Disclaimer: I received this e-arc from the publisher. Thanks! All opinions are my own.
Book: When in Rome
Author: Sarah Adams
Book Series: Standalone
Rating: 3/5
Spice: 1.5/5
Diversity: Black character, character with Alzheimer’s Disease
Recommended For…: romance, contemporary, Audrey Hepburn lovers, food, small town romance, famous person/normal person romance
Publication Date: September 20, 2022
Genre: Romance
Age Relevance: 16+ (cursing, alcohol consumption, romance, sexual content, parental deaths)
Explanation of Above: The book has some slight cursing and mentions of parental deaths. There is some alcohol consumption shown in the book. There is a romance in the book and there are comments of a sexual nature, but all romance is closed door and it’s mostly regulated to kisses and small romantic moments.
Publisher: Dell
Pages: 320
Synopsis: Amelia Rose, known as Rae Rose to her adoring fans, is burned-out from years of maintaining her “princess of pop” image. Inspired by her favorite Audrey Hepburn film, Roman Holiday, she drives off in the middle of the night for a break in Rome . . . Rome, Kentucky, that is.
When Noah Walker finds Amelia on his front lawn in her broken-down car, he makes it clear he doesn’t have the time or patience for celebrity problems. He’s too busy running the pie shop his grandmother left him and reminding his nosy but lovable neighbors to mind their own damn business. Despite his better judgment, he lets her stay in his guest room–but only until her car is fixed–then she’s on her own.
Then Noah starts to see a different side of Rae Rose–she’s Amelia: kindhearted and goofy, yet lonely from years in the public eye. He can’t help but get close to her. Soon she’ll have to return to her glamorous life on tour, but until then, Noah will show Amelia all the charming small-town experiences she’s been missing, and she’ll help him open his heart to more.
Amelia can’t resist falling for the cozy town and her grumpy tour guide, but even Audrey had to leave Rome eventually.
Review: For the most part this was a cute book. The book was an adorable romance about a famous singer who lands in the lawn of a grumpy baker. She has to stay with him while her car gets repaired and sparks fly. The book was adorable and pretty well written. I thought the character development was good and the world building was good as well. The book is also a closed door romance, so no sexual things are shown.
However, there were some things in the book that I didn’t like. The book was Multi-POV but I think we could have done away with Amelia’s POV as Noah’s was much more interesting. The characters in this book are from Kentucky and none of them talk with an accent, except for one character. I believe the character is stated to be Black, but I could be wrong? But it was a bit weird that only one character was written to have an accent while the others were not. And if the character was Black then that opens up a bunch of ick. The time skips in the book aren’t that evident, which made reading it confusing at times. There is a lot of teasing in this book and sexual pining, but it wasn’t my favorite thing. It just felt annoying after awhile.
Verdict: It was good.
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