Hero by Lauren Rowe

​CONTEMPORARY ROMANCE

Publication date: 03/10/2018
Kindle Unlimited: Yes
Cliffhanger: No

This is a tricky one to rate. There’s some stuff here that I LOVE, and some stuff that doesn’t work for me AT ALL. These are always the hardest reviews to write. So, I guess I’ll just start out with what I loved:

• Colby is a great hero. He’s a genuinely nice guy with no fear of commitment, and he doesn’t let the fact that heroine is a widow with 3 kids run him off. Sure, he knows a few moments of trepidation (who wouldn’t?) but he acts like a grown-up at all times and discusses his feelings when appropriate. He’s a keeper as a book boyfriend.

• Lydia isn’t white. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: we need more diversity in romance novels.
• Lydia’s kids are all kinds of adorable. And they act like kids that age would normally act. There’s nothing worse than little kids in a romance novel dishing up sage romance advice, or acting like 50 year-olds in 5 year-old bodies. (And yes, that happens. It’s as awful as it sounds.)
• I like Lydia as a heroine. She’s a little messed up emotionally (and with good reason), but she’s strong and a good mom and good at her job. She’s serious, but not repressed in any way, and while she struggles with feelings of guilt and anxiety about getting involved with a man after the death of her beloved husband, she works through those issues and becomes even stronger as a result. She’s a bit of an inspiration, really.   

Now, for the not so glowy stuff:

• The hero is a dirty talker, which is fine with me. But there’s a fine line between sexy dirty talk and gross dirty talk, and a few times, this one toed the line a bit. There’s a Facetime sex scene where Colby asks Lydia to, uh, smear some stuff on the camera. That one crossed over into “ew, icky” territory for me.
• There is instalove, more so on the hero’s part than the heroine’s, but it’s there. They have a lot to overcome, but it’s definitely a “love at first sight” story. If you’re a reader who finds that kind of thing off putting, you’ll want to avoid this one.  
• The scenes between Colby and his brothers were cute and fun, but there were A LOT of them. And they dragged on a bit. The brothers were obvious sequel bait, which never fails to irk me as a reader.  

But, while this one wasn’t a slam-dunk for me, it definitely had it’s winning moments. So, if you like a dirty-talking hero who is a genuinely nice guy and a strong, smart, survivor of a heroine, then you might want to give this one a try.

Does this book contribute to or help crush the romance stigma?
No rehab needed. It’s clean and sober.  

Other reading suggestions
I’m going to check out the author’s backlist, and I’d recommend you do the same. And for more reads about hot fire-fighting heroes, you’ll want to check out this “best of” list. ​

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