Life is a mixed bag for Piper Calloway.
On the one hand, she’s a twenty-nine-year-old VP at her dad’s multibillion-dollar real estate development firm, and living the high single life with her two best friends in a swanky downtown penthouse. On the other hand, she’s considered a pair of sexy legs in a male-dominated world and constantly has to prove her worth. Plus, she’s stuck seeing her narcissistic ex-fiancé—a fellow VP—on the other side of her glass office wall every day.
Things get exponentially more complicated for Piper when she runs into Kyle Miller—the handsome new security guard at Calloway Group Industries, and coincidentally the first love of her life.
The guy she hasn’t seen or heard from since they were summer camp counsellors together. The guy from the wrong side of the tracks. The guy who apparently doesn’t even remember her name.
Piper may be a high-powered businesswoman now, but she soon realizes that her schoolgirl crush is not only alive but stronger than ever, and crippling her concentration. What’s more, despite Kyle’s distant attitude, she’s convinced their reunion isn’t at all coincidental, and that his feelings for her still run deep. And she’s determined to make him admit to them, no matter the consequences.
Title : Say You Still Love Me
Author : K.A. Tucker
Format : eARC
Page Count : 384
Genre : contemporary romance
Publisher : Atria Books
Release Date : August 6, 2019
Reviewer : Hollis
Rating : ★ ★ .5
Hollis’ 2.5 star review
Whereas my first, and only, experience with a book by Tucker was one that was slow to build, and my enjoyment was initially hard-won, it was worth it to get to the end and see the evolution of very distinct characters with very opposite personalities. But at least they had personalities.
My biggest problem with SAY YOU STILL LOVE ME is that it follows the course of a lot of contemporary romances where the woman is in a position of high power. She’s got a meddlesome family member and someone, a man, usually from the old guard, working against her. She’s in a constant battle of speaking up to be heard and fighting to not make waves; carefully dodging fragile male egos and placating the masses (ugh). Additionally she is exceedingly well off and is with fraught family dynamics — and usually has a dick for a father. So, we have all that at play which, personally, already feels a little tired.
Then we reintroduce a long-lost love interest who claims to not remember the heroine. Why is this a thing now? Sure, time passes, but I’m pretty sure none of us actually forget people who have had an impact on our lives, whether good or bad. So, there’s another bit that made me tired.
Unexpectedly this story is told from alternating timeframes, though a single POV, and we get to see the romance back when it first bloomed. I’ll admit that I did mostly like those chapters. Because, as per my earlier comment about personality, I really felt like I knew those kids. I could’ve been friends with them, crushed on them, had fun during the summer with them. Present day Piper was mostly just overworked and frustrated and present day Kyle was just a source of confusion and sexual chemistry for her. There wasn’t much else.. or at least nothing that I can spoil because spoilers.
So I wasn’t really into this second chance romance, or the characters, and the rest of the background noise was mostly a slow build to an inevitable conclusion regarding work drama, but then, bam, something came out of left field and I’m like.. fighting back tears? There was an emotional element introduced that I was unprepared for and I felt the story ended strong. Rushed, as far as a certain resolution goes, but overall stronger because I cared about these people in their present day forms as a result of what happened.
This does feel a little more chick-lit. It’s light on drama, light on angst, and glosses over sex. And with so much of the focus on their younger days, and their firsts, it almost reads like a YA novel. Even though we spend just as much time with their older selves. So, figure that one out (did THE SIMPLE WILD fade to black? I can’t recall) because I sure can’t.
I think I’ll be cherry picking future reads by this author. I obviously didn’t hate it but it’s certainly not the ‘oh I’m so glad I read this’ feeling I had with my last experience. It was just.. fine. Decent. No major complaints but, ultimately, nothing to get excited over, either.
** I received an ARC from the publisher (thank you!) in exchange for an honest review. **
A Take from Two Cities 