Snowed In

by Navessa Allen

[readingwithwrin]

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an e-arc in exchange for my honest review.

Whew this book was an emotional roller coaster that I was not expecting to happen.

Snowed In is told in duel-perspectives of Ella and Ben. Ella is a graphic designer who runs her own business and takes care of her dogs all while living in the extremely snowy parts of Maine. Ben is a former NFL player who is dealing with loss, and a hard medical diagnosis and has moved to Maine in order to get away from it all for a while.
These two end up meeting because of a neighbor (Jack) who wants Ella to help Ben get adjusted to life in Maine, and he knows she will keep it quite that Ben is in town.
The two meet and end up becoming fast friends and start spending a lot of time together. While they spend this time together we see them fall for each other, but things aren't always sunshine and rainbows for them as Ben is keeping his health problems a secret until he can't anymore.
His health problems end up causing them some problems but they are able to work through them with some help from therapists for both of them to deal with what is happening in Ben's brain.

Snowed In touches on not only romance, but anxiety, and depression and all the things that come with a hard medical diagnosis. It brings up what you would or wouldn't do for someone you love, and how love is worth all the pain and suffering you could go through if the diagnosis is terrible and things decline rapidly. Snowed In shows the fun and happy times, while also dealing with the extremely hard parts of real life.

Overall I really appreciated this story and enjoyed learning more about CTE. Elle and Ben were such good characters and the problems they faced were real and made them all the more loveable. The dogs provided the needed comic relief as did Ella's comments she makes to help lighten the mood. Elle's and Ben's families and Jack were well-thought-out side characters that were loveable as well. I just really enjoyed this book and I like how it dealt with a tough topic in a slightly fun way all while bringing two people together at an unlikely time in their lives.

I'm interested in reading more books by Allen in the future.
(There were a few sexy times but they were never told in graphic detail.)