Is love a formula or pure fate? The residents of the small college town of Mountain View will soon find out. Love is in the air or rather in the coffee in book one of the ABCs of Romance series. 

Blurb:

What do beavers and baked goods have to do with love? Well, everything for Liliana Travis…

Travis, the owner of the local coffee shop, Higher Grounds. Her day job is serving caffeine highs, but her love life is at an all-time low. A meticulous planner ever since high school, she has a checklist for her perfect man and even plans for how she wants this future romance to unfold. But her carefully laid plans are about to be upended by something, rather someone, completely unanticipated from her past. 

Dominic Moore has always been the hometown celebrity of Mountain View. The former captain of the high school football team turned NFL pro is the definition of the “golden boy”. But when Dom is caught in a scandal, he returns home to Mountain View to help his recently widowed grandmother open her dream bakery… and do some soul searching. 

For Lili, Dom’s return is both exciting and a total gut punch. Her high school crush is back in town, but also fresh competition for her small business. To make matters worse, the nationwide baking competition, the Upper Crust Challenge, has come to town and bets are firmly on the table. Is it rivalry or romance as buttons are pushed, banter exchanged, and sparks fly? Maybe not everything in life can be perfectly anticipated… 

For fans of The Kiss Quotient and The Soulmate Equation, Anticipation is a sweet and spicy debut from Rue Harlow that is sure to be addictive. 

Fall in love today!

Amazon: https://amzn.to/3UN6TVV

Nook: https://bit.ly/3MjsmSF

Amazon Worldwide: https://mybook.to/anticipationRH

Amazon Paperback: https://amzn.to/3QMgyJn

B&N Paperback: https://bit.ly/3Llns72

Add to Goodreads: https://bit.ly/3rCS231

*****

Excerpt:

Liliana Travis was dressed like a giant beaver, missing only its head, ready for her life to dramatically change.

Even though the locker room reeked even more like sour socks than usual, Lili was only smelling roses. It had been a long football season — no longer than any other season, but Lili wasn’t into football at all — and now that it was finally ending, it was time for the final act in her epic plan.

“So …” Alicia prompted her. “What’s the plan?”

“You mean the ‘over-plan,’” Runa corrected Alicia.

Lili’s two best friends had been with her during every step of this little scheme, as they had stayed by her side for everything else throughout every noteworthy occasion in high school.

“I don’t over plan,” Lili defended herself, despite knowing how futile doing so would be, especially considering the crazy amount of thought she had poured into her nutty little endeavor so far.

“Okay.” Runa shrugged. “And I bet that Outlander show is gonna be great.”

“Shut up!” Lili laughed, sick of defending that one too. “Outlander is gonna be awesome.”

Lili had made her two besties get through as much of the historical time travel romance adventure as they were willing to read, but neither of them were as enamored by the genre buster as she was.

Not that she was obsessed at all. Lili didn’t get obsessed with anything, including Dominic Moore, no matter what Alicia and Runa said. The Mountain View Beavers’ star quarterback was as handsome as he was charming, and Lili had been dying for an actual conversation, instead of the fleeting exchanges in Statistics, he forgot about five minutes after they happened.

*****

Review:

Overall, I really enjoyed Anticipation and I’m curious what Harlow has in store next. However there were a few things that brought this one down for me. I think that Lili was a little too hard on Dom. She’s got some leftover negative feelings from high school but we never really got to see why she’s holding on to them so tightly. We know that there was a viral video but it doesn’t seem to be THAT horrible all things considered. And it wasn’t even Dom’s fault. (There are some logistics issues with that video – he’s the quarterback but he makes a game winning play for the defense …?) I also was thrown by the end of his career (not sure that what happened was that big a deal in the NFL) and exactly when Lili starts her day considering she runs a coffee shop so it should be pretty early but it seems like not so much. Other than Lili’s attitude, these were little things that just made me go hmmmm but didn’t stop me from enjoying the story. I will say, that once Lili gets over herself and starts being friendly to Dom, the two together are a delight. They are funny and entertaining and the push/pull between them is more positive, leading to a satisfying HEA. Definitely will read more from this author.

*****

Author Info:

Rue Harlow is a semi- professional baked goods aficionado. When not eating carbs or writing smutty novels, you can find her kicking back with a vodka tonic, putzing in her garden, or taking her convertible, Molly the Miata, for a spin. A native Brooklynite, she now resides in the Hudson Valley with her husband and two cats, Artemis and Apollo.

Connect with Rue

Instagram: @rueharlow

Facebook: https://bit.ly/3BnkZ7L

TikTok: @rueharlow

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