Publisher: Berkley
Genre: Contemporary Romance
ISBN: 9780593100387
Source: Publisher
Carly Kennedy's life is in a spiral. She is drowning in work, her divorced parents are going through their midlife crises, and somehow Carly's sister convinces her to foster Baxter--a basset hound rescue with a bad case of the blues. When Carly comes home late from work one day to discover that the dog walker has accidentally switched out Baxter for another perkier, friendlier basset hound, she has reached the end of her leash.
When Max Sheffington finds a depressed male basset hound in place of his cheerful Hazel, he is bewildered. But when cute, fiery Carly arrives on his doorstep, he is intrigued. He was expecting the dog walker, not a pretty woman with firm ideas about dog discipline. And Carly was not expecting a handsome, bespectacled man to be feeding her dog mac and cheese. Baxter is besotted with Hazel, and Carly realizes she may have found the key to her puppy’s happiness. For his sake, she starts to spend more time with Hazel and Max, until she begins to understand the appeal of falling for your polar opposite.
A dog mix-up and a love-struck basset hound are the perfect start to a fun romantic comedy. The love story between depressed basset hound Baxter and the cheerful basset hound Hazel charmed the heck out of me and kept You Lucky Dog sprightly when the main storyline threatened to drag it down. The romance between the humans took far longer to work its charm on me.
Carly Kennedy’s life is one disaster after another. She’s struggling with starting her own PR business and her impossible clients aren’t helping any. Then there’s her family, with her overwhelmed sister who comes with a chaotic household and her recently divorced parents who are into finding their bliss and selling timeshares. And that’s all before the rent hike and the accidental dog swap courtesy of her (now fired) dog walker. Finding the cheerful, throw pillow-eating Hazel in place of Baxter is the last straw. She’s able to track down her dog at Max Sheffington’s house and sparks fly instantly…between the humans, that is. Max is a neuroscientist and trying to make his case for tenure at the university is the most important thing at the moment. He hopes the additional funding for his research will lead to help for people like his brother, who is severely autistic. The last thing he needs right now is a complication in the form of whirlwind Carly, but Max can’t help but find himself charmed. When it’s clear they need to keep seeing each other – for the dogs’ sakes, of course – the pull between them becomes stronger. But Carly has plans that don’t include staying in Texas, so things would be doomed between them from the start…right?
I liked Max from the start. He’s cute, nerdy, and has a good heart – all of those make him an irresistible hero to me. Carly is overwhelmed and a bit too much for me at the start. I could feel her stress and author Julia London made it understandable why she was so short with Max. However, there was so much chaos and so much bogging Carly down that it took until the halfway point for me to start seeing the character beneath the stress. At that point You Lucky Dog improved, becoming a more interesting romance. It never blew me away, but it was solid and I was rooting for Max and Carly to get their happily ever after by the end.
A host of supporting characters both add and detract from the story. I loved Max’s father and brother and welcomed any scenes with his family. As for the boatload of high maintenance family and clients Carly came with… I think there were too many over the top voices that dragged the story down. It was like being in a room with everyone shouting when these characters appeared and it was just too much. Sure, it made Carly more sympathetic when everyone was unlikeable. But it also made me put down the book a number of times for a break. So while You Lucky Dog ended up being just an OK read for me, I will say that readers with more patience for over the top characters might enjoy this book a lot more than I did.
FTC Disclosure: I received this book for free from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
0 comments:
Post a Comment