Stays away from misogynistic cliches of the romance genre and includes diverse perspectives.
This is STEAMY! I got so into this book I didn't even take notes to write a proper view and stayed up all night even though I had work the next day.
To be clear, I usually am not a romance fan. I don't mind romance, but I hate how boring and predictable the genre can be. I also really hate how freaking WHITE it is. If you find me adult romances with Asian or Black leads, I will first be shocked, and then I will be thrilled. Finally, I hate how sexist the romance genre is. It's full of women hating women and men only wanting "pure" women and slut shaming and women having to put up with horrible men when it's supposed to be "romantic". This book had none of that.
This book is about Stella, a sucessful economist. She loves her job and her life, but her mother keeps pressuring her to find a boyfriend. The only problem is that she is autistic, what used to be classified as Aspergers, and hates when people touch her without permission and french kisses. She hires Michael, a male escort, to teach her how to have sex. Michael also happens to be half Vietnamese and look like Daniel Henney, super hot K-drama star, *swoon*. Of course, they fall in love.
OK, the plot is a little predictable, but the writing and the story are just so good.
I think the best parts of the story is how sweet and hot the romance is. I usually feel kind of disgusted after reading a romance, not becasue I'm against sex, but because it's just kind of cold. I often feel no connection between the characters or the male is an angsty asshole. In this story, however, the romantic connection was the most adorable, most stomach tingly thing. Michael is so sweet and so caring toward Stella. He doesn't push her and completely accepts her for who she is. There is this one scene in the beginning where he just holds Stella, and it's so sexy without them actually doing anything. The author does the non-sex romantic scenes very well. There is sex in this book, but the reader has to wait for it. The parts where they are not having sex, though, are just as sexy and endearing, which is a sign of a talented romance writer.
I also applaud how this book did not rely on typical romance tropes. Stella was not a virgin, nor did she or Michael value a women based on their "purity." Michael was not the one in power. In fact, he was a male escort, which do not appear in media often and should get more representation, and Stella was wealthy, educated, working woman, and Michael admired her for it. It wasn't overly cheesy, instant love either or based completely on physical attraction. It felt like they were really falling in love, and I just felt all tingly the entire time.
I'm so happy we have a hot Asian halfie as a leading man! It means the world to me as an Asian American. We need this kind of representation and I feel like it's a growing trend in YA and adult fiction to have Asian men as leading characters. The Asian family culture and and the use of Vietnamese in the household was heartwarming. I also loved hearing about the Vietnamese cooking, and it made me so hungry! It was super important how being Asian wasn't his main character trait. Often it feels like that is the case when diversity is included, and being Asian is a huge part of any Asian-American's identity, but this does it right with including being Asian, but not making his life ABOUT being Asian. It is both more realistic and more accessible.
The final part of representation I want to talk about is Autism. I am embarrassed to say I have always had this idea that autistic people are distinctly different from the rest of us. I don't think I could ever say that out loud, but some subconscious part of me has definitely thought it. I read Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon when I was younger and I got this impression that autistic people just aren't normal because they can't understand other people. In many ways those two books helped me understand how some autistic people see the world, but at the same time they alienated me from them because the perspective portrayed very people that had no real self awareness of how they effected people and I am basically obsessed to an unhealthy point with how my actions effect others. I'm so glad this book changed my mind in a million ways. This book proves why it is important to have books with representation that are not just Issue Books.
Issue Books are books specifically about the issue they are dealing with. There may be other subplots going on, but the main point of the book is to put the Issue on display. I think these books are really important, but genre books with diverse characters included are equally important. We need sci-fi, fantasy, mystery, horror, romance books with diverse characters in it. These books normalize the Issue, instead of highlighting it, both of which are needed.
This book is first and for most a romance a book that happens to have an autistic character. I loved how this book portrayed Stella as sexy and deserving of an epic romance story. Instead of feeling cold, insensitive, and brash, which is honestly how I often see autistic people, she was portrayed as being aware that she makes mistakes. She was confused about social interaction at points, but she was self aware of it and had coping mechanisms to appear normal. It demonstrated how autism is really a scale and is different in kids and adults and girls and boys. It made it feel less like a disorder and more like a personality type. In this way, it was extremely relatable and I started thinking, "Do I have autism?" as I often am confused about social interactions, and sometimes cannot tell when people are joking, but I have trained myself to pick up clues. I obsess about things, I get overwhelmed in loud noisy places, and I hate it when people touch me without permission. Ultimately, I might be on the spectrum, but I doubt I'm actually autistic. Nevertheless, it was so important to see someone who thought a little differently from me, but was ultimately just trying her best to fit in and be loved. I picked up this book would feel like a chore to read because it was about autism, but it wasn't at all.
The only downside was that the "she/he doesn't really love me" part was a little over drawn out. It was angsty and unneeded. If there was just some mature communication, it would not have been an issue, nut it is the romance genre and some angst is like a requirement.
Ultimately, I would 100% recommend this book as a super fun, butterflies in your stomach read. The representation is awesome and worked as both a window and a door for me. A book cannot only rely on representation, though, and this one did not. The story is reason enough to read this book. I'm going to stop writing so you can go ahead a pick it up.
To be clear, I usually am not a romance fan. I don't mind romance, but I hate how boring and predictable the genre can be. I also really hate how freaking WHITE it is. If you find me adult romances with Asian or Black leads, I will first be shocked, and then I will be thrilled. Finally, I hate how sexist the romance genre is. It's full of women hating women and men only wanting "pure" women and slut shaming and women having to put up with horrible men when it's supposed to be "romantic". This book had none of that.
This book is about Stella, a sucessful economist. She loves her job and her life, but her mother keeps pressuring her to find a boyfriend. The only problem is that she is autistic, what used to be classified as Aspergers, and hates when people touch her without permission and french kisses. She hires Michael, a male escort, to teach her how to have sex. Michael also happens to be half Vietnamese and look like Daniel Henney, super hot K-drama star, *swoon*. Of course, they fall in love.
OK, the plot is a little predictable, but the writing and the story are just so good.
I think the best parts of the story is how sweet and hot the romance is. I usually feel kind of disgusted after reading a romance, not becasue I'm against sex, but because it's just kind of cold. I often feel no connection between the characters or the male is an angsty asshole. In this story, however, the romantic connection was the most adorable, most stomach tingly thing. Michael is so sweet and so caring toward Stella. He doesn't push her and completely accepts her for who she is. There is this one scene in the beginning where he just holds Stella, and it's so sexy without them actually doing anything. The author does the non-sex romantic scenes very well. There is sex in this book, but the reader has to wait for it. The parts where they are not having sex, though, are just as sexy and endearing, which is a sign of a talented romance writer.
I also applaud how this book did not rely on typical romance tropes. Stella was not a virgin, nor did she or Michael value a women based on their "purity." Michael was not the one in power. In fact, he was a male escort, which do not appear in media often and should get more representation, and Stella was wealthy, educated, working woman, and Michael admired her for it. It wasn't overly cheesy, instant love either or based completely on physical attraction. It felt like they were really falling in love, and I just felt all tingly the entire time.
I'm so happy we have a hot Asian halfie as a leading man! It means the world to me as an Asian American. We need this kind of representation and I feel like it's a growing trend in YA and adult fiction to have Asian men as leading characters. The Asian family culture and and the use of Vietnamese in the household was heartwarming. I also loved hearing about the Vietnamese cooking, and it made me so hungry! It was super important how being Asian wasn't his main character trait. Often it feels like that is the case when diversity is included, and being Asian is a huge part of any Asian-American's identity, but this does it right with including being Asian, but not making his life ABOUT being Asian. It is both more realistic and more accessible.
The final part of representation I want to talk about is Autism. I am embarrassed to say I have always had this idea that autistic people are distinctly different from the rest of us. I don't think I could ever say that out loud, but some subconscious part of me has definitely thought it. I read Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine and The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon when I was younger and I got this impression that autistic people just aren't normal because they can't understand other people. In many ways those two books helped me understand how some autistic people see the world, but at the same time they alienated me from them because the perspective portrayed very people that had no real self awareness of how they effected people and I am basically obsessed to an unhealthy point with how my actions effect others. I'm so glad this book changed my mind in a million ways. This book proves why it is important to have books with representation that are not just Issue Books.
Issue Books are books specifically about the issue they are dealing with. There may be other subplots going on, but the main point of the book is to put the Issue on display. I think these books are really important, but genre books with diverse characters included are equally important. We need sci-fi, fantasy, mystery, horror, romance books with diverse characters in it. These books normalize the Issue, instead of highlighting it, both of which are needed.
This book is first and for most a romance a book that happens to have an autistic character. I loved how this book portrayed Stella as sexy and deserving of an epic romance story. Instead of feeling cold, insensitive, and brash, which is honestly how I often see autistic people, she was portrayed as being aware that she makes mistakes. She was confused about social interaction at points, but she was self aware of it and had coping mechanisms to appear normal. It demonstrated how autism is really a scale and is different in kids and adults and girls and boys. It made it feel less like a disorder and more like a personality type. In this way, it was extremely relatable and I started thinking, "Do I have autism?" as I often am confused about social interactions, and sometimes cannot tell when people are joking, but I have trained myself to pick up clues. I obsess about things, I get overwhelmed in loud noisy places, and I hate it when people touch me without permission. Ultimately, I might be on the spectrum, but I doubt I'm actually autistic. Nevertheless, it was so important to see someone who thought a little differently from me, but was ultimately just trying her best to fit in and be loved. I picked up this book would feel like a chore to read because it was about autism, but it wasn't at all.
The only downside was that the "she/he doesn't really love me" part was a little over drawn out. It was angsty and unneeded. If there was just some mature communication, it would not have been an issue, nut it is the romance genre and some angst is like a requirement.
Ultimately, I would 100% recommend this book as a super fun, butterflies in your stomach read. The representation is awesome and worked as both a window and a door for me. A book cannot only rely on representation, though, and this one did not. The story is reason enough to read this book. I'm going to stop writing so you can go ahead a pick it up.