ARC Review: The Little Library by Kim Fielding

The Little Library
by Kim Fielding
Published by Riptide Publishing
eARC
LGBT, contemporary, romance

Elliott Thompson was once a historian with a promising academic future, but his involvement in a scandal meant a lost job, public shame, and a ruined love life. He took shelter in his rural California hometown, where he teaches online classes, hoards books, and despairs of his future.

Simon Odisho has lost a job as well - to a bullet that sidelined his career in law enforcement. While his shattered knee recovers, he rethinks his job prospects and searches for the courage to come outto his close-knit but conservative extended family.

In an attempt to manage his overflowing book collection, Elliott builds a miniature neighborhood library in his front yard. The project puts him in touch with his neighbors - for better and worse - and introduces him to handsome, charming Simon. While romance blooms quickly between them, Elliott's not willing to live in the closet, and his best career prospects might take him far away. His books have plenty to tell him about history, but they give him no clues about a future with Simon.

The Little Library had a cute premise of neighbourhood library, book hoarding, historian, and romance. I also saw a lot of positive, five and four star reviews, and I thought this would be captivating and cute story, and I was excited to dive in.

I liked how Elliott and Simon were flawed and how neither was physically perfectly fit. There's also awkward first dates and other awkward mishap that often doesn't happen in contemporary romance books. It was a fresh take on the M/M romance genre, and I really liked the body acceptance theme. 

However. The pace of the story was slow, almost excruciatingly so at times, and it was a bit predictable. Honestly? I got bored. It was all nice and good structurally, but nothing really got my heart racing or captivated me beyond anything else. There are plenty of obstacles between Elliott and Simon, and the story is about balance and acceptance. It was sweet and gentle romance, but I guess I expected more and was disappointed (and a bit bored) because there wasn't much else. The obstacles were nothing new or something that made me doubt the outcome. Even the secondary characters were just kind of there but not really involved. I liked Ladd and Anna (Elliott's brother and sister-in-law) but they were barely there most of the time. I also have to say, without any spoilers, that one thing at the end of the story seemed rushed and very unrealistic, and completely something that could have made the ending better if left out.

If you like sweet and gentle romance with flawed characters and realistic situations, then I'd recommend The Little Library for you. There's a lot of books involved, which is always a bonus and the idea of neighbourhood library was great. This just wasn't something that blew my mind away and excited me, but it's still a good story, and this is more a case of 'it's not the book, it's me.'

3 of 5 stars

Add on Goodreads

Thank you, Riptide Publishing, for giving me a chance to read and review The Little Library!

(A copy of this ebook was provided in return for an honest review.)