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Charlotte Gorman considered herself the brains of the family and above the shallow beauty obsession of her beauty pageant driven twin, Ginny. But when Ginny suffers an allergic reaction the night before the start of the Miss American Treasure pageant, she convinces Charlotte to step in for her. This is Ginny's last chance to win the same pageant that their mother won in 1975. But when the woman looking back in the mirror after her pageant makeover is that of her sister, Ginny, Charlotte learns that her supposed self-confidence is a fraud and that her whole life has been spent denying her jealously over her prettier twin.
Charlotte and Ginny were your usual identical twins, but after their mother died of cancer, their father just didn't have it in him to match their looks each day, and the twins started developing their own personalities. When Ginny started to garner all the attention with her looks and her desire to follow their mother's legacy and compete in beauty pageants, and Charlotte feels that no one really sees her when Ginny is around. Charlotte turned towards her beloved books for solace and friendship. Charlotte became a school librarian, sharing her love of books with the children, while her sister continued to chase the same crown that their mother won, Miss American Treasure.
Charlotte arrives in Florida to support her sister's big chance and also to check out the new Harry Potter theme-park. Ginny's platform is pet adoption, and adopting French Bulldog, Buttercup, is part of that platform. Yet it is Charlotte who keeps having to walk her. It also gives Charlotte an opportunity to meet and flirt with a handsome stranger who is walking his own dog named Hamlet. They share several moments that only a true book-lover would understand and appreciate.
Even though Charlotte and Ginny shared a lovely dinner before the preliminaries begin, it was only Ginny that suffered an allergic reaction to something they ate. Charlotte doesn't want anything to do with the pageant but after some soul searching, she can't deny her sister her chance at her dream. Ginny gives Charlotte a full pageant-level makeover and when Charlotte sees her sister looking back at her reflection, it pokes hard at a devastating wound that Charlotte fights to ignore, the fact that her fiance was going to marry her to get close to her prettier sister, hoping to some day trade-up.
In participating in the pageant and actually meeting the other contestants, Charlotte realizes that she has misjudged the contestants are superficial, back-biters. Most of the other women are supportive of one another and have goals beyond winning crowns. It is Charlotte who does the most soul searching realizing that she has some growing up to do.
While Charlotte adjusts her opinion of the pageant participants and her sister as well, she also comes to the depressing realization that this time she has created the same issue in her romance with Gray Beckham as she had with her fiance, Adam. Not only has she created a conflict since Gray is one of the pageant's judges, but in flirting with Gray and then posing as her sister, any feelings Gray has will be for her pretty, pageant participant Ginny persona rather than for Charlotte herself.
The longer Charlotte competes on her sister's behalf, the more the lines blurs between competing for Ginny and competing for Charlotte herself and when Ginny finally recovers enough to step back into the contest, Charlotte isn't certain she is ready to step back out of the limelight.
I enjoyed this story. It was a quick, light read with some fun scenes. Book lovers will enjoy all the Pride and Prejudice, Harry Potter and other favorite novel references. I would have liked a few more pages developing and solidifying the romance between Gray and Charlotte. They had some great book-lover moments and you could feel their attraction, but it was a bit of a jump from flirty attraction to love of my life since their romance was secondary to the story of the twins bonding over the pageant and healing Charlotte's wound created by her fiance's desire for her sister.
This is definitely worth picking up for a little fun.
Received an ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
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Reading updates
- Started reading
- 18 November, 2018: Finished reading
- 18 November, 2018: Reviewed