Battle of the Bookstores by Ali Brady

 ðŸ’–💖💖💖/5




4.5/5 - Battle of the Bookstores by Ali Brady is an enjoyable, opposites attract, enemies to lovers, slow burn, love story with the texting buddies enhancing the confusion and awareness. This rivals to lovers, secret pen mates, and work place romance that is a love letter to bookstores, especially indie bookstores. The plot is a remembrance of the movie, You’ve Got Mail; be prepared to fall in love with these characters.


Josie Klein and Ryan Lawson have two things in common: they both love books and each manages a bookstore. Ryan manages Happy Endings a romance only bookstore, where he has worked for over a decade. Josie mangers Tabula Inscripta, a bookstore focuses on literary fiction. In between their stores is a café, Beans. When the owner decides to merge both bookstores and threatens to keep only the highest performing manager, the gloves come off. Aas things heat up in this high pressure competition, each turns to their online BookFriends forum and their newfound anonymous friendship for comfort. Little do they know, they are already sharing their lives with each other in that online book forum. At first there is sabotage and insults between them but they realize they need to combine their knowledge to make the store more profitable.  I was impressed with the way Ryan’s dyslexia is incorporated into the story, in a realistic way, without becoming a label.

My favorite aspect though, is that it tells the ultimate love story between book and reader. Every mention of a review, a blurb, an ARC, etc. made me excited that I was able to recognize most of the books and authors mentioned. The books and the dueling bookstores definitely tried to steal the show, but Ryan and Josie were still able to find their happy ever after with a forever kind of love.

 

#NetGalley #Berkley #BattleOfTheBookstores 





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