Amy Lea’s ‘The Influencers’ series now officially has a part two, and it might leave some of you fellow romance bookstagrammers feeling a smidge bit attacked. Lol.
The first book, Set on You [Buy Bookshop Amazon] (my review here) introduced us to curvy fitness influencer Crystal. This time, we’re following her sister, Tara the bookstagrammer, in Exes and O’s [Buy Bookshop Amazon].
Crystal’s man from the first book, Scott, moved in with her, so newly single Tara is moving out to give the couple some space. She’s trading spaces with Scott and moving in with his fellow firefighter, Trevor. They both work long shifts, so it’s supposed to feel like living alone. But Tara walks in to find Trevor in a… compromising position… giving her a pretty solid first impression of what she thinks he’s like.
Tara needs a date for a fundraising gala at the hospital where she works, and decides to try out her favorite trope in real life: second chance romance. So with the support of her social media followers, Tara makes a list of her 10 exes and decides to see if maybe she missed out on the one due to poor timing. However, after Trevor walks through a video, some people are team Room-mance.
There is a trigger warning that comes with this book. There’s a lot of talk about Tara being crazy. The word is thrown around a lot, expecially from her ex-fiancee/coworker who is awful. The author’s note at the beginning of the book gives more insight into the intentional usage, so definitely check that out if it’s something you’re iffy about. I found it to be annoying because Seth is a jerk, but that’s just a terrible person getting in someone’s head, which happens in real life too.
Now, I must confess…. I messed up reading this one. I had a digital ARC but forgot until the night before. I read as much as I could, but fell short and it expired. So, I made a mental note of where I was and continued with a library copy. But… let’s just say numbers aren’t my strong suit. I started where I thought I left off and finished it, but something didn’t feel right. It felt like something was missing. So I flipped back through the middle until I realized I transposed the chapter numbers. I thought I left off at chapter 32…. but it was 23. So, I read it in a wonky fashion.
I say that because I think it tainted my experience and how I viewed the book. Initially, I thought it was a smidge weak, but whatever. Romance books can be like that sometimes. But once I realized my mistake and went back, I saw that there was a little more substance in there and the ending made a smidge more sense. But, the damage was already done to my overall perspective.
It’s a cute rom-com with hints of spice, but you’ll probably like it more if you read it in the correct order. I am still excited for book three, whenever that comes around.
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Literary HypeWoman 