A Dish Best Served Hot

Natalie Caña does second chance romance/friends to lovers really well. Both characters grow and the connection is strong immediately. She also specializes in conniving grandfathers, which is fun. I'm not sure I liked this QUITE as much as the first in the series, but it's VERY close.

What a fantastic love story! I love the characters, flaws and all. And I love their love story.

This is the second book in a series. I have not read the first, and there were a couple of times where I wondered what the references toward the couple from the first book were, but overall, this stands on its own. Caña writes vivid and strong-willed characters that you can't help but love. Not just the main characters, Saint and Lola, but their fiesta and fiery grandfathers as well. And this second-chance love story is fantastic. I absolutely want to go back and read the first book in the series. And I will read any book by Caña going forward.

Please read this.

Slow Burn Second Chance Romance With Quite A Bit Of Political Commentary Baked In. Straight up, just from the nature of the work of our female MC in particular, this book has *quite* a bit of left leaning politics baked in. That noted, if you can accept that this is simply this character... it actually isn't overly preachy. I've certainly seen *far* more preachy books given similar characters in other works by other authors before, so, truly - don't let that scare you too much, just know your eyes may roll a bit if you disagree with the politics being espoused.

Beyond that though, this really is a solid and remarkably deep second chance/ single dad romance showing the power of love... and meddling grandfathers and saccharine sweet young daughters. But it *is* a *very* slow burn, almost with more focus on everything *other* than the romance itself. Like, our MCs met in HS and had this instant chemistry, broke it off, went their separate ways, and yet the flame never died... so it is never really *shown* in the book so much as *told* that it is there (with the *occasional* view of it, often seeming more to remind the reader that this *is* intended to be a romance novel).

And yet... the story really does work quite well. There's nothing definitively *wrong* with it, and the world created here is remarkably "real" and one of the more fully fleshed out communities I've encountered in all of my reading. It just may not be *exactly* the kind of book various readers are looking for for various reasons. Including pissing off the sweet/ clean crowd with its in-the-room sex scenes.

Still, ultimately this *was* a really good book. I *am* looking forward to Book 3. And this *is* very much recommended.