Bingo Square: Sex
Book publicist Clementine is about to move into her late aunt’s apartment. She doesn’t really want to, too many memories. She spent a lot of time with her aunt, travelling together over the years, and feels her loss immensely. But her aunt left the apartment to her, and she remembers how she’d told her it was magic. She doesn’t necessarily believe it until she finds a young man standing in the living room. A man who is living seven years in Clementine’s past. Everything in her screams not to get attached, and her aunt had warned her not to fall in love in this apartment, and yet. Iwan is lovely, he wants to be a chef, and they definitely have chemistry. But what will happen if she finds him in her time?
This is one I wished I’d liked more. All the elements are there. A fun job, quirky ride or die friends, a cute love interest, and the hook of time travel. But it still didn’t grab me the way I wanted. Initially it was how easily people accepted the notion of time travel. Sure, Clementine had been primed for it by her aunt, but she’s also cool about being in the apartment with a stranger. She stays there with him and they converse as if they know each other and it’s not vastly weird that they’re in the same space. I did appreciate the idea that you’re not necessarily the same person you were seven years ago, and that falling in love with younger Iwan doesn’t mean she’ll like who he becomes. It’s also clever with how the two of them interact throughout time, even when they may not have known it. I did like that it focuses on Clementine’s grief, because we should see more of that in books, but had I known I might have avoided it, just for my own sake and where I’m at.
Overall, this is cute and a fun spin on a romance, but I wish I had liked it more.
