This was cute. Hallie was an interesting main character and I appreciated her crush growing into real affect after spending more time with Julian as an adult.

Sadly I just could not get into this one. There characters were not all that lovable and there were so many elements to the story that I was getting confused keeping track of it all. I'm a big fan of Tessa Bailey so this won't stop me from reading more of her books, but this one just wasn't for me.

I received a copy of this book for review from NetGalley. This book is fun, funny, full of unrequited tension, and secret pen pals. It is also apparently lacking a single bed, but that is more than made up for by Tessa Bailey's skill of creating heroes that have filthy mouths. The plot was a little bit predictable, but it was enough fun that I'm already looking forward to the sequel.

A rigid college professor meets his match in a flighty landscaper with this new, steamy romance novel.
👩🏼‍🌾
Hallie fell in love with Julian when she was fourteen and they almost kissed in the vineyards. Now he’s back in town and doesn’t even remember their missed interlude from years ago. She’s hired to work on the gardens at the Vos estate and the more time she spends with him, the more she learns about the man he’s become. In a drunken/brave moment Hallie leaves an anonymous love note for Julian that turns into an honest correspondence between the two. Julian finds himself liking Hallie and his secret admirer, but what happens when he finds out they’re one and the same?
🧑🏻‍💻
I can always count on Bailey to write 🌶️ yet 🍭 romance books. This is the first in a duology that I can’t wait to read because this grumpy sunshine romance hit the spot! Between the vineyard setting, adorable MCs, intriguing secondary characters and 🥵 scenes I’m dying for book 2!

CW: death of a grandparent (off page), grief, parental abandonment, alcohol, fire, anxiety, anxiety attacks
4.5 ⭐️

Sadly this was not for me. I have thoroughly enjoyed other books by Tessa Bailey, but I just couldn't get into this one. The characters felt one dimensional, they lacked chemistry, and I just couldn't get past all of the miscommunication.

This will not be one that I recommend to people.

This book was super cute, but my goodness am I tired of lack of communication being the major issue. These people just needed to talk to each other! I enjoyed the setting and characters and even what I'm assuming is set up for another book in a series. This would be a good vacation read.

Absolutely loved this romance the stream the relationship it was unputdownable I am going to be recommending it for a long time

What has a lot of promise about our dear friend Hallie learning to be herself in a world she is exploring without her grandma turns into an unbelievable tale of someone who has had a crush on someone for over half of her life and she barely knew. I found this part to be a bit outlandish and almost creepy, to be honest. This book felt a bit jumbled to me, and it was mostly too far out there for me. What had an opportunity to be a great navigation of a 29 year old woman turned into her just being totally infatuated with a person she had mostly dreamt up since she was a teen.

Julian - the professor? Somehow a business man? The one who is completely disengaged with his emotions - and not even realizing he didn't call his own sister for a year? And then suddenly falls in love with Hallie? I found their love to be a bit forced - two "big" fights within a month and a half of knowing each other and suddenly they are in love also felt a bit forced to me. I saw it all from Hallie's side, but Julian thinking she was chaotic, disorganized, and would totally mess up his vibe just felt kind of rude.

There were so many extra characters that deserved some more time, too, and stories that felt unfinished (like the vineyard manager, what happened to Uncorked, and a few other things). I feel like the weird situation with Julian's parents also was not explored as well as it could have been.

Overall, this was a miss for me. There was no real development of their relationship and the foundation of it out there. Also, the "letters" were not as a deep or central to the story as I was expecting them to be.

Cute and fun read! The character development was all a little immediate/rushed but overall enjoyable.

Thank you so much to the publisher for providing me with an eARC via NetGalley for an honest review.

4.25 stars

CWs: panic attacks, fire (historical), death (off-page, historical)

I really enjoyed this one! Tessa Bailey wrote fantastic characters with a wonderful story, and I was happily living in their world for the duration of the book. I’m already excited for the second one.
Hallie was an excellent character. She was relatable in so many ways, and I really appreciated her character growth. Her seemingly chaotic way of doing things resonated a lot, and I liked that she embraced it but also recognized where it was holding her back in ways. She learned about herself and found that she didn’t need to change for anyone but herself. Her grief over the loss of her grandmother came through really well, and I liked how she was often mentioned in small ways.
Julian was also a great character. His anxiety was written well, and his panic attacks and shutting down were handled well. His need for structure and control were explained well, and I liked that he realized what was causing those needs and how to learn to handle them in ways that would allow him to be more himself.
The relationship between Hallie and Julian was really good. They had great chemistry, and the steam level was good. They complemented each other well even though they were total opposites in so many ways. I was really rooting for them.
The secret admirer part wasn’t actually as big of a role as I thought it would be, but I liked it. I liked that it freed them both up to confess to big things they wouldn’t have otherwise talked about.
The writing style was easy to follow, and I think the 3rd person POV worked really well to flip between Hallie and Julian’s thoughts and emotions. I got completely sucked into the small town, and was hooked by both the characters and the plot. There were some really funny moments, and also some excellent emotional ones.
Overall this was a great read, and I’d definitely recommend it to romance fans looking for something sweet, with emotion, steam, and heart.

Tessa Bailey does it again. As someone who uses books as a way to disassociate from the real world I know that I can always count on TB to provide easy, enjoyable, reading. This book was so different. If you’re a fan of It Happened One Summer, Hook, Line, and Sinker, and My Killer Vacation- you’ll love this.

This is my first Tessa Bailey book after hearing rave reviews of her writing for the past few years. I did enjoy her writing and I think that the plot moved quickly enough to keep me interested. I didn't think there was anything special about the plot or characters. I wasn't really hoping for the main characters to end up together, and I didn't feel much chemistry between them either. I'd pick up another Bailey book because I know she has some hits, but I wouldn't say this one was great.

This was a cute rom-com and very steamy. Hallie Welch is a chaotic landscaper who is dealing with the death of her grandmother who was her rock and kept her grounded while her childhood crush Julian Vos is the epitome of staid and straight-laced to deal with his anxiety and panic attacks until they meet again and he can’t help but be drawn to her even though he doesn’t remember her from their almost kiss in his families’ vineyard when she was 14. This was cute and I liked the town and that even though it was Napa it had a small town feel with the locals who Hallie and Julien grew up with. Julian’s sister is a train wreck and I can’t wait to read the sequel which is her story with a fake marriage to get an inheritance which is always a fun trope.

Thanks to Harper Voyager and Netgalley for the complimentary copy of this book in e-book form. All opinions in this review are my own.

Thank you to the publisher for the gifted e-copy.

Well...this book has a super cute cover, but that's about it. I normally love books by this author, so I was pretty disappointed. The basic idea is really cute, but it just didn't work for me.

I feel like the plot was all over the place. Hallie is mad about a new wine store opening next to her favorite wine store...but she's a gardener, not the owner of the store...but then her high school crush is back in town and she does gardening work for him...and his family owns a vineyard...and she writes him a secret admirer letter. He's super rigid in his scheduling and she's a hot mess with barely any schedule at all. She's also a virgin (at 29 - which is fine, don't get me wrong, but the way things happen just seems off to me). They still hook up and the sex descriptions are CRINGY, which is so surprising, because in her other books, they aren't!

Ugh, I don't know. I can't even form my thoughts into a coherent review for this one other than I was super disappointed. I'll still read more from this author because I've LOVED some of her past books. This one just was not her best work.

I am so annoyed because I literally pre-ordered this book and read it in one sitting, but then it takes me FOREVER to post my thoughts.
Of course, to no one's surprise, this book was PERFECT. I'm screaming, I loved it so much.

Tessa always makes me laugh out loud. It's actually concerning and embarrassing how many times I laughed out loud at 2am reading this book. If you love grumpy sunshine you are going to eat this up. It was nothing new but an almost more realistic approach to this tripe because it came from the angle of anxiety, instead of "misunderstood" . It's definitely not a "you're mean to me because you like me!" kind of book. I love the way this tackled how much your life experiences, especially loss and grief affect the way you walk through life. It showed two very opposite examples, but I feel like I could always see a little of myself in both characters.

Overall, just BUY THIS BOOK. Like I'm so obsessed. I can guarantee it will put a smile on your face AND make your day better.

This book was SPICY! And I love it! There’s just something about a man who’s all prim and proper but has a dirty side! Really liked the characters and the storyline was entertaining! Definitely recommend!

I'm a little perplexed at some of the negative reviews. 🤔 You can't compare every Tessa Bailey book to "It happened One Summer". They're all different stories. Anyway, here's how I felt about it:

We've got a stuffy professor named Julian and chaotic Gardner name Hallie. Their story is set in Napa Valley. Hallie is hired by Julian's mother to do some gardening for the Vos Vinyards guesthouse on the estate. Hallie brings with her a unruly pack of dogs and is never truly on time. Her antics rile up Julian who is staying at the guesthouse. Julian is taking a sabbatical from his teaching career to focus on writing a book to prevent himself from having a mental breakdown. He witnessed one of his colleagues completely lose it at Stanford and now he is trying to look after his own mental health. But he does so by making strict schedules and planning every minute of his day to feel in control. Obviously, Hallie disrupts all of this. but Julian starts to realize that a little chaos in his life may not be a bad thing. The anxiety rep in this book was awesome.

Meanwhile, Hallie has been secretly pining over Julian for yearssss. So it's all so surreal to her once they start realizing their attraction to one another. Julian doesn't remember her, so Hallie starts writing secret admirer letters to tell him how she feels and how much she admires him as a person. All sorts of drama about the letters ensue. I won't get to much into it as to not ruin the story. It had a little bit of the "You've Got Mail" and "The Shop Around the Corner" vibe.

This story definitely has the grumpy x sunshine trope. I loved all the side plots. The cheese theft! BAHAHAHAH! That was golden. The side characters were kookie and so lovable. I really look forward to reading the upcoming book in this series about Julian's sister.

So to the spice- Tessa, mah gurrrrrrrllllll. The dirty talk in this book is soooooo good. The whole dirty knees bit. OMG. DEAD. Just go out and read it ya'll and pick up the copy from Target as it has an exclusive epilogue.

Not my favorite Tessa Bailey book, by any means. This one was cute and whimsical and gives the type of outlandish plot that somehow works Tessa is known for. Vineyard town? Cute. Gardener? Very cute. Secret letters? A little dated and corny.

But overall, the accompanying elements seemed forced and tropey. Julian was very one-note anxiety until he...all of a sudden...wasn't? With very little reason to let it all fall to the wayside and become A New Man. Despite that, as someone with diagnosed generalized anxiety, I think the manifestation of his anxiety was well-done. Hallie overly frantic and messy and it made her seem immature and unrelatable, despite my being the same age as her.

Their relationship flew just a bit too close to instalove for me. I have very little idea WHY Julian was into Hallie with no resistance so quickly, other than being faced with her very nice breasts. The steamy scenes were, as always with Tessa, well done and just the right amount of light dominant dirty talk. I also found this to have a bit too much miscommunication. There's no reason Hallie couldn't tell Julian about the letters other than she was immature.

This would be a perfect book to read in a single summer day: nothing important or long-lasting, but enjoyable enough to save the second book in the series for a similar summer day win.

I cannot get over how cringe this book was. I did enjoy most of the characters and that they had real life issues instead of perfect lives. However, the plot was just meh and there were SO MANY cringe parts like him masturbating thinking of her being broke down and can’t change her own tire. Also, him being possessive over her before they’re even dating (and during) is not romantic and is toxic AF in my personal opinion. That part and so many others similar just took me out of the story completely. Don’t get me wrong I like smutty books if they’re done right, but this one just wasn’t it for me in so many ways.

Tessa Bailey just knows how to do it. I’m not usually a fan of traditional grumpy sunshine, but how does one not love Julian. I loved the side characters as well and can’t wait to read Natalie’s story. And don’t even get me started on the spice, top tier. 10/10 would recommend if you’re looking for a small town romance, grumpy sunshine, and all over adorable story.