The Writing Retreat

I really enjoyed reading this. It could have been 5 stars with a little editing. The characters aren't really likable, but this is more about the story so it actually matters less than it normally would. The author's virtue signaling really draws the reader out of the story at times though. If you're going to have characters give their pronouns, just have them give their pronouns. Don't shoehorn in a lecture to the reader about why it's needed. That's not normalizing it. Some of the comments that were clearly in there with the intent to say, “Look how progressive I am!” didn't even make sense. Also, parts were more vulgar than they needed to be. This isn't (as far as I can tell) a romance novel. The graphic sex comes off as the author trying to be edgy rather than serving the story. Having said that, I do think it's worth reading and the annoying bits can be overlooked for the overall story. But it would have been nicer if I didn't need to overlook them and could have stayed immersed in the story. I would absolutely read another book by this author and recognize that she might have been pressured to add in some if the disjointed stuff by her editor.