The minute this book was announced, I was eager to read it. You’ve Got Mail was definitely one of those movies that had a hold on me via countless reruns on TV while I was growing up, and even now, when I see issues with the main relationship, it still stirs my nostalgia.

So, a You’ve Got Mail-inspired Sapphic romance? Sold.

The book started off paying off to all my expectations. It was cute and charming and I liked both characters, and of course the way they meet promised tension and drama, and had me gripped.

Unfortunately, by the time they start a relationship all of that sort of vanishes. Jane tells Rosie who is she is early in the book, which is great because the lying was the worst aspect of the movie, but then the falling in love montage gets a bit boring. They get head over heels in love almost immediately, so the eternal conflict of Jane being Rosie’s landlord and evicting her is truly the only thing in their way, and it never seems to set well into misgivings they might have about the relationship. In fact, Jane’s conflicts are all external—she wants to give up her job sooner rather than later because Rosie resents it and Rosie’s hurt has made her finally see how bad gentrification is (though the book never really says the word gentrification or condemns Jane’s sister for gleefully becoming the CEO of a NY property development company whose whole thing is buying old buildings, moving out the undesirables, and building brand new condos), but she wants to please her family and be dependable. It’s not a spoiler to say you can see from the beginning that the grand gesture will be Jane giving up her job for Rosie and becoming a full-time writer.

And yet, when it happens, it doesn’t feel earned. And I think a lot of that has to do with Rosie. Rosie seems heavily based on Kathleen (Meg Ryan). She has short, curly blond hair, blue eyes, and a certain innocence about running a successful business in a cutthroat city that is equal parts endearing and annoying. You understand the family connection, the feelings attached to her store, but you also roll your eyes as she instantly makes it clear she does not give a shit about any of her neighbors of years and concocts a very ineffective plan to save her bookstore that seems to hinge on the fact that her and her alone should be allowed to stay as tenant of the building once it’s renovated because she has an independent entry (and offers tea on Sundays, I guess).

The problem is that Kathleen, at least, is coherent. She hates that big corporate store despite falling in love with Tom Hanks’ character, and that’s that. Rosie spends two hundred pages yo-yoing between thinking what Jane did is fine, but personally wounding, and feeling mad at Jane for her real estate search going abysmally. The book doesn’t seem to want to commit to either Jane or Rosie being overly political about this and thinking that gentrification is wrong, period, not just wrong when it happens to beloved white women with cute dogs, so at no point does the conflict has any real bite.

This was one of the best reads in a while, I’m always a huge fan of enemies to lover and this was it in its best way. Right the moment Jane Breslin walked into the store and Rosie catches her eyes I knew there is some heat between them, but I didn’t expect the story to be so well thought trough. Rachel Lacey climbed with this work definitely into my top 3 of lesbian authors. The story has everything, the whole time I read (2 days nearly nonstop^^) I lived through the eyes of the 2 main protagonists I could feel with them and hoped for them, sometimes I had to comment their actions – just to realize I’m alone in my room and nobody cares^^

Im also a fan of great covers, which is not always a thing in lesbian fiction, so already the cover made me want to grab this book and read it.

Read Between the Lines by Rachel Lacey

Known for her well-loved series, Rachel Lacey comes back with the first novel “Read Between the Lines” of her new series “Love in the city” according to Goodreads. If this one is anything like the other ones coming our way, it’ll be another series I’ll be excitingly waiting for.

Rosie Taft is the owner of “Between the Pages Bookstore” and has been proudly keeping it alive after her mother had passed away, with the help of her great friend and employee Lia. She is good with her customers and even more amazing with books and offering amazing book recommendations to her clients who love her immensely. She loves romance books, and her favourite author is Brie; with whom she has an amazing anonym friendship online.

Jane Breslin works as a property manager during the day for Breslin Property Development, her family’s company. She is not particularly fond of her day job, but she keeps it until she can survive and manage to pay her bills from her real passion, writing. Jane has been writing in all her spare time without anyone knowing it, except her sister and her niece. And she has been doing it successfully for a few years under the pen name: Brie. She had never even seen her books in a bookstore until fate (in my opinion) makes her cross path with her book exposed high on a shelf in a bookstore, whose lease she had just terminated under her company’s name.

What will happen when their identity gets discovered and the implication behind it take more space than they had planned in their existing friendship. Can Rosie put aside Jane’s day job and focus on the real woman Jane is?

The first few chapters are setting us up in what could become the greatest Enemy-to-lovers story I have yet to read. And Lacey never disappoints on that front. Her writing in “Read Between the Lines” is perfect and the story hooks its readers from the beginning (Should I mention the few sleepless nights I spent reading this one?).

Rachel Lacey once again provides her readers with characters they can connect with, whether it is Rosie’s fun and upbeat persona and her love for reading, or Jane’s secret and shyer one, everyone can find one that fits most of their favourite characters.

From the book, I particularly loved the bar scene that I cannot avoid quoting it. “Was it a date? The person you were meeting here tonight?” That simple moment broke my poor reader's heart because that is the moment, we can feel Rosie’s hurt and Jane’s shame. It was at that moment that I noticed how well and complete both women were written. Another special mention because I appreciated seeing Jane evolve and owning her pen name slowly throughout the book.

Read Between the Lines is a go-to read for everyone looking for a cute, well-balanced story under the Enemy-to-Lover’s trope. The snide remarks are present just enough to make it obvious Rosie dislikes the idea of Jane Breslin, but not enough to turn it into something irreversible for both characters.

Go and pre-order your copies, while I’ll be here recommending it in the following months since it is set to be released on December 1rst 2021. It is a book you will not regret owning and reading over and over again.

RainbowMoose’s Reviews
@RainbowMReviews

* I received an ARC from the author via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.”