“Sing Me A Soap Opera”

CONTEMPORARY: Kendal Harper is a fantasy author whose publisher has challenged her to write a romance story about a workplace romance by experiencing it herself. Kendal is resistant to the idea; after all, she is still recovering from the loss of her husband, Cam, a man she fell in love with when she interviewed him. Unfortunately for Kendal, her publisher is dead-set that this is what Kendal should do, and is willing to offer a large financial reward for the project. Despite her misgivings, Kendal goes ahead with the experiment and finds herself applying for jobs so she can start finding someone to begin a workplace romance with.  Kendal soon finds that while there may be many choices of men to start a romance with, none quite live up to the man she lost. Determined, she keeps trying until finally things start to take a much deeper turn in the relationship department.

When this story begins, the reader is likely to feel just as hesitant about where it's going as the main character is feeling.  The book begins with a prologue that essentially tells the reader how the book is going to end, and is confusing in that it tells you the end before you even know the beginning. The characters have potential, but the storylines feel disingenuous to this reader. How can someone root for a character to have a life-changing love story when the reader knows the main character is being deceptive? Kendal and the man she will fall in love with have so much character potential, but it's lost to the story. A little polishing and reorganizing will help this tale shine.

Valerie Vicars