Wild Love by Elsie Silver
SYNOPSIS
Forbes may have labeled For Grant the World’s Hottest Billionaire, but all he cares about is escaping the press and opening a recording studio in gorgeous small-town Rose Hill. Something that comes to a screeching halt when he ends up face-to-face with a young girl who claims he’s her biological father. Now, he spends his days balancing business with parenting a sullen twelve-year-old, all while trying desperately to keep his hands the hell off his best friend’s sister, Rosie Belmont.
After living in the city, Rosie came blasting back into town like a storm. Beautiful, messy, and chaotic. And one wide-eyed, desperate plea for a job is all it takes for Ford to hire her. He vows to keep her at arm’s lenth. Tries to stick to scowls and grumpy one-liners. But with her, verbal sparring is a type o foreplay - friction that soon turns to blistering heat. Ford knows damn well he shouldn’t cross this line. But “shouldn’t” and “can’t” are two very different things.
And the only thing he truly can’t do is resist her.
~~~~~
The small-town romance queen strikes again. This book highlighted the deep love of found family and the strong roots you can only find in your home-town.
Wild Love lived up to the hype. This book had so many themes of growing up but also of starting over even when you’re at that age where you’re supposed to have it all figured out and I think nothing is more relatable than that. Rosie and Ford were both extremely dynamic characters and, though they share some similarities with Silver’s other characters, I love how she’s able to make each leading couple entirely their own. Lots of romance writers that pump out books this fast tend to have leading men especially that are very similar to one another and I love that every one of hers feel so unique. As much as I enjoyed the story and the characters, I did have a few problems. This book was marketed as both enemies to lovers and friends to lovers. Choose one. Because to me, they weren’t enemies but there were some scant moments where they were forced into those roles and that took away from the story for me. I think we’re starting to see the downfall of trope marketing. I loved the story, and the characters, but I do think the execution could have been a little smoother.
We follow both Rosie and Ford as life somehow leads them both back to the small mountain town where they spent their childhoods. Rosie has just left her job after facing sexual harassment, and Ford is hiding form his billionaire fame, trying to carve out his own music inspired dream. The thing is, Ford has been GONE for Rosie for over a decade, and she has no idea. They’ve always had a playful antagonism to each other but it’s always been to mask something more there. Another wrench gets thrown into the mix when Ford’s not-known-about-daughter shows up out of nowhere needing support.
Rosie was immature and slightly mean, and I really loved that about her. She portrayed the selfishness and the recklessness I think we’ve all been at one point or another and her messiness made her all the more relatable. I didn’t, however, love that her playful mean-ness could turn knife-sharp on Ford and ONLY Ford whenever he got too close to being vulnerable with her. Just because SHE is afraid of that vulnerability, doesn’t give her the right to deliver a gut punch. Without going into too much for spoilers, I found that the author tried to force these characters into more enemy roles way too far into the book after having them already break that ice and bond and it made a few chapters feel way too out of character. Was that a personal choice of the author? Or was it the pressure to deliver on the trope they marketed? Either way, I think it was a failing and it ruined the first steps into spice this book gave us for me.
Ford was gruff and grumpy but actually just an anxious kid with walls up for miles. I really enjoyed his story and his growth especially when he screws up. He immediately works to make amends not excuses and I loved that in a main male lead. I didn’t, however, love the daughter plot. It could have been done literally any other way and been so much better. Sperm donors don’t have rights to call their genetic donation their kids. I’m sorry, but it’s true. I get connecting with her and I found that lovely, but immediately viewing her as his daughter and all his friends and family acting that way too? Didn’t love it. As an adoptee, my personal feelings on it were that it was weird as hell and handled all wrong. I could have enjoyed it much more if it were a secret love child or the offspring of some high school fling instead.
I absolutely loved the setting and the set up of a recording studio inspired by the rough mountain town. It made me want to visit there, hell it made me want to pack up and move to this fictional place. I think Silver does a really good portraying both the pros and the cons of small-towns pretty accurately so it doesn’t just seem like a cookie-cutter dream place. I was also impressed with Silver’s ability to foreshadow and tease protagonists and story-lines for future books in the series in subtle enough ways to not take away from Ford and Rosie’s spotlight but still excite us for upcoming releases.
Overall I really did enjoy the main story but I was a little disappointed by a few subplots so I gave this 3.75 but I would still reread it and I’m definitely excited for the next book!