3.5 stars

Jasper! Finally, Jasper gets his HEA. First, let me say that this book can easily be read as a standalone. However, this author tends to have connections amongst her books, even when they are not part of a series, and Jasper has popped up on more than one occasion. He is often comic relief, but he is also a favorite of mine. I’m so glad he found a woman who understands his sense of humor and looks beyond that humor. No matter what, it’s always been obvious that Jasper has a heart of gold.

As much as I love Jasper and Jane’s connection, I was annoyed with how little Jane’s daughter was on the page. I don’t need the kid of a single mom to take over the story, but I feel as if Londyn was seen more in Jane’s sister’s book than here. When she and Jasper shared the page it was wonderful, when Jasper and his teen nieces shared the page it was magic, I wanted more of both. There was so much made of Jane’s thought process about being a single mom, yet she seemed to find it ridiculously easy to find a babysitter with no advance notice although her sister was out of the country. It was so different from what I remembered (and I admit I could be remembering things wrong) from the first book, and how this book seemed to want to portray Jane’s life annoyed me.

That being said, the friendship and chemistry Jane and Jasper have is phenomenal. I greatly enjoyed the parts when Jane would get out of her own way and let herself be loved and cared for. Yet there are some decisions she makes that are troubling, especially when you consider her past and the current reality in which this book is being published. In some ways, this book does a good job of showing a responsible couple taking care of business. Then Jane makes an odd decision that just doesn’t make sense. I think I understand what the author was going for…destiny and all that. But in the fall of 2024, it just hit the wrong way. At least not for me.

I love this author. Her books always keep me engaged. I didn’t want to put this one down. Yet I found some of the decisions in this story to be questionable enough that they took me out of the story.

I keep reading Ilsa Madden Mills hoping for another Beauty and the Baller. This wasn’t it.

Single mom Jane Darling works in her sister’s bookstore and is starting a matchmaking service. Jasper Jannich is her professional quarterback frenemy. They banter, they bicker, and eventually they fall into bed, where there is a condom mishap.

Jane is single-parenting her daughter (a daughter she really loves) because of an unplanned pregnancy that the father walked away from. She has been celibate for years and she is understandably upset about the missing condom. Jasper makes some tasteless jokes but they eventually walk off hand-in-hand to get Plan B…and she DOESN’T TAKE IT. WHAT!?!! Natural consequences ensue.

I finished the book but this is where it lost me. There were some other random subplots that seemed unnecessary: Jasper’s birth mom and Jane’s baby daddy didn’t really add much to the story. This was an ARC and there were a couple of continuity issues that I hope are caught before publication.

This is the second book in a series. I didn’t read the first but I think this one stands alone.

Thank you to NetGalley and Montlake for the ARC. Opinions are my own.