Florence ‘Flo’ Day is a novelist with one not very successful novel to her name. She has been working as a ghost writer for a famous novelist, but since her grade a dickback boyfriend quite literally dumped her she can’t find her groove. Her super sexy new editor tells her to get her ass in gear, but she can’t – and then her beloved father dies, her world shatters, and she returns home to the town she fled when she was eighteen.
You see, Flo can see ghosts. They can see her too. They’re okay; mostly they just want to talk, want someone to listen. Sometimes Flo can help them move on.
You see where this is going, right? With the whole dead sexy editor and ghost writer thing. Predictability can be a safety blanket, but it’s a little disingenuous to write a very predictable novel yet have your character pretend they didn’t see it coming. Granted, Flo’s mind is understandably preoccupied, but honey, you can talk to ghosts. Stranger things have, quite literally, happened.
Perhaps I’m being unduly nitpicky (fun fact: nitpicking in Dutch translates as ‘mierenneuken’, meaning ‘ant fucking’, which, I believe, is a far superior term). Other cannonballers really liked this book. As romance go, it’s probably not that bad; I just don’t think it’s for me. Too twee, too wholesome.
And it is very wholesome. Everyone is respectful of each other’s boundaries and pronouns. High school bullies come to apologise. People fall in love and stay in love. Siblings bicker and make up. There are letters from beyond the grave, and bucketloads of wildflowers. Everyone is just so gosh darned nice. Strong Stars Hollow vibes here, which, to my cynical mind, is a bit disingenuous in Trump’s America. The whole thing is tied up neatly with a bow on top. No loose ends.
I’m not a huge fan of the romance genre, but I can be made to enjoy it with the right tone and this book didn’t really have that. The jokes weren’t that funny, the characters weren’t that interesting. There’s nothing wrong with this book, per se, but it wasn’t really for me.