Maybe I Do by Nicole McLaughlin
Whiskey & Weddings #1
Contemporary Romance
August 29, 2017
St. Martin’s

Reviewed by Kini

Favorite Quote:

“I’m afraid you may find me . . . unenticeable at the moment. A perk of reaching your forties.” She yanked her hand up and gently slapped his chest. “Will you stop acting like you’re old? I just had the most amazing sex of my life with the hottest guy I’ve ever met.”

The thing that drew me to this book, was that it is set in/around Kansas City. I have family in that area and so I feel a small sense of pride about it so I was excited to see it in a book. It was such a small focus of the book, but that is okay. There was even a reference to Overland Park and that made me happy.

This was a cute read, but it didn’t blow me away. Caroline, the heroine, is a wedding photographer who was jilted by her then fiance 5 years ago. She is mostly over it. Working in the wedding industry she is surrounded by love. She isn’t jaded, but she doesn’t fully believe she’ll find her man. One of her favorite work venues is a distillery where Dean, our hero is a co-owner. Dean is almost 12 years older than Caroline. He is divorced and has anxiety about whether or not Caroline would be interested in him. Spoiler alert- she is.

They are brought together when Dean’s sister gets engaged and Dean has to plan the wedding. The sister is in the military so even though it sounds like a far-fetched plot device, it works. During this planning time, they really get to know each other and let their relationship grow on a deeper level. Dean is definitely more of a beta than alpha and I really enjoyed it. I loved his insecurities about dating, it felt authentic.

Trigger/Spoiler warning of sorts-
[spoiler]if miscarriage is something is hard for you to read about, this book is not for you. Nothing happens on the page, only referred to in the past, but it is definitely a theme in this story.[/spoiler]

Dean has some stuff from his past that I wanted him to share with Caroline, but he never did. I felt a little let down by this. Dean behaved badly and it was a little easy on the grovel. But I loved that Caroline called Dean out on his shit, here is one example-

“Charlotte, stop,” his voice called behind her. With a groan, she wiped under her eyes and then turned. “What do you possibly need to say to me?” Dean stopped short on the sidewalk. “First of all, I need to say I’m an asshole. I haven’t handled things well, but . . . I’ve had a lot going on.” “Yeah. You have. And I guess I thought it might have been my place to help you with that. But if not, that really tells me all I need to know.”

This was a solid read for me. She lightly and carefully sets up at least one other couple, I will probably read the next one. I really enjoyed the older (than the heroine), beta-y hero who struggles a bit with his confidence. The heroine was kind and relatable as well. And of course I enjoyed the setting of Kansas City.

Grade: C+
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