“If I did anything in the next nine days, I hoped to show her that at least one person believed in her, that one person didn’t expect her to conform to a certain role…”
OMG. OMG. OMG!!!!
Holyyyyyy wow!! This book was absolutely incredible and I finished it bawling happy tears!! Is that even a thing?? GAH! Seriously that was one of the most beautiful endings I’ve ever read! Holy freaking feels, you guys! From start to finish, this was a captivating love story with deep emotions that truly made me care for the characters, and the beautiful writing kept me glued to every page! In all honesty, this was one of the BEST BOOKS I’ve read in a long time and without any doubt this is a 5++ STAR FAVORITE!!
Devney Perry is easily my most consistently favorite author. I’ve read every book she’s released and each one has become one of my top favorite recommendations. Whenever anyone comes to me for recommendations, she is always the first author name I give them because her books are just so well rounded and relatable and they feel so real that I truly feel like they’ll appeal to absolutely anyone looking for a beautiful love story to read. Each one of her books is addictive and full of feels, they’re passionate and funny and emotional, they’re so well written and the characters end up feeling like people you know, they’re well paced and while each story is quite distinct they’re also all balanced… In every way her books are everything I could ever want from a romance novel and literally every single book she writes is pure gold!
This is the last standalone in the Lark Cove series and while you could actually read this book alone without any confusion, all the books in the series are top favorites of mine so if you’re looking for a bunch of amazing reading, I would recommend reading them all in order. They’re all listed down below. And here’s the blurb for this book:
Sofia Kendrick has always cherished her tiara. As the youngest daughter of a wealthy New York family, she’s lived the life of an American princess. But after two scandalous divorces and a breakup smear her name across the society rags, the shine from her crown has dulled. People call her superficial, even gaudy.
She’s nothing more than tinsel.
Desperate for escape and starving for peace, Sofia heads to Montana for a holiday weekend with her brother. But she doesn’t get the relaxing vacation she planned. Instead, she’s put to work in a bar alongside Dakota Magee — a man who does not want her help. A man who is set on teaching her a few lessons about real life and hard work. But Sofia has a couple of life lessons of her own to teach. Like how to fall in love.
This story features an interesting heroine because in previous books, she came off as an unpleasant character and certainly not the type of person you’d consider to be heroine material but the author did such an amazing job of making you truly sympathetic to her and make you understand her side of things and why she was the way she was. Another thing I really appreciated about her character is that she *was* flawed but she was aware of it and actively worked on improving herself. It’s hard to fault someone who is trying to be better. She was quite smart and she meant well. Her life had just never led her in a direction where she had any incentive or direction to use any of those for good.
“You think it’s true.”
“Huh?” Thea asked.
“The magazine. You think what she wrote was true.”
“The truth?” She sighed. “Yes and no. Yes, I think they captured the facts. No, I don’t think you’re all of the things she called you.”
“Thank you.” My chin quivered. That was maybe the nicest thing she’d ever said to me. “I, um… I feel kind of lost. I don’t want to be that person.”
As a child she’d always felt overlooked by her wealthy family’s clear preference for her brother and sister’s interests and over time that had turned her into a purposeless individual who someone on the outside might truly see as shallow.
But after a scathing article highlighted all her worst traits and printed them front and center for the world to read, she began to question her life choices and needed an escape, and perhaps a fresh start.
In Montana, staying at her brother’s family home, she got put to work at her sister-in-law’s bar under the scowling but sexy watch of Dakota Magee where slowly but surely she began to find purpose.
“That’s your tip jar. Write your name on it.”
She hesitated, her eyes locked on the marker… Finally, she took the marker and carefully wrote out Sofia in swirly, flowing letters.
When she was done, I took it and set it on the bar, making sure it was front and center… I wanted hers to be visible.
Because she was visible.
She had more potential than she knew. She had more intelligence than most — in spades.
If I did anything in the next nine days, I hoped to show her that at least one person believed in her, that one person didn’t expect her to conform to a certain role because of her heritage or last name or birth order.
It was heartwarming and heartbreaking and both sweet and adorable to see her learning to be a real person and I loved the way Dakota at first begrudgingly but eventually quite sincerely helped her.
“I don’t want to let my family down,” I whispered. “Not again.”
“You might.”
“What?” I stood back, making sure I’d heard him right.
“You might.” He nodded. You might not do exactly what they want or how they want it. But take it from a guy who has disappointed his family for years. It doesn’t matter. Don’t do this because you want to make them proud. Do this because it’s going to feed your spirit. My guess? They’ll be damn proud, no matter what happens.”
Despite how deeply they fell in love with each other, there were actually a lot of things keeping them from building a life together right from the start and I appreciated how believable those hurdles they had to get over her. From family pressures to long distances to life goals, they had a lot of external issues to work through before earning their happily ever after.
Dakota and I soaked up every second together, savoring this time.
I’d lost track of the number of times he and I had broken apart. The number of times we’d agreed to go our separate ways only to find ourselves thrust together again.
This story really packed on all the feels and I loved the progression of time — it just made their story that much more believable and by the end of this book I was seriously bawling happy tears!!! It’s so rare for a book to pull that much emotion out of me but it just hit all the right notes and the ending was PURE ROMANCE PERFECTION!!!
If you’re looking for a truly amazing romance reading adventure, I highly recommend both this book and all the ones in this series! I can almost guarantee you’ll fall completely in love with the Lark Cove love stories!
Rating: 5+ STARS!! Contemporary Adult Romance, can standalone
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Series of standalones.
Alison says
yes! you are a rock star of review’s I so cant wait to go home & read this one!!!
Thank you so much as it was you who introduce me to Devney Perry – you rock !!
Aestas says
Aw you’re so sweet!! Happy reading! XO