It to 28% but then I had to quit. Maybe it is just because I have read a lot of contemporary romance because I just had enough with this book.
In my update for this book, I said that I find it so annoying when authors emphasise how small and petite yet curvy the main character is and how her love interest is this big muscly building of a man. And lo and behold: this. exact. thing. It is not that it was only said so many times that he is so manly and big, but it is the fact that the author literally wrote a scene where Bear (yes, you read that correctly, his name is fucking Bear, so we would not forget how big and strong and muscly he is) gets locked out of his house and the only way back in is through Trixie's window. But get this, he is sooooo big that he--wait for it--gets stuck. In the window. His shoulders are supposedly too broad for his window. Now let me ask you this: how does he walk through a door? Does he turn sideways so he is able to walk through a door that is usually narrower than a whole ass window?
Another thing is, this is insta-love. Like they see each other for like two seconds and all of a sudden they want to rip each other's clothes off. You literally just met and made eye contact for 2 seconds on a highway chasing a chicken! The cherry on top to make their sudden attraction even more unbelievable is that Bear does not talk. He only grunts. It is not even that he speaks through his actions (like Brandon Taggart did), but he literally barely speaks. And do not get me started on him simply having to flee his house while Trixie is showering because she is naked in there (shocker! People are naked when they shower) after only knowing each other for two fucking weeks.
I really tried to give this book a chance, but I also promised myself to not push on books that just do not do it for me. I am kinda sad because others seem to like it, but I just cannot force myself to finish this book.

This was a funny little book with the grumpy/sunshine trope. Trixie was all happy but immature and Bear really was like a grumpy but sweet teddy bear. The real star was Chick-Chick, the chicken.

The story felt and kind of cheesy. It could have benefited from some steam. Trixie felt immature and why she adopted the chicken didn't really make sense to me. The book could have used some spice, but the chemistry was so lacking that I'm not sure it would have worked here. Also, having grown up in Minneapolis and spent plenty of time in Chicago, a few more references to Chicago would have been nice since the book make such a big deal about it being in Chicago. I did appreciate the dual first-person structure, which helped bring a bit of depth to the trauma narratives.

I also honestly think it could use another editing round. For example, how many times do we need to be told why there's play doh sitting on the table? Overall, this was cute but didn't stand out to me as a particularly great romcom.

Thank you NetGalley and Alcove Press for the opportunity to read this ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Expected Publication Date: December 6, 2022.

Bear is like his name, a big teddy bear and Trixie is little miss sunshine with some baggage and a chicken as a pet. Their chemistry is there from the beginning, however, I missed a bit of steam.
It’s a funny, entertaining book.

Trixie rescues a chicken in downtown Chicago.

One of the funniest parts of the book is the add that Bear's sisters place in the newspaper trying to help Bear pay his bills by obtaining a roommate for him.

There were a few things that were repeated; such as why there is PlayDoh on the coffee table. Trixie's issues with her parents and prior roommate.

As a Midwesterner who visits Chicago somewhat often (my brother lives there), I was hoping for some more Chicago specific trivia. As someone who had a chicken (turned out to be a rooster) as a "pet" in my bedroom ... due to a high school science project ... for a couple months; they are not the best pet choice. Ours was evicted as soon as the weather was bearable.

A pretty good romance; but I honestly think it could be a bit better. Will give the the publisher a specific suggestion. I read the Advance Read Version; so ... maybe the final version will be 5 star!

Thank you to NetGalley, Kelly Ohlert the author and Alcove Press the publisher for the opportunity to read the advance read copy of To Get to the Other Side in exchange for an honest review. Publication date is Dec 6, 2022.

To get to the other side
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

When I started this book I was convinced it was immature and cheesy. THEN…a few chapters later the pining began! 😉 the first three chapters just seemed to unrealistic and almost like a preteen read. But luckily good things come to those who wait!!

I loved this story!
✅Close proximity
✅Friends to Lovers
✅Roommates

Bear… swoon 😍 he is just like a big teddy bear. Once you break into the hard exterior he is the sweetest most respectful man. He prefers wine over beer and has a creative calling.

Trixie is a bundle of sunshine, who always wears a smile. Her previous relationship trauma has prevented her from revealing her true self or show any real emotion. She radiates a bubbly and outgoing personality. Everyone is her friend but at the same time she doesn’t really have any friends. Her heart of gold is what captivates Bears attention.

I loved Bears family and sisters. I hope to one day read their stories. I feel like there is a lot unsaid about his caring and hilarious siblings.

Thanks to NetGalley and Alcove Press for the opportunity to read an advance copy of the ebook To Get to the Other Side by Kelly Ohlert in exchange for an honest review....The ebook checked off all the boxes for me. RomCom. Check Strong,hunky guy with a huge heart and shows compation. Check. Strong female character who you would want to be your shopping friend. Check Go out for ice cream with.. Check Check. Two new found friends become roommates that slowly grows into more. Check. Breakup.Check. Common love of their sick chicken.. Check Wait. You got me, I’m all in. Thank you #NetGalley for this opportunity. Yes I would definitely recommend this to anyone looking for a fun / cute romantic quick read. Check it out. This ebook will put real smiles on your face.. A little escapism and happiness is what everyone needs right now.I

To be entirely upfront : The best thing about this book was the chicken.

It started out well enough with nice character introductions and witty writing, but it went downhill pretty quickly from there.
The first 100 pages definitely use the word 'throbbing' way more than necessary, and even though the sisters serve as wonderful comedic relief, Trixie and Bear's relationship simply got exhausting to read as the book went on.

When literally none of the issues were even slightly resolved by the 200 page mark, I was starting to get annoyed.
Especially Bear's problem with the flower shop got blown way out of proportion and dragged on for much longer than it should have.
Over the entire book he says he wants to take over the shop only to hold off on it for no good reason except to make the book drag on longer.

Every relationship except for Trixie and Bear's seemed superficial and the ending was way too cheesy for my personal tastes.
I had high hopes for this book, but unfortunately I'll have to rate it 2 stars.

Well, the basic premise of the book is that the protagonist Trixie stops her car in the middle of a street in Chicago to rescue a chicken that is struggling to cross the road. She keeps said chicken and since her landlord doesn’t want pets she moves. And of course, her new flatmate is the second protagonist (and Trixie’s new love interest), Bear.

From here on I’ll just make a list of my thoughts on the book because writing in full sentences is above my mental capacity at the moment.

- Trixie names the chicken Chick-Chick, which sounds cute at first but after repeating the name often enough it grates on your nerves. Or at least that happened to me.
- Trixie is *not like other girls* and supposed to be quirky . What she actually comes across as is annoying and childish.
- Trixie doesn’t swear. At least not like normal people do. For example, she uses “horseradish” as a curse. See point above, not like other girls, quirky.
- The chemistry between Trixie and Bear? I didn’t get any. This was also basically insta-love which I’m personally not a fan of, but to each their own, I guess.
- The main “conflicts” between the mcs were a little silly and felt too constructed. The main issues being Bear feeling insecure about being a more “feminine” man (which in this case only means that he wants to take over his mother’s flower shop. Apparently liking flowers is very unmanly. Cue eyeroll. ) and Trixie faking to be happy and bubbly all the time and feeling bad about pretending. I just did not get the problem.
- Mild spoiler warning here, but I feel like it’s important: [ about 85% into the book Bear and Trixie have a fight in which Trixie hauls a clay sculpture at Bear. She misses, so he doesn’t get hurt, but I would personally still categorise this as abusive behaviour.
When she starts crying at some point, she tells Bear to go away and has the audacity to complain afterwards that he left her alone crying. Yikes. (hide spoiler)]
- Another pet peeve (see what I did here) of mine is pets being used as cheap plot devices. I mean, it’s usually dogs, so the author got a little creative at least, but still... the chicken? That was trying a little too hard to be quirky.
- Trixie spends tons of money on that chicken and she definitely can’t afford that money, so it felt rather dumb.
- I don’t think the reader ever gets an answer as to where the chicken came fom and what happened to its previous owner. Or at least I don’t remember that question being answered.

So overall I personally didn’t really like this book all that much, but that’s probably on me and other people might enjoy it a lot.

i really did not enjoy this, i'm (not) sorry to say!

i can't put my thoughts into sentences, so here's a running list of the things i didn't enjoy:

1) the characters fell so flat—they had exactly 2 character traits each
2) the entire premise was very strange? The chicken thing just felt so irrelevant after a while, and I got so tired every time they brought it up
3) it really feels like the author came up with character names, chose a genre, and did not plan out any of the surrounding details
4) the romance build-up wasn't even well done either—it was bordering on insta-love, which is SUCH a tired trope
5) having your leading man constantly comment on how good a woman's ass looks while she's just... going about her day... is actually not romantic, Kelly Ohlert!
6) on that note, the fact he described himself as 'blue-balled' THREE times after she literally just breathed around him?? stoppppp
7) when will authors get the memo that characters using alternative swears is not fun or quirky! what the fuck is "oh fish sticks" ???
8) i'm sorry but i laughed at that whole subplot where bear drank beer because he was afraid of being judged for drinking wine. WHAT are you talking about.
9) the sex scene? terrible. awful. i cringed, i barfed, i died, etc etc.

there's definitely more to point out but i can't be too vile. my closing thought will be: if you're a fan of romance novels, don't read this one!

When Trixie stops to save a chicken that's in the middle of the road, she doesn't anticipate the chain of events that'll set in motion: first off, now she has a chicken. Which means she has to move out of her no-pets-allowed apartment. Which means she has to move in with Bear, the attractive man who helped her save the chicken in the first place.
Trixie and Bear both have trauma that makes them hide who they really are, and shut down around people when things get uncomfortable. I loved the dynamic between the two of them-- it felt real, and relatable, and there was a good balance of them supporting each other and them (especially Trixie) pulling away.
There were times the narration felt a bit too distant, especially considering both perspectives were told in the first person. This *almost* worked for me, because of the trauma aspect, but they were both able to articulate the trauma well in their narration, so the distance didn't quite land for me-- I wanted to feel what they were feeling more, but I felt like I, as the reader, was often being kept at arm's length. Most of what we learned about the characters came toward the end of the book (for example, there were a lot of scenes of them eating together, but Trixie being vegetarian was dropped in her narration, seemingly as an afterthought, about 80% of the way through).

Overall, To Get to the Other Side was sweet, the trauma felt real, and I was rooting for the characters to get together, and for Chick-Chick to pull through, but I wanted to be sucked into the narration a bit more.

Had such great potential.
When I began reading it was 5/5.

The rating plummeted with drunk driving in Chapter 13 with “hangover” starting chapter 14.

Trixie is a colorful, full of life, animal-lover who doesn’t think twice before saving a chicken during evening rush hour in Chicago. Her relationship with her parents is tumultuous after a childhood of high expectations. When she meets our male protagonist it’s a hilarious situation. Bear is the youngest sibling with 4 older, melding sisters. They put out a “room for rent” ad for Bear’s house without his knowledge.
It’s refreshing to see characters who aren’t wealthy and may need to take on extra jobs to get by. That is what was sold, but when Bear gets injured and can’t work there are no more mentions of his money problems. He magically gets by without work for weeks, while Trixie is working extra odd jobs on top of her full-time job to pay vet bills.

Overall, it’s a cute storyline. I enjoyed the writing and the characters’ personalities.

This is clean simple romance wanting desperately to be more. As I was reading this book I felt the same, desperate for it to be more too. But the book lost me when protagonist wanted to be a florist and talented but wouldn’t because his estranged father thought it was not masculine enough profession. This could be just me, but it irritated me. Apart from that, objectively this is a fun clean romance. Trapped in close quarters, insanely attracted to each other, with just a chicken, an injured one at that, to chaperone…what’s there not to like!!

When I read the blurb from this book, I was excited to read it. A lumberjack in the city? Yes, please. A pet chicken? Interesting, you have my attention. Roommates? We love a good forced proximity. But unfortunately, it just didn't work out for me.
There's something all my favorite romances have in common--getting to watch the characters form a relationship right on the page. That was missing in this one. The characters were so closed off from each other that we didn't get to see them become completely comfortable in each other's company (and they were roommates). This made every steamy scene feel forced to me, because there was nothing between them besides attraction.
I also didn't feel like the characters went through much growth throughout the story, which is probably because they were still unwilling to work on their past traumas until that last 15ish% of the book. Where the characters should have gradually grown as a person on their own, these two felt stagnant for a majority of the book, which was frustrating. Their conflict was drawn out, then magically 'fixed' by a certain point in the story without putting a believable amount of work into themselves. By the end, I was no longer rooting for them to end up together because they just didn't seem to fit.

I adore unique fiction, and this is such an interesting premise. I recommend because of the story itself, writing style, and its ability to transport you into a different world.

Thank you to NetGalley Alcove Press and Kelly Ohlert for the opportunity to read this ARC!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2

The age old question of “Why did the chicken cross the road?” To Get to the Other Side answers that very question with beautifully written love story between two misunderstood characters. Trixie Ward, ex-dancer turned vet employee, just happens to catch a rouge chicken running downtown Chicago. Along comes Bear Ross trying to help save the day but honestly Trixie is one determine lady. Their chance meeting ends as quickly as it begins.

Loved of all animals, Trixie is once again determined to nurse this chicken back to health! She goes through heavy medical bills and even a forced eviction due to a strict no pet policy. Fate plays its part being Bear and Trixie back together, this time as roommates.

These two have the heaviest sexual tension you’d ever seen between two people! I guess we can thank his 4 meddling sisters for putting that roommate ad in the paper behind his back! Bear and Trixie try to navigate their new lives, nursing that chicken to health, and fighting off every urge day by day!

But this book is about so much more than just a love story. It’s about past trauma that can be inflicted by the ones you’re supposed to look up to the most, your parents. Trying to figure out past traumas while dealing with current problems is a huge theme that was very well written in this novel.

I only had one negative review and it’s so childish, but I could not stand the chickens name. It never grew on me and I think that’s because when Trixie was coming up with names to begin with she was coming up with some all star names! And then ended up with Chick-Chick the chicken. That’s a me problem and not the books problem!!

THIS NOVEL COMES OUT DEC 5, 2022

One day I will be saved form the helms of manic pixie dream girls.

This book is someones cup of tea but certainly not mines. The premise is simple but farfecthed in which our female lead, Trixie, saves a chicken, goes into debt for said chicken and leaves her apartment for this chicken. It is honestly just hilarious how absurd it is.

Our manic pixie dream girl ofcourse finds romance in our grumpy male lead, Bear, who carries as much emotional damage as our female lead, which allows them to bond, grow and become involved.

The writing of this book as well as the writing of their relationship was just a headache. The writing was very flat and bland, written in a one dimensional aspect that had a lot of telling not showing. It didn’t paint anyone in a very good light. If it was geared towards a younger audience it maybe would have made sense but an adult romance? I cant see it working.

I think a better communicational aspect of their relationship as well as more in depth writing would really save this book. The book was too long for its content and it was a chore to even manage to get through any of it.

Thank you to Netgalley and Alcove Press for providing me with an ARC for an honest review.

I liked this one! Really loved ChickChick haha. I do wish that some of the dialogue was more natural and that we could see more from the other characters besides just the relationship of the main characters.

This was a really great and fun read though! Read it super fast and couldn't put it down!

I'd recommend it to anyone in need of a good classic romcom!

When Trixie needs to find a new place to live for her and her newly rescued pet chicken she answers a strange add in the paper and ends up renting a room from Bear. Bear hides his softer side behind a gruff and manly disposition and Trixie keeps everyone at a distance with a sunny personality and an ever present smile. They become fast friends and then fall hard for each other, but can they open up and tear down the walls they’ve built around themselves? Full of meddling family members and endearing animals, To Get to the Other Side is a sweet and heartfelt romance that will keep you rooting for Bear and Trixie’s happily ever after.

So good, I loved this story, and let's be honest the star of the show was almost definitely ChickChick!

Makes me want to work in a rescue centre and look after all the lovely animals. I loved the force proximity trope and the book had me laughing out loud frequently. I would have liked to have seen more interaction between the other characters (not get the main love interests) but overall it is a great book and a lovely evening read!

Thank you NetGalley and Alcove Press for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for a honest review.
This started off really well, I loved the style of writing and the story seemed sweet. Then somewhere along the middle it lost my interest and the story started to drag for me.
I did like the main characters, but didn't really care what happened to them as it took so long for them to get together and then they were still not really together?!
Still, it was well written and funny at times.