on September 8th!
Beverly's grandfather ran a famous children's puppet show built around the star, Bernie Bird. But since his death, the show was cut and she has spent all her savings trying to revive. Personally, she's still wounded from the very public breakup with her famous musician high school sweetheart, Beau. When she lands a spot on a late-night show for one last ditch effort to get funding to revive the show, she ends up going viral thanks to her on-screen chemistry with singer-songwriter Griffin Harvey. Little does Beverly know, but Griffin is a single dad to a two-year-old and also desperately seeking creative inspiration - and he sees her children's show as an opportunity.
Okay, buckle up, because I have a lot of Thoughts and Feelings about this one. First of all, the good:
- I liked Griffin a lot. I am always a sucker for a hot and famous musician (fictionally speaking). Plus, he is a single dad (cue all the awwws). And he falls fast and hard.
- I love fake dating. I know sometimes famous people do this for publicity stunts, which is not exactly what goes down here but it felt believable because they're both in the public eye.
- This was well written. It feels cozy while still feeling realistic.
- This is open door but there's only one open door scene and it felt tasteful and not too much. Lately, I feel like a lot of romances I read are so explicit they feel pornographic. This one hit the right note for me and I appreciated it.
- I give Julie Olivia MAD props for a unique occupation for the FMC. Never did I think I would read a book about a puppeteer. It was giving the Muppets/Sesame Street.
- Loved that a good chunk of this book was set in North Carolina! Loved the smalltown mountain feel and the steep and winding roads that felt very familiar to me.
- I liked Beverly's family and the way Griffin gets to know them. It was really sweet how close Beverly is to all of them.
- LOVE that she inspires him musically. I was here for that.
- Love that he works hard to protect her from her ex, make him jealous, and also be the exact opposite of her ex in every way.
- Beverly just seems really sweet and kind and deserved better than the way she was treated in the past and I was really rooting for her.
- Loved all the yearning and the slow burn. Checking so many boxes here!!!
Now for the things that prevented me from giving this a higher rating. I am being ruthlessly honest here, so I pray the author isn't reading this because Julie, I love you and your characters and I'm sorry I had so many issues with this book!:
- I was fine with the whole puppet premise, but Beverly makes that puppet her whole dang personality. WHY did she need to bring it up at every turn?! She offers to speak in the puppet's voice (jokingly) during both awkward and intimate moments, and I just wanted to scream at her to leave work at work. It was way too much. I also did not understand WHY she was so into the puppet career and reviving the show other than it was important to her grandfather. I wanted some sense of what she enjoyed about it. I will concede that she was passionate and seemingly creative and talented at entertaining children with her craft!
- This book was nearly 500 pages and yet we learn nothing about Griffin's backstory. Nothing about his family, his childhood, how he got into his career and got famous. After how much we learn about Beverly's childhood and family, it felt very one-sided to be missing all that information for him.
- Why does Beverly have no friends other than a 70-year-old man who works with her on puppets?! You mean to tell me she doesn't have a single friend in LA?
- Beverly's ex was too much. I just don't buy that he would keep popping up like that over and over. At one point, her brother suggests just blocking him and Beverly seems shocked to realize she can do that?? Why would that not occur to her?
- I'm so sorry but Griffin's daughter was annoying. I love that he was a single dad and I loved the connection Beverly builds with her, but she is two years old. Why is she screaming all night, every night like a colicky newborn?? An occasional bad night, sure, but virtually never sleeping at night? It didn't feel normal. And why is she virtually only ever eating pancakes? I get that it was a cute connection to Beverely's family diner, but it was too many pancakes. And did he really think he could prevent people knowing she existed interminably? It seemed far-fetched.
- This read like the author really wanted this to be set in the 1970s but was either told she couldn't or didn't want to fully commit. The wardrobes, hairstyles, names, and even decor at Beverly's family home were all soooo 1970s and yet it was supposed to be a contemporary story. Something about it felt off to me. I did not care for the baby blue, bellbottom suit he wears to the Grammys. Again, I don't know, maybe her editor nixed the whole 70s setting and this was the best she could do.
- The details of their collaboration felt so fuzzy. On the one hand, he's willing to travel and stay with her to work with her for MONTHS and on the other hand, they never discuss actual deliverables or how he is going to contribute? She is shocked when he shows up to help her pitch the show's revival, but shouldn't that have been a given part of the collaboration?
-The tension in the end felt very manufactured. They're both busy and yet both into each other - there was no real problem.
I love Julie Olivia's cozy writing style and likable characters, and I will absolutely read more of hers in the future. I'm sorry that I can't give this more than 3 stars because I genuinely did like a lot of elements of it! But there was also enough that didn't work and prevented it from being 5 stars for me.
Stars: 3
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