Friends Don't Fall in Love
Ratings2
Average rating3.8
15
Ratings2
Average rating3.8
Erin Hahn’s Friends Don’t Fall in Love is about long-time friends, taking chances, and finding out that, sometimes, your perfect person was right there in your corner all along.
Lorelai Jones had it all: a thriving country music career and a superstar fiancé. Then she played one teenie tiny protest song at a concert and ruined her entire future, including her impending celebrity marriage. But five years later, she refuses to be done with her dreams and calls up the one person who stuck by her, her dear friend and her former fiancé’s co-writer and bandmate, Craig.
Craig Boseman’s held a torch for Lorelai for years, but even he knows the backup bass player never gets the girl. Things are different now, though. Craig owns his own indie record label and his songwriting career is taking off. If he can confront his past and embrace his gifts, he might just be able to help Lorelai earn the comeback she deserves—and maybe win her heart in the process.
But when the two reunite to rebuild her career and finally scratch that itch that’s been building between them for years, Lorelai realizes a lot about what friends don’t do. For one, friends don’t have scratch-that-itch sex. They also don’t almost-kiss on street corners, publish secret erotic poetry about each other, have counter-top sex, write songs for each other, have no-strings motorcycle sex, or go on dates. And they sure as heck don't fall in love... right?
Reviews with the most likes.
Country Music Romance For The Anti-Second Amendment Crowd. So let's get it out of the way as quickly as Hahn does in the book: Seemingly literally on page 1 of this tale, Hahn brings in an anti-Second Amendment screed. Which could have been excused... except that then became a recurring and even somewhat central theme of the overall book. And not even in a way that felt particularly organic, if anything it actually felt quite derivative of the real-life Dixie Chicks anti-Iraq War controversy of a generation ago. So there's the star deduction, right there. And from a tactical side of "As an author, I want to sell as many books as possible"... tacking into the *anti* Second Amendment side of *Country Music*? As a lifelong fan of Country in all its forms... eh, there may in fact be a sizeable enough niche there to sell a few books. I wouldn't recommend trying to build a career as a romance author specifically within that niche. (Though it is certainly wider within the overall romance novel reader set, and perhaps *there*, it could in fact be more sustainable in today's hyper-divisive world.)
As to the actual friends-to-lovers romance here... it works, and it certainly has enough spice and XXX elements that the clean/ sweet crowd probably won't like this one as much. And enough F-bombs that those who abhor those won't like it either. But overall, for the characters as portrayed and the situations they are placed into, it actually works rather well. Maybe not as good as the first book in this series - but that could be the lingering aftertaste of the hyper politicization and preachy politics still tinging my thinking of this book.
Ultimately, if you like spice and you like being in the room for sex scenes in your romance novels, you're going to like this book - likely even if you don't actually care much for Country Music itself and particularly if you find yourself to be more of a Dixie Chicks / Taylor Swift fan. If you happen to actually agree with its preachy politics, you'll probably like it even more. For more Country Music traditionalists... eh, maybe less, maybe you want to build your trust in Hahn a bit by reading the first book in this series first before you come into this one.
And as more of a note to Hahn, herself a teacher who openly notes that she wrote the politics of this book this way due to her beliefs about the classroom... I myself am *also* a former teacher. One who actually had a high school senior lean across my desk and directly say "If you do [the thing I had just told him I was about to do, which was to write him up for blatantly sexually harassing a Junior in my classroom not 10 feet from where we were then standing], I *will* kill you." Yes, I then wrote him up for the threat, and yes, he then spent a few days out of school. So yes, I've seen at least some of the same things you have. And I still disagree.
Recommended.
Originally posted at bookanon.com.
I read the first book of this interconnected “world/series” of books (”You’d Be Mine”) forever ago. I had NO idea that this author wrote more in this universe. When I started reading, some of the names sounded really familiar, so I did a deep dive and lo and behold! This book is connected! I feel like it needs to be advertised more because I would have read it way sooner!
That surprise aside, I really liked this book. I enjoyed the dual POV and how you could see how much each character liked the other. I also liked the occasional flashback chapter as it just helped round out the picture of how long they have known each other.
In terms of plot, there isn’t much. A lot of the events are more small scale and largely internal conflicts in their thoughts. I didn’t mind though because I liked the characters and the world of country music. I would definitely read more books by this author and suggest that others read this and her others ones too!
