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NetGalley Review of Love Naturally

Posted on October 16, 2023January 16, 2024 by caritagardiner
Screenshot 2023-10-14 at 8.38.26 PM

title: Love, Naturally

author: Sophie Sullivan

publisher: St. Martin's Griffin

publication date: January 16, 2024

pages: 320

peppers: 2 (on this scale)

warnings: none

summary: Trying to convince her boyfriend that she can do the activities he likes, Presley buys a surprise vacation for two to an island nature retreat. When he doesn't want to go with her, she dumps him and goes alone. There, she discovers Becket, who's helping repair the run-down place his brother got in a divorce settlement.

tropes:

  • fish out of water
  • don't realize how bad one boyfriend is until trying to move forward with him
  • family first
  • cute kid
  • small town
  • nature heals our hearts

what I liked:

  • the cute kid
  • the family scenes

what I didn’t like:

  • the book covered the same ground lots of times and felt repetitive. With the same story and characters, it would have been improved by being 30% shorter.

overall rating: 3 (of 5 stars)

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WHAT I DO

I serve as a class dean and teach English to high schoolers at a boarding school in Connecticut. I’ve earned a Bachelor of Arts (Amherst College), an Education Master in Learning and Teaching (Harvard University Graduate School of Education), a Master of Arts in English (Bread Loaf School of English), and most recently a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing with a certificate in the online teaching of writing (Southern New Hampshire University).

As a writer, I hope to capture the complexity and joy of life in the New England boarding school world. On this site, I share what I know about trying to write fiction while deaning, teaching English, coaching, and doing the other tasks associated with helping to raise over six hundred other people’s children.

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