Revamping Family Inns
Gettin' hot over hammers and hospitality
I love a good property DIY book (see my roundup from late 2022), so of course inheriting a family inn or being involved in its renovation is going to appeal to me as a setting for a romance! These are also three extremely different takes on this trope, which appeals to me on a curation level; we’ve got a classic romcom take, a queer awakening/career identity take, and a women’s fiction set abroad take. Something for everyone!
In Your Dreams, Holden Rhodes by Stephanie Archer. When her fiance left her in debt and her late aunt leaves her half their family’s inn on the remote Canadian island of Queen’s Cove, artist Sadie doesn’t have a lot of options. Especially when she discovers the other half of the inn is owned by the guy who’s hated her since they were kids, local contractor Holden Rhodes. Luckily, he doesn’t want her on the island any more than she does, and he’s willing to buy her out of her half of the inn… if she sticks around to help renovate and find him a wife.
Holden’s brothers have been getting married off at rapid rates (Emmett’s story; Wyatt’s story) and he’s, honestly, jealous as hell. He doesn’t hate Sadie quite as much as he pretends to, and at this point, post-Googling “how to find a wife,” he’ll take any help he can get. Not just for the wife stuff either; her artistic eye will be a big help in ensuring the future success of their, for now, shared inn.
We’ve got bears stealing sex toys as a running gag, a man so gone he builds his girl a treehouse, and small town shenanigans that suck you back in no matter how much you might think your destiny is in the big city.
How hot? 🔥🔥🔥🔥
Astrid Parker Doesn't Fail by Ashley Herring Blake. The second in AHB’s sapphic Pacific Northwest romance series follows the failed bride of book 1, the usually impeccably polished Astrid, dealing with the aftermath of her interrupted nuptials. So, fine, the wedding to a gigantic douchebag that her mother approved of didn’t quite work out, but she’s still got her interior design business (also mother approved, because she bought the business from her mother’s friend when she retired). The fact that the business isn’t doing amazing either is besides the point… she’ll turn it around. She always does. If only she felt more passionate about the work. Ah, well, we’ll worry about that later, for now she’s got a gig redesigning the local Everwood Inn (on TV, no less! HGTV 5eva) but before she heads to her first meeting, she just needs a coffee….
… and is nearly bowled over by a woman carrying a tray of drinks. The bowling over largely fails, but her perfect first meeting outfit (all white, all crisp lines) is ruined. Astrid’s a little on edge, so she lets the edge out before the tall, curly-haired woman runs off. She feels bad, but she’s having a rough year, ok?
Unfortunately, Jordan Everwood, the granddaughter of the current Everwood Inn owner and carpenter, is the woman who Astrid just snapped at, and now they’re working together on camera for the foreseeable future. Jordan could maybe overlook the meet-disaster, but when Astrid’s ultra-modern McMansion design choices are made evident, Jordan knows she can’t allow this beautiful ice queen to ruin her family’s legacy and the unique historical aspects of the architecture. So Jordan, who’s broken-hearted in her own right and in town largely to lick her wounds, maybe does a bit of sabotage. A smidge. A dash.
I think this was my favorite book of the series (though I loved Delilah’s story and Iris’). It’s the only book where one of the heroines starts the book believing she’s straight (sexuality crisis on aisle 4!), and the unique forced proximity of meeting under the worst possible circumstances then having to work together on camera is delicious. Both our heroines are messes at love and life, Astrid in particular makes some absolutely massive mistakes, but together, they realize they aren’t ruins. They’re just… fixer-uppers.
How hot? 🔥🔥🔥
A Perfect Vintage by Chelsea Fagan. I have been a fan of Chelsea Fagan for probably almost a decade now; her company The Financial Diet has been a longtime resource of mine for financial and career advice, not to mention lifestyle/home design advice. So when she announced she was writing a romance novel and it was gonna be an interior design/family inn revamp story? I pre-ordered so fast I nearly broke a finger.
This is the only book where the property being revamped isn’t already an inn; rather, it’s becoming one. Lea Mortimer is an American abroad, and has built an empire as a consultant turning French country estates into boutique hotels. She’s all prepared for her latest job in the Loire Valley when her beloved cousin’s divorce turns heated and she reluctantly offers her cousin and her cousin’s college-aged daughter with her.
Things go from complicated to chaos when Lea, a deeply pragmatic, childfree by choice woman in her late thirties, falls for the 20-something son of her new boss at the same time as her cousin’s daughter does. Love isn’t always something you can control, and Lea’s affair with Theo is absolutely beyond her usual calm detachment as soon as it begins.
This book definitely errs on the side of lit fit/women’s fiction moreso than it does romance, as Theo doesn’t have much of a plot of his own and Lea’s our only POV character. Which is fine! It’s more Emily Henry than Christina Lauren, but even further in the heroine’s pocket. I will say, I think the author spends a lot more page-count than necessary on the minute details of Lea’s day to day job, and I say this as someone who relishes the Outlander chapters where Claire just wanders around Fraser’s Ridge doing doctor stuff. If I’m saying there’s maybe too much focus on the job and not enough on the other stuff… well, then it’s a lot.
How hot? 🔥🔥
Next week, I’ll be recommending books with billionaire heroes, which are ALSO the perfect books to cue you up for the release of MY billionaire hero book, Rehabbing the Billionaire! Have you pre-ordered your copy yet, or marked your calendar for August 1st to snag it on Kindle Unlimited? Now’s the time!
What should I be reading next? Let me know in the comments!