Fool's Gold by Jenny Bunting

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

With a little bit of free time, I needed to read a book to finish up the first bingo board of Love Has Sprung. One of the remaining prompts I had left was one of Shelby's favorites of 2021. I went through her top rated books of 2021 and pulled a few ideas. After glancing at blurbs, I decided to pick up Fool's Gold by Jenny Bunting. This is the first book in her Finch Family series. This also worked to cover the Taylor Swift Quarterly Challenge prompt Story of Us (part of a series or more than one person on the cover). 

Cameron is the playboy in town and never has been one for a serious relationship. When he comes across childhood friend Annie crying in the local bar one night, he proposes to go to her ex's engagement party as her new "fake" beau. When the lines between them start to get blurred, the decide quickly to not be fake-dating anymore and just do what feels right. As Annie helps Cameron plan an event for his family's brewery and they spend more time together, he realizes he wants Annie as his girlfriend and even more long term.

Once again Shelby hits a recommendation out of the park for me. This book was so sweet and swoony and sexy and fun and just a good-feeling overall. I really loved how the fake-dating situation wasn't pushed too far and they both quickly opened up about wanting more. They didn't put labels on the relationship, but they had the conversation about it first. They were just so emotionally together and I could just gush about this book so much. There was some great humor as well and I loved the way that Jenny Bunting really established Cameron's family (I can't wait for the rest of the books).

I know that with the friends-to-lovers trope sometimes people have trouble believing that there wasn't anything there before, but I thought it was really well handled. They both have insecurities and think in different ways that they aren't good enough or what the other person would want. I also really loved that even though they didn't have the super close relationship before the fake dating situation, Cameron was all in and ready to do anything to help Annie. He was just so all-in and in tune with her (for the most part). I did think the 3rd act conflict was little hanky and that Annie should've done more groveling than Cameron, but at she apologized. I was waiting for it and felt a sense of relief when she did. I don't know why, but it just really bothers me when all of the groveling is pushed on the male character whether he was in wrong or not. Our heroines need to take accountability for their words and actions too.

I have a new contemporary author that I can't wait to read more from and will definitely be looking into Jenny's backlist. Shelby really has been giving the best contemporary romance recommendations and I'm am so happy to have another great author to add to my list. If you enjoy small town, family focused romances certainly check out this book. I think it's definitely worth your while.

Have you read Fool's Gold?

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

STATISTICS: Fool's Gold, Jenny Bunting, 5-stars, 0 days, eBook, 286 pages, published in 2021, indie published