Knowing Nichelle by Tinsley Sellers
On August 27, 2019 by Jaye
Knowing Nichelle by Tinsley Sellers
🍸🍸🍸1/2
Blurb
She’s just met the man of her dreams…but he’s not who he said he was. Neither is she. Until they get a second chance to make a first impression.
Is he a sophisticated big-city lawyer, or an easygoing small-town woodworker? And if she’s not a career-driven high-powered attorney, then who is she? Hiding behind their masks is second nature until circumstances force them to see beneath the surface and realize just how alike—and in love—they really are.
He’s only got one rule: no lawyers. She’s a lawyer.
Burned by experience, Buck’s got a rule for a reason. After walking away from a lucrative legal position, he found his peace in Beckley. Life on the farm is simple, and his woodworking business is thriving. He’s not interested in trading his work boots for wingtips and rejoining the rat race. So what if she’s the most compelling woman he’s ever met?
She’s only got one requirement: no a**holes. He’s an a**hole.
After a disastrous encounter in a trendy bar, Nichelle’s convinced that he’s an over-muscled a**hole. She’s got a sleek car, luxurious condo, and elegant designer clothes. Family comes first, and her legal career is on the fastest track. She’s never met a problem she couldn’t solve on her own. So what if he can see beneath her carefully constructed façade?
They’re perfect together. They just don’t know it yet.
Welcome back to Beckley, Michigan! Autumn is in the air and as the days get shorter, the air gets cooler and the calm lakes reflect the blue skies and red-gold trees for a double-dose of fall color. The people are just as warm, friendly, smart, funny, and real as you remember. When you need a place to call home, Beckley welcomes you—and sometimes the family you choose is as strong as the bonds you’re born with.
If you like small-town romance, you’ll like Beckley. If you like smart heroines who balance demanding professional careers with a commitment to family, friends, and finding love, then you’ll definitely like it here. If you like strong, sexy, hard-working heroes who have not-so-secret soft spots for kids, dogs, and classic cars, you may find that you never want to leave!
Knowing Nichelle is the third in the Beckley’s Daughters Romance series. It can be read as a stand-alone story, but continuing readers will recognize many of the characters and locations. This series is recommended for adult readers and contains explicit language and intimate situations.
Buy Links
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | iBooks | Kobo | Google Play
Review
I’ll be honest. I didn’t like either main character all that much. For the first 2/3 of the book I was sitting there scowling at my iPad, seething and telling both of them they could go ahead and be alone forever and freeze to death in Chicago and Michigan and everyone would be better off.
I wound up ugly crying by the end, absolutely sobbing, running back to the bathroom to grab more tissues. I didn’t see a way out for anyone, and even though I didn’t like either of them I just wanted the pain to stop.
It did – this is a romance, after all. (Thank God, or whoever, for romance. I swear. It’s the one genre where you know things will turn out okay in the end.) But seriously, how incredible must the writing be if this author can take two people I don’t care about and make me ugly cry?
Knowing Nichelle is the third book in a series, which I didn’t realize when I signed up for the review tour or else I’d have snagged the ARCs for the rest of them too. Now I have to pay for them, which I’m happy to do. I’m just regretting my lack of foresight. Apparently I like to ugly cry. Who knew? The book stands alone, but does reference other books (here and here.)
I think the reason I didn’t like the main characters is because they seemed to go out of their way to make a bad impression from the start. Nichelle starts it, to be quite honest, although Buck is pretty ham-fisted about his behavior too. I understand why he’s ham-fisted a little better. His mindset going into their first meeting is better described.
Through a series of coincidences and the kind of proximity that could only come from small town living, they’re thrown together on a fairly regular basis and eventually Buck manages to make a decent impression. The thing is, both of their families have kind of done a number on their psyches and now they’ve convinced themselves they can’t be together.
Their families aren’t bad people. Far from it. This is something I can definitely learn from in my own writing. Their families are good and decent people who have made mistakes (common mistakes), which have had repercussions down the line. (I should take notes for my own parenting benefit as well, but anyway.)
Most of the side characters are well developed, possibly because many of them have their own books or (maybe) will have their own books. Esteban is the one outlier. I’m not aware of his being a main character in another book, he’s just an asshole, and he can go drown in a mud puddle.
The writing is obviously good enough to make me sob about people I don’t like. Their pain, their loneliness, comes through the page without Sellers ever really using that word.
I definitely recommend this book, especially on days you might need a little bit of a cathartic cry. There’s no shame in that, by the way.
Author Bio
Tinsley Sellers grew up in Chicago, spending her summers with her grandparents in a tiny town a lot like Beckley, Michigan. Life took her to Arizona, Washington, and Idaho before she finally found her home in Arkansas. She is married to an amazing, supportive (and handsome!) man, with whom she has rescued three dogs and two cats. When she’s not writing, she teaches physics and engineering at the local university. When she’s not writing or teaching, she’s probably trying new recipes. She enjoys fast cars, loud music, fine whisky, and big books. In no particular order.
Author links:
https://www.instagram.com/tinsleysellers/
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/18212378.Tinsley_Sellers
1 comment
Ad
Thanks for being on the tour! Great review! 🙂