this was good! i really loved her first book and while this didn't exactly measure up, it was still a fun ride and i for sure will read more from this author in the future. it was funny, emotional, and heartwarming at the same time. katherine center writes amazing female characters that are relateable and down to earth.

Thank you to Netgalley, the author, and the publisher for the opportunity to read this ARC.

I devoured this book in less than a day! I love the way Katherine Center is able to blend "real life" tragedies and hardships into stories of hope, growth, and love. Themes of forgiveness, grit, acceptance, and kindness are common.

It was interesting to learn more about face-blindness through the main character's experiences. I mean, a portrait artist who develops face-blindness is a great plot conflict, and the scene where Sadie is painting Joe's portrait by touch rivals the pottery scene in Ghost!

Clean romance (some innuendo) and just a touch of language.

I adore Katherine Center's books, and Hello Stranger is another great addition to her collection! Sadie Montgomery is a portrait artist who has acquired face blindness after an unexpected brain surgery, which makes it impossible for her paint faces in the same realistic way she always has. What I love about Katherine's books are the layers of emotions she weaves into each novel. This one has themes of hope and redemption and reexamining how we've judged others. There is also a really fun romance as well. This is the kind of book that is hard to put down, and I read it in just a few sittings. (Also, don't skip the author's note. It's a fantastic essay on romance novels, and I was highlighting it up!)

I cannot wait for a new Katherine Center and this title did not disappoint. Not only does it have her trademark colorful cover, it isn't your traditional happily-ever-after. In each of her titles, the main character has an incident which leaves permanent scars, sometimes literally. How they adjust to their new lives and how those around them adjust make for a beautiful, but heart-rending story. A portrait artist with face blindness? Wow. It was a beautiful read and again, I can't wait for her next title. Every one is better than the last.

A strange and lovely romance that was a bit of a slow starter for me. At first, I wasn't sure how I felt about the main character, Sadie, a struggling portrait artist. She seemed a little self-involved and I found her personality frustrating. When a near-accident leads to the revelation that she needs immediate brain surgery, Sadie comes out of surgery with prosopagnosia, also known as "face blindness", where all faces just look like a jumble of puzzle pieces, including her own. Not ideal for a portrait artist who has just won a spot in the finals of a portrait competition. As Sadie navigates her new reality and hopes the prosopagnosia goes away as her brain heals, she develops a raging crush on her new veterinarian, and also grudgingly becomes friends with a man in her apartment building who had previously made a terrible first impression on her. I ended up really enjoying where Center took this story. The only element that I struggled with was the utter vileness of Sadie's stepsister. I know there are terrible people in this world, but Parker was such an over-the-top villain that it didn't feel like it fit the story being told. The Author's Note at the end about romance and romance novels was absolutely wonderful, don't skip it. Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for a digital review copy.

Another five star review for one of my favorite romance authors. I cannot explain the excitement I felt when I received the invitation to read this! I started on it immediately. Katherine Center really knows how to play with your heart strings. This one was such a fun story with so much depth.

I love how creative, refreshing, and different Hello Stranger is from any other romance I've read. I had never heard of prosopagnosia before reading this book and seeing how Sadie dealt with this, being that she makes a living by painting portraits, was both heartbreaking and hopeful. It was so rewarding to watch her change, grow, and figure things out, little by little. She faced her illness with courage and humor as she navigated the world of faceless strangers.

The book was so hopelessly romantic and swoony; it gave me literal goosebumps at times! Sadie's relationship with two different men whose faces she cannot see is both entertaining and so interesting. The two men are her new vet, Dr. Addison, who helps her dog, Peanut, through a health crisis, and Joe, a neighbor who doesn’t exactly make the best first impression. The love story is immersive & you really get invested into Sadie's journey. The anticipation was strong with this one and I devoured it! I absolutely loved how all the pieces of the plot came together so perfectly. Such a satisfying, sweet, hopeful story.

Be sure to read the Acknowledgements from Katherine Center at the end of the book! ❤️ It's like she organized my thoughts about romance and put them into the most beautiful words! What she says about anticipation is literally why I love romance so much. It gives you something to look forward to.

Cannot recommend enough! Thank you Netgalley, St. Martin's Press, and Katherine Center for my advanced copy!

So fun to get an ARC of this one from NetGalley! I love Katherine Center and was excited to read this one!

I feel like Katherine Center does such a good job of writing feel good romance with depth and this one was no different. I will admit that reading a book about face blindness did give me pause but it turned out to be so interesting. It's not something I've heard a lot and reading about how the narrator navigates this huge shift on her life and perception of people definitely has be wondering how I might react on that situation. At the core, this book is a love story and that part of the book was very sweet but I felt like watching Sadie navigate her new normal and seeing her find herself really took center stage. Would definitely recommend this one and look forward to Katherine Center's next book!

Katherine Center is one of the most dependable authors, I can always count on her to give me a feel-good romcom with a little bit of depth. Hello Strangers is no exception. I had heard of Sadie's diagnosis before and it was really interesting to read from the perspective of someone experiencing it. There were no surprises, but I think that's one of the points of a romcom. Also, the author's note at the end is a must read!

This book was delightful! At first, I disliked Sadie’s character for being so stubborn, but grew to love her and she changed throughout the book. The love story was charming and inventive, as was the plot. Katherine Center never disappoints!Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for this advanced copy in exchange for my honest opinion. This was a treat!

I loved this book! It was extremely cute and I couldn't help but laugh and cry! I thought the plot was a little bit out there and had to google if face blindness was a real thing. After the first 30ish percent, I thought the book got a lot better and I finished it really quickly. At times I felt it could be a bit wordy, but I still really enjoyed it. I figured Joe and Oliver and the good samaritan were the same people pretty quickly, but it didn't ruin the book for me at all. Over all, I liked this book a lot and the giddy-ness it made me feel. 4/5 stars

I have been waiting for Katherine Centers newest book, and I was so excited to get and early eARC copy from St Martins Press.

Have you ever heard of prosopahmosia? It is also known as face blindness. I have heard of it and read about it because of my nursing background but I have never seen it in a book and represented so well, it is truly fascinating. Center’s ability to describe exactly what is happening to Sadie, in her mind and what she was seeing, I felt like I could picture it exactly like she was.

I don’t think it is my favorite book my Katherine Center but Hello Stranger was quick and cute and different and I enjoyed every single second of it.

“We see what we’re looking for. Knowing how much I used to be missing has taught me to pay better attention. To pause from the hustle more often and just take it all in.”

I have been waiting for Katherine Centers newest book, and I was so excited to get and early eARC copy from St Martins Press.

Have you ever heard of prosopahmosia? It is also known as face blindness. I have heard of it and read about it because of my nursing background but I have never seen it in a book and represented so well, it is truly fascinating. Center’s ability to describe exactly what is happening to Sadie, in her mind and what she was seeing, I felt like I could picture it exactly like she was.

I don’t think it is my favorite book my Katherine Center but Hello Stranger was quick and cute and different and I enjoyed every single second of it.

If you enjoyed The Bodyguard, I think you'll like this delightful upcoming release from Katherine Center!

This book deals with some heavy topics, but it's still more rom-com than drama. A few fun plot twists combined with a couple of perfectly pivotal emotional scenes made it a pageturner for me, and I really liked the ending.

I did feel that some of the characters (Parker and Sue, particularly) came off as one-dimensional, but I appreciated the main character's growth throughout the story.

This book was heart wrenchingly beautiful. Having to see our FMC struggle with face blindness. We see her mentally fall apart and struggle with family and relationship problems all while trying to be brave outward but falling apart inwardly and her possibly finding love and trust.

A portrait artist named Sadie Montgomery needs to have emergency brain surgery due to a recent seizure and it just so happens to be weeks before her big break in an art competition, Sadie suffered from swelling in her brain that is giving her temporary face blindness and she hasn't even started with her portrait. Sadie is struggling with her new health condition and trying to figure out how she's going to pull off this portrait she needs to have finished, she ends up having help from a neighbor that lives in her apartment complex and decides not to tell him about her temporary condition.

I really enjoyed the cute love story that was involved with her neighbor "Joe" but also a love triangle with Dr Addison her dog Peanut's vet, definitely a little love triangle that ends up in a lot of confusion.

Thankyou NetGalley and publishers for giving me early access to this book!

Katherine Center is quickly become a must read for me anytime I see a book of hers come out. When I received an ARC of this book, I was excited to read it and knew I wouldn’t be able to put it down.

While this book is not my all time favorite of this author ( I think that is The Bodyguard) it was still engaging with an interesting topic - face blindness. I didn’t know this condition existed so it was interesting to read about this fictional character and how she experienced this acquired condition. The only thing I had difficulty with was my lack of love for the main character. I felt for her and the situation her condition had her in but she was a little self absorbed and the villain was a little too over the top mean. I think their relationship was a little too unbelievable for me. The plot and the characters still kept me reading all the way until the end.

I should start off this review by saying that I have read and loved several of Katherine Center's books. While Happiness for Beginners is my all time favorite and I am highly looking forward to it becoming a movie. I also really loved How to Walk Away and Things You Save in a Fire, so I was really looking forward to reading Hello Stranger. When I saw that Katherine Center had a new book coming out, I didn't even need to see what is was about to decide that I was going to read it. Unfortunately, this one is going to be a DNF for me. It's hard for me to pinpoint exactly why I am having a hard time getting into it, but every time I pick up the book to read it, I get so bored that I fall asleep. It is putting me in a reading slump. As much as I have tried to push through, I don't think that I can keep pushing through this one. I may try picking it up at again at a later date, but for now, I am going to set it aside and consider it a DNF. Thank you to the publisher for giving me the chance to read a digital copy of this ARC. I'm sorry I couldn't make it through and it wasn't more enjoyable for me. This will not deter me from picking up her books in the future.

Life has not been easy for Sadie, a struggling portrait artist, and it’s just one obstacle after another. After an unexpected brain surgery, Sadie has acquired face blindness. How is she supposed to paint when faces suddenly look like puzzle pieces? This is right after she was selected from thousands as a finalist in a contest that could be life changing for her career. While trying to stay positive, she has to navigate and discover a new way of seeing things.

Katherine Center delivers on books that are filled with hope, happiness, anticipation, comfort, and leaves us with something to think about. The author’s note at the end feels like a love letter to readers everywhere.

I loved this latest from Katherine Center!! Everything she writes is just so positive and makes you feel better after reading it. This story is one of the most complicated to describe but here goes. Sadie is a struggling artist that is given an amazing opportunity to showcase her art when she is selected as a finalist in a completion. This could be her big break. An accident leads to a surgery that leaves Sadie with a condition of face blindness. This is a huge problem because Sadie is a portrait artist. Coping with her problem Sadie finds herself dealing with family problems, an evil stepmom and sister. Her dog Peanut get sick and she is pretty sure she is in love with the vet. She gets stuck dealing with the horrible neighbor in her building that she is pretty sure sleeps around but is incredibly nice to her. Sadie learns to see people differently as she navigates through her complicated situation.

Katherine Center is an automatic buy for me. I love everything she writes, this was no exception. This has a great twist and was an absolute joy to read!! The characters were relatable and complex. The plot was well thought out and written perfectly!! Well done!!

Thank you to NetGalley for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

5 ⭐️

Wow! My first Katherine Center book I have read and definitely not my last! Loved it from the start. Laughed, cried a bit, and just felt good at the end! Will for sure recommend