Astrid Parker Doesn't Fail

[psocoptera]

Astrid Parker Doesn't Fail, Ashley Herring Blake. I wanted to read this because I liked the previous one (here), but then on page three the eponymous Astrid starts thinking about how she can't wait to remodel a local historic building by replacing the cherry wood wainscoting with white shiplap, and I completely ceased to experience this book as a romance novel because I was too concerned about whether the love interest would also manage to save the building. I mean, usually romance is very relaxing to read, because you know the couple is going to end up together, and it's just a matter of how the story unfolds to get there, so I was entirely unprepared for this level of tension from this reading choice. I tried to cheat and see if I could get back to reading the story the author had intended - I have it as an ebook and my entire search history is, like, "shiplap", "cherry", "wainscoting", "wood", "woodwork", "painted" - which did not really find me an answer, and then I skimmed and jumped around a bunch, and it sounds like there is a whole battle between the romantic leads over competing visions for the remodel, but the compromise still involves painting the existing built-in bookshelves, and grey walls, and an inexplicable fixation on sage green, and there's a whole scene about smashing the old kitchen cabinets with sledgehammers, and dumping old clawfoot tubs in a dumpster, and, you know, fuck this shit, this is supposed to be pleasure reading, I don't need to read about the gutting of a historic home/inn from a perspective that does not use the word "restoration" even once. I guess there's also a couple of ladies and they have hot sex and fall in love? And good for them? But definitely do not read this book if you have ever loved your original unpainted wood trim or hate the hideous greyification of contemporary interiors.