Weather Girl by Rachel Lynn Solomon
Ari Abrams has always been fascinated by the weather, and she loves almost everything about her job as a TV meteorologist. Her boss, legendary Seattle weatherwoman Torrance Hale, is too distracted by her tempestuous relationship with her ex-husband, the station’s news director, to give Ari the mentorship she wants. Ari, who runs on sunshine and optimism, is at her wits’ end. The only person who seems to understand how she feels is sweet but reserved sports reporter Russel Barringer.
In the aftermath of a disastrous holiday party, Ari and Russel decide to team up to solve their bosses’ relationship issues. Between secret gifts and double dates, they start nudging their bosses back together. But their well-meaning meddling backfires when the real chemistry builds between Ari and Russell. Working closely with Russell means allowing him to get to know parts of herself that Ari keeps hidden from everyone. Will he be able to embrace her dark clouds as well as her clear skies?
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Rachel Lynn Solomon is quickly becoming an instant-buy author for me, her books just don’t miss! Weather Girl was such comfort read and, out of most modern-day romances, felt so much more realistic. I know I say that a lot but this time it’s very true. Accurate depictions of depression, representations of more than just your typical nuclear family, plus-sized male lead, there was a lot in this book that you just don’t usually find great representation for in most romance novels. Honestly I felt like this book was a refreshing experience. Even though there were minimal “fairy-tale/love story” aspects, the realism in this book actually made for a pretty beautiful story about hope and healing.
I love how Solomon’s stories are always based in the media industry. The Ex Talk and Weather Girl both have fun insights into radio/television and the behind-the-scenes stuff that make such an intriguing plot with a lot of directions for the story to go. I was slightly stressed over the match-making thing. It’s NEVER a good idea to get involved in your boss’s personal life and I spent most of the book just panicking over whether or not Ari or Russell would get fired (and whether they’d blame one another for said loss of job). I was, however, pleasantly surprised at the way our main characters handled a toxic work environment and were able to work towards a more healthy work space. I think that was a very relatable topic to include in this book because most of us have experienced the same at some point in life. I also really loved the fact that there was NO miscommunication trope to be found in this book, this was the best part of the entire book for me. So many romances have that and it’s my least favourite thing so having a book that focused more on the communication as opposed to miscommunication was refreshing.
Now the true winner of this story was Ari’s journey with trust and overcoming childhood trauma. Her past wasn’t the kind of abusive past you’d expect when talking about childhood trauma, but little things that add up when you struggle with mental health growing up in a time period where a lot of people a) didn’t believe it was a “real thing” b) being medicated for it was considered a “failure” and c) support systems just did NOT understand. Seeing Ari face that and realize that just because she has depression does not mean she’s defective or that she’s a burden was such a healing journey to witness. She also lacks trust in relationships because of the expectation that she “always be happy” like she is on TV so watching her interactions with Russell and his unending support of her through it all was so touching.
Another favourite thing of mine: Russell’s body image issues. We never see men struggling with their body image in books, and especially not in romances when they’re meant to be super-jacked heroes with no flaws. To me, Russell represented a lot of the real men that are out there and seeing that vulnerability of his reminds us that everyone has their struggles. It was also nice to see, as someone who has also struggled with body image, a main character still be considered attractive even if they weren’t super fit or super thin. I think a lot more books need to have that kind of representation when telling the happy stories.
Overall, I loved this story. It was a refreshing and feel-good read that dug into a lot of real modern-day issues. My only hold-up was that, besides character development, there wasn’t that big of a plot happening so at times the book could be quite slow. However, not every romance needs to be full of drama and this one was still so well-written that I’m giving it 4 stars. If you’re looking for the perfect, feel-good, spring romance, look no further.