The Something About Her by Rachel Higginson

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Since I already read the first three books of Rachel Higginson's Opposites Attract series, I decided to go ahead and finish the series. The fourth and final book is The Something About Her. I was able to use this for the Love Has Sprung prompt backlist romance.

Dillon has unexpectedly been named the new executive chef for her brother's restaurant Bianca. She was hoping to hit that career milestone in the future, but feels it's too early. As she struggles with her identity both in her career and overall, she keeps running into Vann. What starts off as a slightly antagonistic relationship quickly changes as they both learn that their first impressions of each other were wrong. When Dillon starts opening up about things to Vann that even her own brother doesn't know, they move from friends to lovers.

First off, this book was a little bit of a struggle for me, but really pulled it out in the end. I wasn't too sure about Vann as a hero and really connected with Dillon's identity issues in the beginning. When we as the reader learn about how she developed those issues, it just breaks your heart. From the previous books we were aware of the abusive situation with Ezra and Dillon's father, but we also learn that when Dillon was a reckless party girl, she was drugged and raped. Big triggers for that situation. It was really tough to read Dillon's struggles with opening up to anyone (outside of her therapist), but I did like that even though we don't see her in therapy currently she has been through it. It broke my heart that she hadn't even let Ezra know it had happened, but when she shared her experience with Vann it made it all the more powerful. Now, I feel like I should also mention that there really isn't any comeuppance for the perpetrator. Dillon isn't sure who he is and it's now been over 5 years since the incident. There is a beautiful author's note at the end about how powerful it is for other's to speak out about what happened to them, but it doesn't work that way for everyone. Even though I wanted this guy hogtied and tortured (my dark romance side comes out), I loved the beauty that it wasn't Dillon's way to be so vocal about it.

To move on to more happier things though, I really loved joining Dillon on her way to find identity and really come to join her in gaining her self-confidence. I also loved the way that Vann was constantly helping her, but it wasn't in a way that showed he was taking over. It just was so well done. Like I mentioned earlier I was on the fence with them, but seeing how they both progressed and grew together was so beautiful. I thinks that's really what it came down to for me; this book was so beautiful and a great way to end the series.

What's fun about this little binge I went on, is there's another author note in the back that there is going to be a spin-off set in the same city! We met the first hero Will a couple times in this series since he owns a craft bar in town and is friends with Killian. The first book of Decisions in Durham is actually already out and called Decisions We Make After Midnight. I can't wait to pick up this other series by Rachel. The second book comes out in May, so I have time to get caught up!

Have you read The Something About Her?

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

STATISTICS: The Something About Her, Rachel Higginson, 5-stars, 1 day, eBook, 347 pages, published in 2019, indie published

The Problem with Him by Rachel Higginson

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Continuing my binge of Rachel Higginson's Opposites Attract series, I picked up the next book. The third book is The Problem with Him. I was able to use this for the prompt pink on the cover for Love Has Sprung.

Kaya has been elevated to first sous chef at Lilou once Killian left to start a restaurant with Vera. Her fellow sous chef, and frequent kitchen rival, Wyatt is the new executive chef. When they start butting heads even more than usual, Kaya is feeling out of place. She's interested in taking over the suddenly open executive chef position and another one of Ezra's restaurants. While Kaya secret prepares and learns the other restaurant's personality and vibe, she struggles with her attraction to Wyatt. While they were always butting heads, it's really been hiding the attraction between them that never seemed to be at a time to move forward. When it finally boils over, Kaya and Wyatt struggle to keep their attraction to each other from distracting the rest of the kitchen.

Now, I am not the biggest enemies-to-lovers reader. While the first two books in this series had a little bit of that vibe, here I was expecting it to be a lot more prevalent. Once we got into the meat of what was going on between Wyatt and Kaya this wasn't enemies-to-lovers, but more not-so-secretly pining. I loved how much Wyatt was all in for Kaya. When she brings up going for the other executive chef position, he doesn't think twice and encourages her to go for the position. He's sad that we won't get to see her everyday at work anymore, but he just is so freaking supportive. Also, can we just say that Wyatt is freaking hot. He's a tattooed, pierced chef that seems like a complete hard-ass, but is really just a cinnamon roll on the inside, especially when it comes to Kaya.

One thing I really liked as well is that even though we got two chefs in The Opposite of You, here we get two chefs in the same kitchen. I also loved seeing that Wyatt is actually apart of the foster brother group that Ezra and Killian were in as well. It was so nice to see how he made a similar path but yet also did things differently. I just really liked the pining and then breaking of tension between them. 

I can't wait to dig into more of Rachel Higginson's backlist and see what other stories are in her brain. I'm so happy to have gone on this mini binge and am always happy to add a new author to my contemporary list. Over the past year it's been really growing and I'm starting to find some really great authors! If you enjoy foodie and chef romances, this one is a must! I think it could do well as a standalone, but I've enjoyed the series as a whole so certainly check them all out.

Have you read The Problem with Him?

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

STATISTICS: The Problem with Him, Rachel Higginson, 5-stars, 1 day, eBook, 328 pages, published in 2018, indie published

The Difference Between Us by Rachel Higginson

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After reading The Opposite of You, I immediately jumped into The Difference Between Us. This is the second book in Rachel Higginson's Opposites Attract series. I applied this to the Love Has Sprung prompt slow burn romance.

Molly has been struggling at her 9-5 job. She works for an advertising company as the social media guru, but most of her co-workers aren't up to the current needs of society. As she struggles to show the importance of social media advertising, she is also being harassed by her boss. He's also the CEO's son and she feels like she can't really go to anyone for help. When Ezra comes to her for help for his restaurants' advertising, he starts learning more about her skill set. Molly is also a painter, but struggles with acknowledging her talent and won't sell her paintings. As Ezra and Molly work closer together on various projects, he ends up finagling her to paint a mural at his lowest performing restaurant, Bianca. The more time that they spend together, the more Molly and Ezra can't seem to stay away from each other and eventually give in to their feelings.

This was so good and I really enjoyed it as well, but in a different way than The Opposite of You. So once again, we have a couple triggers, and as you can tell from my summary it's for harassment. Molly's boss starts off with grazes and staring, but constantly is doing double entendre and finding ways for them to end up in meetings together. Now nothing really physical happens outside of one firm boob grab, but I can see how it can be triggering. Even more so since she get's told she's overthinking by HR three separate times. She does have a female friend that walks with her to her car after work and a few other times they buddy up, but I just had to dock a 1/2 star for this situation. I didn't like that no other coworkers came forward or at least banded together to protect each other. Even from the males that saw what was happening but didn't step up. I understand that that was the point of the situation, but it would've been nice that even if nobody was able to stand up to this guy they could at least buddy up as much as possible. Because this was a big deal in the story, I did want my revenge at the end but it was just a few lines in the epilogue. I wanted this guy's head and was felt left feeling a little "that's it?" I liked that Ezra pushed the issue and supported Molly, but I do wish that we could've seen what went down as the reader so we could get that little bit of closure as well.

But let's get to the good stuff. Ezra and Molly, oh my gosh. I loved them both and how they interacted with each other. Molly is one of the only people to talk-back to Ezra and call him out when he's wrong. I just loved how much Ezra wanted her because he needed that and too many people in his life were willing to just roll over. I also love how much he supported her in all aspects of her life, including the fact that Molly can't cook anything. I mean, she frequently burns toast. There was a scene where she tries to cook them dinner and does spaghetti and it ends up a complete disaster. The way that Ezra handled it and an emotional Molly was just so sweet. Honestly, I loved most everything about this book except for Molly's corporate job situation.

Like I mentioned in my review for The Opposite of You, I went on a binge of this series so the reviews for the other two books are coming soon! I can't wait to look into Rachel Higginson's backlist and see what else she's written. I also love that the series is all based around Restaurant people and while the first book was about chefs, here we get Ezra the owner. I loved seeing a different side of the business!

Have you read The Difference Between Us?

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

STATISTICS: The Difference Between Us, Rachel Higginson, 4.5-stars, 1 day, eBook, 284 pages, published in 2017, indie published

The Opposite of You by Rachel Higginson

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Continuing with my full on mood reading, I decided to pick up The Opposite of You by Rachel Higginson. This is the first book in her Opposites Attract series. I first heard about this book thanks to the Smart Women Read Romance podcast! They did an episode on it pretty early on and it's been on my tbr since. Since I knew I needed a foodie romance for Love Has Sprung, so I decided to finally pick it up. I was also able to use this for my March Yahtzee roll which ended up being a large straight. The prompt for that was a book with over 5,000 reviews.

Vera is back to her hometown of Durham after getting out of an abusive relationship and travelling throughout Europe for a year. Now that she's back (thanks to a health scare with her father), she is looking to getting her chef career back on track. Not sure if she'd be able to get a job in a restaurant, she decides to start a food truck called Foodie. When she parks across the street from high end restaurant Lilou and renowned check Killian, sparks start to fly between the two. When Killian starts helping Vera with her recipes and giving his reviews, she gets annoyed but is also happy for the input. As they grow closer, the sparks start to flame.

Oh my gosh, first off it's weird that I ended up picking two books in a row with a hero named Killian. I guess that works though since it's March? Anyways, this was such a fun book and I really enjoyed Vera's story. I feel like I should mention, this is single POV and all from Vera. I do wish that we saw a little of Killian's POV, even as an epilogue or something. I understood that it helped keep the mystique of Killian, but I wanted inside his head. I do think that Rachel did a great job giving nuances so that as a reader we could tell what was going on with Killian before Vera realized.

The beginning was just so perfect and I loved him sending his sous chef over to get her food and then send him back with his notes on the dish. Sometimes I felt so bad for Vera, but I also liked that even though at times it was annoying or a little over the top, it helped her think of her dishes more critically. Oh, I should also mention that there is triggers for abuse and manipulation. We don't see too much of it present day, but Vera is still struggling with her guilt over "letting" it happen to her and how she allowed him to cut out her friends and family. I feel like it is enough for a warning because we spend the entire book in Vera's head and she is still coming to terms. She is near the end of her journey to moving on and past her experiences, but it is talked about quite a bit. 

I really enjoyed this book and am so happy I finally picked it up. You'll see over the next couple reviews, but reading this prompted me to binge the complete series! I just couldn't put them down and had to see what would happen with the next couple. I am definitely going to be looking into Rachel Higginson's backlist and see what else she has written. Another win from Juliette and Jessen!

Have you read The Opposite of You?

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

STATISTICS: The Opposite of You, Rachel Higginson, 5-stars, 0 days, eBook, 302 pages, published in 2017, indie published