This romantic suspense has a fantastic premise: grief, healing, underwater danger and a twist that absolutely shocked me. I enjoyed the small-town vibe and mystery, though some character choices felt a bit rushed or underdeveloped (particularly Maddie’s secrecy and the romantic resolution). I also wish we saw more of her vet career & more of Wes too <3. The final chapter flipped everything in the best way and I really,really hope book two is already on its way!

The setting makes this novel. A made-up town off Florida's coast lays the foundation for relationships, grief, self-discovery, and love. The writing is good, but it can be a bit slow at times. I love the book's cover. The story could use some refining, but overall, it was a good story for summertime.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing this ARC.

This book was a bit of a mixed bag for me. The writing started out very stilted and wooden, but it did get better as the story progressed.

The romance was a bit insta-lovey, but was otherwise cute. 

The mystery was good, but it did take a long time for it to pick up. 

It's a fast read and I think it could be really good with another round or two of edits.

Maverick Key Hearts on the Line by Margot Keene was such a great read! I was not ready to get emotionally wrecked over a small town diving mystery, but here we are. This book is the perfect mix of romantic suspense and grief. Maddie is a heartbroken vet trying to start over, but things get complicated when she finds clues her brother left behind after his passing. I appreciated how the author portrayed Maddie’s grief. It felt real, messy, and never brushed aside! I loved the mix of suspense, the gorgeous seaside setting, and of course the romance. I can’t wait to see what happens next in Maverick Key!

Unfortunately, this book didn't really work for me. For the first 50% I seriously considered DNFing it, but I kept going. I thought the second half of the book was much better, so I'm glad I pushed on. But it still didn't make me fall completely in love with the story or characters. The best part of the book were the diving scenes, with vivid descriptions that brought to live the danger, thrill and wonder of cave diving. I'd say the first half of the book sat between one and two stars. with the second half maybe at three stars, so I'm going with two stars overall. (50% is too much to write off as a rocky, slow start and go with my feeling at the end of the book for the overall rating.)

The romance wasn't really to my taste. It's described as a "slow-burning romance" in the synopsis. To me, what I hope for and expect from a slow burn is that the initial spark of attraction takes a while to form, and is based on personality (after getting to know each other) instead of physicality (at first sight). Here, there was too much insta-lust for me. The first time Scott meets Maddie, when she opens the door wearing a bikini, he immediately thinks about how the image of her in her bikini will be coming back to him later on - before they've exchanged more than a basic "hello". And on Maddie's side, the first time someone mentions Scott to her it's about him being someone she should talk to about her brother, but that never seems to be what's on her mind once she meets him. It's all about wanting him to notice her and finding him attractive. Also, at 50% I still felt like I didn't really know the characters any better than I did from just the synopsis. I didn't feel an emotional connection to either of them, so I wasn't invested in their story. I felt like their relationship was very surface level. And I felt like the only suspense I was getting out of this "romantic suspense" was the suspense of waiting for the suspense part to start.

I also wasn't a fan of the writing, especially when it came to dialogue. The dialogue often felt stilted and wooden to me, lacking the natural flow of actual conversations, instead randomly skipping from one point to the next. It felt like there was a list of story beats each conversation or character interaction was meant to cover, and these beats were checked off one by one with awkward transitions, making the whole conversation feel artificial. I especially noticed this during the earlier chapters, when a lot of the dialogue was about exposition and introducing the characters to the reader and to each other. It definitely improved in the second half of the book.

My reading experience overall improved significantly after the halfway mark, so I'm glad I decided against DNFing. There was finally some plot progression with the suspense plot, Maddie started to actively pursue figuring out what had happened to her brother, and I felt like suddenly the characters were starting to come alive off the page and show me their personalities. I still couldn't fully get on board with the romance - although that also improved compared to the first half. I thought Scott's pet names for Maddie came across as condescending rather than romantic most of the time. And I'm not a fan of the possesive "you're mine" type of language in romance. But I didn't hate their relationship, even occasionally kind of liked it. And stepping away from the romance, I enjoyed and felt invested in the way the suspense plot developed and was resolved, even if I wasn't surprised by any of the twists except for the very last cliffhanger-y one about "Elliot". It's just a pity that it took more than half the book for the plot to really take off for me.

As I said at the beginning of my review, I did enjoy the descriptions during the diving scenes. I know absolutely nothing about diving, so I can't say if they are accurate, but they made me feel like I was right there underwater with the characters. The diving parts were definitely my favorite part of the book.

Thank you to Margot Keene for providing a review copy of this book via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.