I received a free ARC through NetGalley, and this is my honest and voluntary review.

I was drawn to this book by the charming cover, with the dog, the music notes drifting upwards, and the masc-looking love interest. Cait is a freelance editor working from home, sharing her flat with her Great Dane, Pancho. Allie is a musician and a music teacher, and after the unexpected closing of her rehearse space, she's forced to give lessons and practice at home instead.

And by "unexpected", I mean that she got several warnings probably months in advance and it only caught her off guard because she ignores her mail. On some level I relate to that, as someone who has ADHD and certainly forgets my share of things, but it was still tough to feel sympathy for her at first, especially when she blamed her friends for her own mistake. I was very much feeling Cait's frustration at her work schedule and life being disrupted without warning, and Allie's solution of earplugs doesn't work if she needs to make calls or anything.

Of course, that is the initial conflict described in the blurb, and I expected it to get better, but instead it got bad in a different way. This book ended up being much darker than I expected, with a rather explicit domestic abuse situation between Allie and her brother, and that's on top of Cait's editor blaming her for a male writer being an absolute unprofessional prick.

Overall, the tone was darker than expected despite the happy ending, I wasn't satisfied with how Cait's work conflict was resolved, and most of all, I didn't really feel the chemistry between the two main leads. I liked them as individual people, but I think they spent more time arguing or having misunderstanding than actually talking, and I just really wasn't feeling the relationship.

Would I recommend this? I'm not sure. It definitely had some bright points, like the dog, or Cait's background in Appalachia and the conflicted feelings around that, but unfortunately it didn't win me over.