This is an age gap romance which unfurls with such beauty
that it creeps into your heart and has you cheering for the growing
relationship every step of the way.
Pink haired, twenty-three year old Madison Wilson has
just graduated as a marine biologist and is excited to be joining her first
full time job as part of a team researching dolphin behaviours in Santa Cruz.
Though her parents offer to buy her a place Madison wants to be totally
independent and chooses to rent a place. Her heart is set on a cute pink house
that she has seen online. Nestled between a blue house on one side and a bar,
Western Shores, on the other, the tiny pink house captivates Madison as much as
her new landlady, Ally Santos, who owns all three properties. Forty-year-old
Ally lost her husband nine years back has a highly gifted eleven-year-old son,
Theo. Madison is gay but through her college years she’s only had short-lived
flings with straight girls who always go back to their boyfriends. She is keen
on breaking this pattern but cannot get Ally out of her mind. Much to her own
confusion, Ally, on her part seems to be especially eager to spend time with
her new tenant. When Ally begins to recognise her attraction to another woman,
she has difficulty in accepting her new sexuality especially since Madison is
seventeen years younger.
The thing we enjoy most about Lise Gold’s books is the
excellent relationship building between the MCs. The pace is always just right
and the connection totally believable. We love the conversations and banked
fires in this one. Gold also writes about places with such feel that she
transports you to the place and you can actually smell the sea, taste the salt,
‘see’ the million-dollar-view with the MCs and get goosebumps over the red
tide. The ability to create the atmosphere just adds to how invested you get in
the relationship. Madison and Ally are individually people we’d like to have in
our lives and as a couple the make us rather swoon. We totally get Ally’s
hesitation and love the way her fears are dealt with.
This is a wonderful, wonderful romance and though it is part
of a series it can totally be read as a standalone.
⭐⭐⭐⭐★
