About This Book
Darcy Barrett has been in love with Tom Valeska since she was eight years old — a problem, given that Tom is her twin brother's best friend and, by unspoken rule, completely off-limits. When their grandmother's cottage needs renovating before it can be sold, Tom shows up as the contractor, and Darcy's carefully constructed indifference starts to crack. It's a premise built on longing rather than hatred, on the particular ache of wanting someone who has always been just outside your reach — and Thorne makes that ache feel genuinely urgent rather than contrived.
Where Thorne's debut leaned into sharp-tongued sparring, this one is quieter and more melancholy at its core. Darcy is a prickly, self-aware narrator who knows exactly what she wants and exactly why she can't have it, which gives the internal monologue an unusual texture — wry on the surface, bruised underneath. The prose moves at a leisurely pace that suits the renovating-the-old-house structure, and the twin dynamic adds a layer of loyalty and rivalry that keeps the central tension from resolving too neatly. Readers who like their romance grounded in character psychology over meet-cute mechanics will find a lot to sit with here.
