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A review by ncrabb
Stay by Allie Larkin
3.0
Over the past several months, I’ve become increasingly disenchanted with the romance genre, stepping away from it without much regret. But this book was a hard-drive holdover, and I’m actually glad I gave it a shot. Here’s why:
Savannah (Van) Leone has been quietly in love with Peter Clark for years. They attended the same college, but that’s where the common ground ended in many respects. Peter is well off; Van is the daughter of a women who kept house for a wealthy family in Westchester, New York. His parents hated her from the first minute, and as a romance, it never went anywhere—but not because she didn’t want it to.
On one fateful day, Van introduces Peter to Janie, the daughter of the women for whom her mother worked. Van and Janie had been solid friends growing up, but it was always Janie whose needs were met, since she was the little rich girl and Van the daughter of the hired help.
On the day of the wedding, Van dutifully carried out her obligations as a maid of honor, came home, got roaring drunk, started watching a Rin Tin Tin marathon on cable, went online, and ordered a German Shepherd puppy from a breeder in Czechoslovakia. She dropped a cool $6,000 on the dog.
The next day, now much sobered, Van is horrified to learn that a dog she had paid for would arrive at the airport in a crate the following day. She presses forward, buying puppy supplies—a dainty leash, a tiny collar—only to find that the massive beast in the crate at the airport is not the puppy she assumes she’s getting.
This, then, is Van’s story of a lovely romance between her and Joe, the clumsy but well-tempered dog, who understands foreign commands, and as long as you know those words, you can get him to obey rather nicely. The former owners were thoughtful enough to tack a list of those words along with the food recipe for what the dog was used to eating inside the crate.
But Van knows she needs to get the dog to a vet to ensure that he’s ok, and she picks one randomly out of the book. Enter Alex, the nice-looking single veterinarian who, as you already surmised, is instantly attracted to Van and she to him.
So if this book is so formulaic and so typical as a romance, why am I encouraging you to give it a try? First, because the character of Van is so wonderfully carved out here. She is all at once vulnerable, independent and strong, and above all, lovable. Granted, this is a typical romance, but there are some additions that make it better. Van changes over the course of the book in good ways. Dog lovers will be drawn to this story out of an appreciation for Joe, Van’s online dog purchase. Larkin does a nice job of portraying him exactly as the dog he is, not some anthropomorphized version of a dog.
The F-bomb falls with moderate frequency here, and there is one sex scene that is described, but not in molecular detail. But if avoiding profanity and sexual descriptions is your thing, this is probably worthy of either staying away from or at the very least being alert to those passages that might be problematic and being able to skim quickly.
Julia Whelan’s performance is stellar. She particularly seems to integrate her voice into Van and bring Van alive. I could see a book club taking this one on, because there are lots of places you could go as far as character development. The story is set during the Christmas and New Year holidays, which prove wonderful additions to the change of character that Van and others experience. It’s not a Christmas book per se, but the holidays are an important backdrop.
Savannah (Van) Leone has been quietly in love with Peter Clark for years. They attended the same college, but that’s where the common ground ended in many respects. Peter is well off; Van is the daughter of a women who kept house for a wealthy family in Westchester, New York. His parents hated her from the first minute, and as a romance, it never went anywhere—but not because she didn’t want it to.
On one fateful day, Van introduces Peter to Janie, the daughter of the women for whom her mother worked. Van and Janie had been solid friends growing up, but it was always Janie whose needs were met, since she was the little rich girl and Van the daughter of the hired help.
On the day of the wedding, Van dutifully carried out her obligations as a maid of honor, came home, got roaring drunk, started watching a Rin Tin Tin marathon on cable, went online, and ordered a German Shepherd puppy from a breeder in Czechoslovakia. She dropped a cool $6,000 on the dog.
The next day, now much sobered, Van is horrified to learn that a dog she had paid for would arrive at the airport in a crate the following day. She presses forward, buying puppy supplies—a dainty leash, a tiny collar—only to find that the massive beast in the crate at the airport is not the puppy she assumes she’s getting.
This, then, is Van’s story of a lovely romance between her and Joe, the clumsy but well-tempered dog, who understands foreign commands, and as long as you know those words, you can get him to obey rather nicely. The former owners were thoughtful enough to tack a list of those words along with the food recipe for what the dog was used to eating inside the crate.
But Van knows she needs to get the dog to a vet to ensure that he’s ok, and she picks one randomly out of the book. Enter Alex, the nice-looking single veterinarian who, as you already surmised, is instantly attracted to Van and she to him.
So if this book is so formulaic and so typical as a romance, why am I encouraging you to give it a try? First, because the character of Van is so wonderfully carved out here. She is all at once vulnerable, independent and strong, and above all, lovable. Granted, this is a typical romance, but there are some additions that make it better. Van changes over the course of the book in good ways. Dog lovers will be drawn to this story out of an appreciation for Joe, Van’s online dog purchase. Larkin does a nice job of portraying him exactly as the dog he is, not some anthropomorphized version of a dog.
The F-bomb falls with moderate frequency here, and there is one sex scene that is described, but not in molecular detail. But if avoiding profanity and sexual descriptions is your thing, this is probably worthy of either staying away from or at the very least being alert to those passages that might be problematic and being able to skim quickly.
Julia Whelan’s performance is stellar. She particularly seems to integrate her voice into Van and bring Van alive. I could see a book club taking this one on, because there are lots of places you could go as far as character development. The story is set during the Christmas and New Year holidays, which prove wonderful additions to the change of character that Van and others experience. It’s not a Christmas book per se, but the holidays are an important backdrop.