Cover Image: Love's Recipe

Love's Recipe

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Member Reviews

"Love's Recipe" by Mila Nicks offers an intriguing blend of romance and culinary delights, setting the stage for a light-hearted and enjoyable read. Nicks crafts a narrative filled with charming characters and picturesque settings that evoke a sense of warmth and comfort. The chemistry between the protagonists adds a layer of anticipation, though at times, their relationship progression feels somewhat rushed and underdeveloped. While the novel promises a sweet escape, it occasionally falls short in depth, leaving readers craving more substance in both character development and plot complexity. Nonetheless, "Love's Recipe" serves as a pleasant, if not entirely fulfilling, dish for those looking for an easy and breezy romantic read.

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Rosalie Underwood, needs Nick to snap out of it. Both are single parents. Nick is not over the death of his wife. Rosalie is divorced, living with her mother, and needs a place of her own. Nick owns a cafe that he cannot find the energy to run properly. Rosalie sees opportunity and gently pushes Nick to invest in the cafe again. Along the way you meet characters that have reasons to see the cafe stay. It’s a warm story, but here is a warning. IF YOU LIKE FOOD THATS MOUTH WATERING, YOU WILL FIND YOURSELF MAKING DISHES YOUR TUMMY WILL LOVE AND YOUR WAISTLINE WILL FORGIVE.

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Thank you to the publisher for my eARC copy of this book. Unfortunately I didn’t love this book and therefore didn’t finish, I just didn’t connect with this one. Not for me, sorry.

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This is a great story where lives are falling apart and everything works out in the end. I really enjoyed reading this entire book.

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It took me some time to really get into the story, but this was a cute small-town romance, and I liked Nick and Rosalie a lot!

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This book was so entertaining. I was drawn into the story from the beginning and was involved until the end. The characters were complex and interesting. I found the story to be well paced and engrossing throughout the whole book. I was invested in the couple throughout the book and felt all the emotions through both the highs and lows of the story.The side characters were such an integral part of this story as well. This is the love story i needed to read at this time. If you want an entertaining and well written book this is it for you

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First of all, this book made me hungry. Rosalie knows her stuff and knows how to whip up some Creole food that honestly sounds so good. Which brings me to how Rosalie has become my favorite character. Her tact, moxie, ambition, strength, tenacity is prevalent through the events of the story and I loved it. She's going through some things and despite it all she's powering through it with everything that she is, mishaps and all. The food competition, the MC and LI having to work together despite differences in order to save the business and cooking up a recipe for love amongst the disasters.

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A lighthearted fun romance with hidden depth and layers. With some realistic family drama and dynamic well written characters, I always enjoy work written by this author.

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Sweet, touching and romantic - I enjoyed this so much! I personally enjoy love stories set in a small town, paired with tantalizing imageries of food, I was hooked from the start to finish.

Love's Recipe follows Rosalie as she returns back home after a failed marriage. She starts waitressing at Nick's restaurant and soon enough, sparks fly and they get closer.

Both Rosalie and Nick were great characters, who felt so real and genuine. They both had interesting backstories and my heart went out to them. By the end of the story, I felt like they were close friends. The romance between them was also so sweet and I enjoyed their interactions together.

Overall, I recommend if you're looking for a sweet love story filled with mouth-watering descriptions of food.

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I absolutely adore foodie books. I look dishes up on Google and then drool all over my phone.
I love how you can bond over food. Creating recipes, learning to cook, eating...food brings people together.

I enjoyed this book a lot. Both characters grow while trying to save the cafe. Learning they can succeed and work as a team...while falling in love.

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A well written, layered story that's not just romance but a look at love in all of its manifestations. Mother-daughter, parent-child, and community. I really enjoyed this book as I waited out a storming weeknight.

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Such a dynamic book. On the surface, its a lighthearted romance. But underneath that is layers of real life, rawness, and pain. Very well told story!

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This was a fine and quiet book, cute and heartwarming. Sometimes I lost the interest on the story, which could mean that the writing style or the narration could have been better, more engaging. The characters were good and the story was interesting, with social and economical discussions. Maybe this wasn't the right book at the right time, but is was enough to be read and appreciated at the time.

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4.25 Stars / 2.5 Steam Fans

Love's Recipe is a well-balanced women's fiction story and romance. Rosalie has always had issues with her mother. As soon as Rosalie can, she leaves her home with a boy that is a few years older than her. Years later, when Rosalie learns that boy is not the best thing for her. She returns to her mother's home with her daughter in tow. As Rosalie was driving back into town, she stops at the local restaurant that was super popular before she left only to find that the restaurant is in ruins. Nick is the new owner of the restaurant and looking for a waitress even though his heart is no longer engaged in running the restaurant that his mother left for him. Nick and Rosalie have more in common than they initially think, and when they start working together, sparks begin to fly.

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3.5/5 stars!
I love books which are set around small towns. I think there’s something really cosy about such kind of books, so I keep looking forward to reading small town romances. Love’s Recipe was a really sweet read as well, but the storyline also had an emotional depth which I didn’t except at all. Also, there was a lot of talk about FOOD, so yeah, this book was a complete package of things I love in books : Food, small towns and romance.

The book dealt with themes of grief and loss, and I loved how the author expressed these factors through the lives of the characters. It was heart-warming to see Rosaline and Nick work together for the restaurant and bring it back to it’s past glory. It took a little time for me to connect with Rosaline and Nick’s chemistry, but I liked their relationship by the end of the book. The dynamic of the relationship between Rosaline and her mom was really well written as well, but I think it wasn’t fleshed out properly like the story demanded.

I really, really loved the cooking moments in the book. PLUS, Nick and Rosaline’s daughters add such an AWWW-ness to the story, my heart melted at times!

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A nice romance between two single parents trying to save a struggling restaurant in a small Louisiana town. I thought the relationships between the characters were really nice, but I was occasionally frustrated with the character's choices. Still a fun romance with a lot of talk about cooking.

I received a copy of this book from netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

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Combine one down-on-her-luck single mother with a grieving restaurant-owning single father. Add two adorable little girls who become instant best friends. Sprinkle in some mother-daughter conflict, a dash of family drama, and finish with some heat. And voilà, you end up with a very cute romance!

The chemistry between Rosalie and Nick was there from the start, and the author did a great job creating these fully-formed characters and convincing the reader that those characters belong together.

This was a quick read, perfect for those times when you just need a happy story to get you through the day.

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This book was everything I could have asked for from a romance novel. Real family drama, cooking and great character dynamics! I really felt connected to the main characters and even the side characters added a good element to the story.

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Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for providing an advanced copy of “Love’s Recipe” by Mila Nicks. Thoughts and opinions are my own.

They say don’t judge a book by its cover but
how could you not with this one? It’s soooooooo cute! This story is a small town romance set in Louisiana. It reminded me a little bit of watching shows like Kitchen Nightmares or Restaurant Impossible where a small family restaurant has to turn their reputation around.

The story follows Rosalie and Nick, both single parents. Rosalie has returned to her hometown after her marriage fell apart. Nick is struggling under the weight of his late mother’s legacy as her prized restaurant suffers under his neglect. Rosalie ends up waitressing at the restaurant and helping Nick find his way out of his grief to enter the restaurant in a fall festival competition with a substantial cash prize.

Some things I liked about this story were that Rosalie and Nick were both single parents whose daughters become instant best friends. I also liked how Rosalie came into her own through cooking lessons with Nick despite being told all her life by everyone that she was a bad cook.

Some things that didn’t work for me were Rosalie’s toxic relationship with her mother. Rosalie’s mother is described as having a revolving door of men throughout Rosalie’s childhood. I don’t know if the author intended for malicious subtext there as it wasn’t explicitly stated outright, but I found it troubling that Rosalie would leave her daughter with her mother and her mother’s boyfriend whom she’d never met. I get that Rosalie was in a hard place as far as childcare but this seemed dangerous. Rosalie’s mother continues to cause conflict in the story so it felt like at the end this was all swept under the rug in an unsatisfactory way rather than finally have Rosalie examine whether she should have such a toxic person in her life.

The small town setting was strong and I find I’m loving the small town festivals that tend to go along with such stories. The story also takes place in the fall so yay for Halloween and autumn vibes.

3/5 stars

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3.5⭐ rounded up

I found this book while looking for a few more romance reads to brighten up the dumpster fire that 2020 has been. When I saw that this was not only a debut, but a romance written by a BIPOC I knew I had to read it. I'm so glad I requested this book because it was such a sweet and appetite inducing read that was impossible to put down. I enjoyed reading Rosalie and Nick's story and I can't wait to read what the author writes next.

What I loved about this book:

1. Rosalie's hope and determination is what really drew me in to this book. I think when a person is forced into a difficult situation that it's easy to flounder, but Rosalie chooses to try to create a better life for her and her daughter.

2. I enjoyed that even though this one takes place in a small town the two protagonists don't have a past history and it was a nice change of pace. The reader really gets to know both Nick and Rosealie as they fall for each other and the chemistry was 🔥. Their daughter were an added adorable bonus to this story.

3. The author covers some difficult topics such as divorce, grief, and being a single parent (without a support network) in this book. I felt she did a great job of getting to reader to connect and empathize with the characters and I definently laughed and cried along with them.

If you're looking for a short, but sweet read with great characters overcoming all the obstacles life has thrown their way, Love's Recipe is the book for you. I definitely recommend you pick this one up and discover this new author!

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