ARC Review: THE MAP TO YOU | Rachel Stockbridge

 

★★★★☆

PUBLICATION DATE: 25 JANUARY 2022

SYNOPSIS:

Sasha Deforest always seems to fall hardest for girls she can't have. And she's never fallen harder than she has for her tough, stubborn best friend Kinsey. Sasha can't help all the outrageously flirty things that come out of her mouth when they're together, even if Kinsey always plays it off as a running joke. Sasha doesn't really mind, though. She likes that they're just friends. It's easy. Uncomplicated. And it means she has an excuse not to open up about her troubled family life back home.

Kinsey Han has been nursing one hell of a crush on sweet, sarcastic Sasha for the better part of the last year. Not that she'd ever let Sasha know it. Kinsey tends to express herself by frowning and ordering her loved ones around. Even if she thought Sasha meant all the flirty nonsense she's always coming up with, Kinsey could never be the kind of cheerful, outgoing woman Sasha deserves to be with. It's better for everyone if Kinsey keeps her true feelings to herself.

But when Sasha drops everything to drive Kinsey 600 miles to deal with a family emergency, things get complicated. The more time they spend together, the harder it is for Kinsey to keep her feelings for Sasha buried—and the harder it is for Sasha to remember why it's so important to keep Kinsey at arm's length. If they continue to conceal the depths of their feelings for each other, they'd be missing out on falling in love with the one person who could truly get them. But taking that chance also means opening themselves up to heartbreak. And neither is sure they're willing to risk losing the other forever.

Okay - first off - this book definitely looks and sounds like a fluffy, easy-to-read contemporary romance, but I am here to tell you to not let the beautifully illustrated cover fool you!

The Map to You has angst in spades. Just lashings and lashings of family drama, internal struggles, misunderstandings, and communication issues all wrapped up in this very cute, quite misleading package. I enjoyed every minute of it.

Kinsey and Sasha are two absolutely wonderful leads, and I loved the richness that Stockbridge brought to both of their characters. It's a dual POV novel (it's romance, so of course!), so we really get to dive into the nitty-gritty of what each character is going through over the course of the story. Sasha is (secretly) dealing with a wayward mum and internalising all her abandonment issues; Kinsey is struggling to reconnect with her parents after a blow-out over her ex. Their journeys almost mirror each other in a way, and it works so well for this story.

I know we are all about the enemies-to-lovers (guilty), but there is something so sweet and heartwarming about friends-to-lovers. The pining. The yearning! The "I don't want to ruin our friendship so I just won't say anything" and the "there's no way she could possibly like me like that after we've been friends for so long"! The shift in the relationship! It's done perfectly in The Map to You and I loved seeing Kinsey and Sasha navigate all their fears and feelings to Make It Work.

I will say, there were moments which got a bit repetitive. Especially some of the internal monologues, which reiterated both characters' concerns (particularly about the relationship working out) over and over, more than once. It got to the point where I did think, okay, we get it. Sometimes I skimmed over those sections. With that said, though, I did enjoy the book and I don't feel like this detracted too much from what was, otherwise, quite an enjoyable read.

I will definitely be reading more of Rachel Stockbridge's work. Queer new adult romance? Yes please!

Thank you to NetGalley and to Rachel Stockbridge for providing me with an ARC of this novel.