American Fairytale

Very good book! I didn't like it quite as much as the first one, but I did enjoy all the domestic moments, as well as the development of the relationship between Tom and Milo. They had a magnetic attraction and that came through very well. I liked the nods to fairy tales, such as Tom telling Milo, “te quiero comer,” and I'm sure I'll pick up more of those the next time I read or listen to it (which I'll definitely do).

Overall, it's kind of a reluctant Cinderella plot, but it addresses some of the problems inherent in that setup. Milo, in the Cinderella role, does not want Tom to sweep him off his feet, and that was an interesting conflict. Of course they do find a very fairy-tale-ish happy ending together. I've read a lot of versions of Cinderella since I started reading romance, and I've enjoyed them all.

The main thing I disliked: most of the important side characters in this book are female, and they all have to do a lot of emotional work for the main characters. After Tom and Milo have their big argument near the end, Tom's friend Priya gives him a very long lecture on how he had messed up his relationship with Milo. Tom has two other close friends who are men, but the burden to help Tom straighten out his life was on a woman. This is an extremely common trope in m/m, though, so it isn't really fair for me to complain about this book specifically. Still, that scene did annoy me.

This one seems a little preachier than the first book, in terms of social-justice issues, but that didn't bother me. These plots are about how real-world issues affect people's lives, and that seems reasonable to me. In fact, I like it, because I find it really easy to imagine the main characters as real people with believable problems.

I'm very excited to listen to book 3 now. This is the second romance series I've read of this kind, about a group of friends all finding love (Society of Gentlemen was the first), and I like the format a lot.

I haven't been this conflicted about a book for sometime but I think I wanna give this a 3.5.

I haven't read the first book in this series but I have heard great things and really got excited when I got this ARC. I love stories with fairytale-esque themes and this book was very adorable and swoony for the most part.

Camilo is a social worker and I loved the passion he had for his work. Every time he talked about the work he did at the shelter and the ideas he had for how to help his clients, it was wonderful to read and I could totally see why Tom fell in love with him. Tom on the other hand is such a thoughtful amazing person, very connected to his roots and this drive to support causes that are close to his heart. Except the part where Tom tries to solve issues with money, which made Camilo uncomfortable, these two were literally perfect for each other. The attraction was instant since the first time they met and the slow organic progression to love was beautiful to watch. And the scenes with Tom's daughter Libe were an absolute delight.

The writing in this book is just so easy to get through, I was done in a single sitting. The author does a great job of showing us the culture that both Tom and Camilo come from, and it was awesome to read their conversations about their heritage, the ethnic food or even the issues related to their community. The friend group in this book is also very very diverse and I liked getting to know them, even if I couldn't keep track of all of them sometimes. While I understood why the conflict occurred in the story, I didn't completely like how it played out and I felt that some very thoughtless accusations were thrown around, which never did get a proper resolution. Also, despite hearing so much about Camilo's passion for his work, we don't get to see much of him actually doing it and I think that was a missed opportunity.

Overall, this is a swoony sweet romance featuring very good characters and some emotional angst thrown in. I recommend this book if you like reading romances about people who are proud of their cultures and it reflects off the page and who are very eager to do something for helping those in society who need it. It also works very well as stand-alone and I never felt that I was missing out any references. I also have a feeling I'll be checking out the next one in the series because I really liked the author's storytelling.