Been Searching for You: A Romantic Comedy
Annabeth is a hopeless romantic who believes in soul mates. In fact, she’s been writing to hers each year on her birthday since she was 16.
Now, at 34, she’s still holding out hope of finding Mr. Right even though he’d be fighting an uphill battle to gain her trust, thanks to a traumatic experience years before that’s left her unable to commit.
When Annabeth meets a handsome literature professor named Alex on her 34th birthday, she thinks her quest may finally be at an end. Things don’t quite go as planned, so Annabeth resolves to do everything she can over the next year to find the unknown recipient of her letters. But blind dates, Meetup events and online singles sites have nothing on what fate has in store for her when a co-worker unexpectedly quits and Annabeth finds herself working in close quarters with both Alex and her long ago ex, Nick. Fighting her attraction to one and loathing for the other, Annabeth is forced to face all of her old insecurities while keeping an eye on a scheming frienemy who may derail her hopes and dreams.
Written in the tradition of Bridget Jones' Diary, You've Got Mail, and Sleepless in Seattle, Been Searching for You hearkens back to the old-fashioned romanctic comedy. It shows that love on the sweet side can exist for the modern girl, if only she’s willing to trust herself and search hard enough.
Been Searching for You was the winner of the 2015 Romance Writers of America Great Expectations and Golden Rose contests.
Plot/Idea: 8 out of 10
Originality: 8 out of 10
Prose: 8 out of 10
Character/Execution: 9 out of 10
Overall: 8.25 out of 10
Assessment:
Unhappily single Annabeth has been writing letters to her imaginary future soulmate since she was 16, and now at 34, she questions the existence of true love in Evelina's sweet tale of romantic persistence. Pleasantly written and amiably accessible to general reading audiences, this first-person narrative is reliably anchored by Annabeth, a hopeless, foolish romantic protagonist whose decision to remain chaste until her wedding night cost her a future with her hometown boyfriend, Nick. Though at times Annabeth appears desperate in her search, the story ramps up into an engaging workplace melodrama with the inclusion of both a man she's smitten with and one she now loathes, all complicated by her bisexual best friend, Mia. A smooth and thoroughly satisfying romance novel.
Date Submitted: June 14, 2016
