EBookObsessed
Written on Dec 3, 2016
Leah is a confident business woman and the owner of a very popular bakery. She is also a literary standard of a plus-sized heroine. She grew up with a mother who was constantly making snide remarks about her weight. Her ex-fiance wanted her to lose weight and broke up with her because she didn't. Leah was a sweet, lovely woman but her defensive default was self-deprecating jokes about her size. She also interpreted every statement by Sam as being how he couldn't be attracted to a fat girl.
While anyone who doesn't considered themselves perfect will quickly deem any statement as an attack of that flaw, Leah has such low self-esteem that we feel sorry for her rather than sympathize with her pain. It takes way too long for Leah to finally stand up for herself and it was too little, too late.
The major problem with Sam is that he can't keep his foot out of his mouth and can't keep get his head on straight. Sam has been attracted to Leah since he first laid eyes on her across the bar, but after a failed marriage and a crazy ex-girlfriend, he is suddenly commitment phobic. He keeps chanting to himself "I don't want a relationship" but a man with all his bad experiences should have realized right away that Leah was completely opposite of the prior women in his life and instead of fighting a relationship with her like it was a death sentence, he should have latched tight to the one women who engaged his brain and his nether regions before she got away.
Sam never explains to Leah any of his thinking and never lets her know that he is attracted to her but isn't ready to step into a relationship right now. He leaves his thoughts hanging which Leah always interprets as Sam doesn't find me attractive. He gets to a point where he realizes he doesn't want to lose her and suggests that they become friends...with benefits. He even has that moment where he realizes he doesn't like the idea of Leah dating other men if they are just friends, but Sam still can't make the leap to she needs to be my girlfriend.
The basic premise is that Sam hates hearing Leah and other people talk down about her, so he introduces himself to her ex-fiance as her new fiance. Unfortunately, he also does this to Leah's mom. They now have to pretend to be engaged until they can figure out how to break it off so Leah doesn't look like she is being dumped once again.
I loved the section of the story where they go off for the weekend with Leah's family and it is almost a reverse Meet the Parents story. Instead of having Ben Stiller trying so hard to impress the family and failing, here Sam is trying to be a jerk so that her family will hate him and be happy with they break it off. This fails because Sam either forgets himself and does something nice or his rudeness is seen as a joke and the family ends up thinking he is a fun guy with a quirky sense of humor.
The close quarters leads to a stronger connection between Sam and Leah, especially since Sam constantly comes to her defense when her mom tries to made a rude comment. Some of those romantic moments were incredibly sweet, but unfortunately their own issues keep rising up to ruin all these great romantic moments.
While I would have liked to have seen Leah have a little more self-confidence, I had more of an issue with Sam not manning up and realizing that his feelings for Leah should have been acted on fully and not looking like he was using her for sex.
The ending was well done but I would have enjoyed this story much more if we saw growth and change in these characters from the beginning of the weekend with the parents to the end, and not have to wait until the bitter end for them both to make that leap.