Synopsis

I didn’t know I was that person. You know—the one who gets the kids. But that’s what the will said. June Lawler: Legal Guardian.
My niece and nephew are 6 and 9, and all they’ve ever known is San Francisco. I arrive the day after the wreck, pack up my sister’s mansion, and fly them back to Georgia.
The small-town farm where their mom and I grew up isn’t what it once was, but it’s home. That’s all they really need.*

I was courting an investor when it happened. Tromped all up and down the Himalayas, and he didn’t even buy in. It was a week before I found out what I’d lost. My little brother meant the world to me. Now even his kids are gone.
Spirited away to Heat Springs, Georgia—population 298.
They’re living on a farm that’s half a breath from bank foreclosure with a 26-year-old who didn’t finish high school. Nowhereville is not the place for little Mastersons. But I’ll get them back. It’s the money she must want, and I’ve got lots of that.
“June Bug” Lawler is poorer than that red dirt she comes from. I can make her dreams come true—and do one last thing for my brother.

I hate him.
She makes me crazy.
He thinks he can buy me off! I’ve never met a man so arrogant.
There’s no woman anywhere more stubborn.
I wish I had never met him.

But that’s not the story.

Review

4 stars

I had read two books by Ella James so far, both that left me with a lasting impression of a writer master at writing angst and complex stories. Hate You Not is a very good read but it’s Ella James’s sweet side here.

Yes you’ll get sad moments and a secret to uncover by the end, I guess it wouldn’t be Ella James otherwise, but I experienced this one rather like a sweet story with some bitter on the side.

The synopsis says it all: June, a young woman who never finished high school will become the legal guardian of her daughter’s two young kids after a car crash.

Enters Burke, the kid’s uncle who is loaded, a workaholic and determined to get the guardianship. Surely a woman without any diploma and living in the middle of nowhere, in a small town filled with rednecks is not suited to take care of his nephew and niece?

As Burke comes all high and mighty, condescending, you can imagine how well their first meet went!

This will be an “enemies to lovers” romance very easy and entertaining to read!

June is a loveable heroine. Truly. The one you want as best friend. The one you’d leave your kids in a will. She lives on her family’s property trying to make by. June will end up with tons of pat animals and they were all adorable from horse to puppy to goat, piglet etc.

Sunny, loyal, hard working she is determined to do her best to raise these kids.

“She does a little twirl, reminding me of the cheerleader she used to be. And she says, “Well, I make cakes. Really good ones. I could be a chef or something, but I like being a farmer better.””

Burke is smart, gorgeous and comes as very judgmental at first. Once he meets June, he’ll change tactics as he can’t ignore how attractive she is!

He is deep down a good guy but he has a hard past, some secrets, that will make him behave like a douche once or twice.

Ella James wrote a small-town romance, making the South alive with all its clichés and traditions. Filled with colorful characters and oscillating between humor, heat and sadness.

I can’t resist to share with you another quote that had me laughing while reading on the train and that is the perfect symbol of a competitive “enemies to lovers” story:

“I arch a brow. Nope. I don’t. He grins as he tickles Oliver, and it’s a wicked, evil grin. I know, it says. And I love it that you hate me. I’m a villain, so this is my version of fun. Fuck villains, I say with my face. But not literally.”

Have you read it?

Thanks for reading

Sophie