Suzie's Reviews > Old Flames and New Fortunes

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Steam Level: 🔥🔥🔥🔥 (very descriptive open door scenes)

Romina Tempest loves creating flora fortunes- flower arrangements that help one's love life- in the shop she owns with her sisters. When an opportunity comes up to get the money their shop needs to expand, Romina and her sisters jump on it. The only problem? It turns out the man who has the money they need is marrying the mother of Romina's first love, Alex. Romina hasn't seen Alex since they broke up, and she creates a ruse to prove that Alex no longer has a place in her heart. But when Alex starts to suspect Romina's true feelings, it's hard for her to deny her attraction. Can these two fix their past mistakes and finally make it work this time?

Let me start by saying that I completely understand why this book has mixed reviews. If you've read Sarah Hogle's previous books, then you know her humor is quirky and odd at times. I personally find it entertaining, and I enjoyed the zany personalities of the characters. I wasn't super into the whole witchy/magical store that Romina owns with her sisters, but that turned out to be unimportant as the romance took over and became the focus of the story. While Romina and Alex have a second chance romance, they gave off enemies to lovers vibes in the first half as Alex teased, taunted, and pushed Romina's buttons to get her to reveal that she really still loves him. Some readers may find Alex to be mean or immature for this reason, but it honestly worked for me. Another reason others may not love Alex is the secret that's revealed in the second half of the story. I was extremely thrown by this and thought it would ruin everything. Luckily, I felt like the author did a nice job of working things out between Romina and Alex, and the rest of the book had playful teasing, flirting, and some super romantic quotable moments. That really solidified my four star rating. It felt like You Deserve Each Other and Just Like Magic were meshed together to create this book. Go in open-minded, and I hope you'll enjoy it in the end like I did.

Thank you Netgalley and Putnam Books for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.