April 10, 2021 - Staff Reviews

Steele

By Sawyer Bennett

Release Date: December 8, 2020

Ebook Available from WV Reads

https://wvreads.overdrive.com/media/5816534

3 Stars - Bennett's books are all pretty unique, and yet again Steele different from the rest of the Arizona hockey series. It's sentimental not sappy but also light and easy to read. This couple is trying to repair their broken relationship.

The hero and heroine aren't the usual young yet somehow bitter and baggage ridden characters of so many romance novels lately. There's angst but it's not hangs up from past heartache here. I definitely wanted more of Ella and less of Steele though at parts. Steele being a mediocre husband I could sort of forgive because it takes two to keep up a marriage in all ways. But he wasn't just a sloppy husband, he was a sloppy dad. He was willing to fight to keep his family which I totally respected but his faults were hard to take. Ella didn't get nearly enough POV time in the beginning. She's still got her heart firmly attached to Steele, but she's trying to think about her future.

So Bennett has so many books and I have to give her major points for continuing to release in multiple series when so many authors (from a few years ago's popular lists) are slacking. I love mixing it up with a romance about a married or long-term couple! There are some excellent old school screwball comedy elements are work here, and I loved every bit of that. Also it was refreshing to see Lucy as a teenage girl who isn't a total brat even if she's troubled. It pains me to say I think I would have liked this a bit more without her but I think some of the back and forth with Steele and Ella wouldn't be so painful if they childless. And Steele's slacking in the past would have been easier to forgive. He does grovel though and makes a lot of effort. I think we could have used a bit more excitement. Their standard fight toward the end was pretty dull. But seeing them reunited in the end was worth the read.

(NS)