Sometimes a story can be romantic fiction but the behaviour
of the characters so real and possible that it leaves you unsure about the
rating. There are things you wish were different because it is a romance but you just know that the people are following behavioural trajectories that
are most typical.
Lynn Monroe’s sister had a baby when she was just
sixteen. The sister dumped the child, Carrie,
on Lynn and disappeared so Lynn became Carrie’s de facto mom, though there is just
twelve years between them. A teenaged Carrie’s bestie, Maggie Randall is
smitten by Lynn on first sight. Lynn feels the attraction but is married
(albeit to a largely absent and rather narcissistic wife) plus she is intensely
aware of the age gap so she keeps Maggie at an arm’s length. Carrie and Maggie
leave Baltimore and go to Boston to pursue their education in medicine. After graduating,
Maggie is back in Baltimore with an internship in John’s Hopkins, where Lynn
works as a nurse and her ex-wife is the head of surgery. Inevitably, Lynn and
Maggie run into each other and the pull between them still exists. Maggie believes
they are meant to be but Lynn struggles with a variety of doubts.
The chemistry between Lynn and Maggie is fantastic. Both are
individually likeable but there are just so many circumstantial roadblocks that
it is quite frustrating. First, Maggie thinks Lynn is already involved with
someone else, then Lynn thinks there is someone younger interested in Maggie,
then there is the age gap, Lynn’s ex trying to put a spanner in the works,
Carrie and her issues with a possible relationship between her mom and bestie…and
maybe more stuff that we’re missing. Through it all Lynn kind of
blows-interested-and-blows-tentative. Maggie remains steadfast in her feelings
for Lynn even when she feels that Lynn doesn’t quite care as much about her. (Okay,
this one also has our pet peeve – Maggie breaks someone’s heart quite badly. We
hate that.) In the end, Maggie is the one who makes their relationship happen.
Through it all, we were firmly rooting for the pair but
towards the end we so desperately wished that Lynn had offered more to Maggie
in context of Carrie’s hang ups. It would’ve been a perfect romance if Lynn had
stood up for her relationship with Maggie instead of choosing to wait out
Carrie’s issues.
Despite all that, the writing is totally engrossing. Do we want
the couple to be together? Yes. Do we believe that Lynn and Maggie have their
HEA? Yes. (It really helps that both the ladies are very likeable.) And that is
the most important thing in a romance. So we’d say, go for it.
⭐⭐⭐
