3 out of 5 stars
Ebook. Kindle Unlimited. 109 pages. Published January 29, 2019.
Blurb:
“Will you start a DADcademy with
me?”
Eric Buchanan just wants to do right by his
daughter, but when she expresses an interest in all things glamorous–something
his nerdy, dad jeans wearing self knows nothing about–he’s absolutely lost.
The solution? Find an adorably fashionable hairdresser who can show him the
ropes.
Julian Rossi has spent his life helping other
people become the best version of themselves, but when it comes to raising a
son on his own–especially feeding that son–he’s making it up as he goes
along. When a big teddy bear of a man comes in looking for help, Julian can’t
resist. And when he learns that man also knows how to cook, he decides to
strike a deal.
The plan: Swap essential dad-skills to support
each other, one single dad to another. But attraction grows with every lesson,
and Eric and Julian soon find themselves eager for a little one-on-one
teaching. When old insecurities and crazy exes threaten to ruin what they’ve
built, they’ll have to learn to truly trust one another–with their family, and
their heart.
Likes:
- Single dads who are very involved in their children’s lives.
- Eric’s ex-wife is a nice woman he’s still friendly with. No evil women character.
- Dads who want to learn and do better by their children.
- Multiple LGBTQ+ side characters.
- The idea of the dadcademy.
Dislikes:
- The term ‘dadcademy’.
- The romance wasn’t well developed enough for the emotions the characters felt.
- There wasn’t enough time spent on page with the Eric and Julian together.
- So much childcare.
- The thing with Omar, that happened and then was ignored.
- Eric being stupid.
I started off liking this story. The premise is good and I liked the characters. Especially how much both Eric and Julian cared for their kids and their businesses.
And then the story lost momentum. I put it down around the 65% mark and had a hard time picking it back up. The time Eric and Julian spent together just wasn’t the good kind of ‘building a romance’ kind of interactions. In fact, we barely get to see them interacting romantically at all. They literally have one date before things go south.
Which brings me to my second point. Considering how little time these two men have been romantically linked, their emotional attachment is way too strong.
Both men are negatively impacted by the breakup to the point where it’s affecting their daily lives. They simply didn’t connect enough for that kind of reaction. Or the way Julian instantly forgave Eric for the breakup.
Because this story is so short, I think the romance should have started sooner. On the one hand, I like that Eric is reluctant to start anything, and that there are some missteps between him and Julian over actually trying to date. But all that took time. Time that could have been spent deepening the relationship. The first date doesn’t happen until the 57% mark.
And I just have to complain about Julian’s ex. Hendricks’ author blurb says she “believes love stories are better with just a little angst thrown in” and I wish she’s chosen some other sort of angst for this story. Julian’s ex shows up at Eric’s bakery to “warn” him about Julian. This sparks Eric’s hidden insecurities and he ends up breaking up with Julian, even though it takes him a week of indecision to do so. He doesn’t talk to Julian, doesn’t try to be an adult about it. Just freaks out and runs away. Later, we learn that Omar tried to contact Julian over social media, but Julian blocks his new account. It makes Omar seem like a total creep stalker, but nothing is done about it. I wish Omar had been left out entirely. His presence made Eric seem really weak willed and susceptible to suggestion. Not to mention, I was deeply annoyed at the lightening quick way Julian forgave Eric when he finally realized breaking up was a mistake. It made Julian seem so desperate to have someone in his life that he’d forgive anything – something he specifically said he wouldn’t do after the way Omar treated him. More than anything else, it was the breakup/makeup part of the story that really killed my interest in the book and had me skimming until the end.
Overall, I think there was too much going on for a book this length. It needed to either be trimmed down, which would get rid of a lot of the little things I liked, or expanded into a longer book with a lot more focus on building the relationship. I’ll give the next book in the series a shot, but I can’t say I’m eager to read it. The hint in the epilogue about who the next main character will be didn’t exactly wet my appetite, but I’ll give it a shot.
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