You’re Still the One is another amazing story in the Calamity Falls series and a delightful contemporary romance. ~ Slick – Guilty Pleasures Book Reviews
Synopsis:
When Stella Cavanaugh gets the chance to come home after a seven-year, self-imposed exile, she takes it. She was born to be a wedding planner, and she hopes creating her sister’s wedding might just earn her the redemption she’s been hoping for.
The only thing holding her back is the fear of running into Griffin James, the love of her life. Because she not only hurt her family, she destroyed their relationship. Burned it right to the ground. And she just doesn’t know if she can bear to find out he’s moved on. She sure hasn’t.
Griffin James has a roommate. The fourteen-year-old’s staying with him while his dad’s on deployment. Sounds simple, but the boy’s grandparents are looking for any excuse to pull him out of the clutches of the big, tattooed owner of a bike shop. If Griffin can just stay under their radar, everything should be fine.
But that’s just not possible when Stella bursts into their lives. Her sparkly spirit, her big, splashy ideas, and her impulsiveness always lead to disaster. He knew that…but he couldn’t resist her.
And now she’s on the run again, because…
The very things they love about each other are also what tear them apart.
Second chance romance is one of my favorite tropes and Erika Kelly delivers up a fine one in You’re Still the One. This couple have known each other most of their lives and spent their high school years and a few years after together and planning a future, but one night changed everything and for the last almost 8 years they’ve been apart. An opportunity brings the heroine back to the small town of Calamity Falls and in to the middle of a crisis the hero is trying to deal with. With so much between them from before and past hurt still lurking not to mention the lost of trust, it was interesting watching these to find their way back into each other.
Stella Cavanaugh has always been a jump first and thinks about the consequences later type of gal. As the baby in a family filled with a famous mother and father and with her older siblings rising to fame in their respective careers on their own talent, she always felt a bit out of place. She knew she was loved and she loved back fiercely, but she always felt a bit less than. So Stella make sure she was well liked and the life of the party to everyone, she was good a reading people and used that to her advantage and that also led to the rash decision she made at her sister’s engagement party to prove to her that her soon to be husband was a lying, cheating snake and all it took was a bit of flirting and a kiss she’d love to forget especially since it cost her the man of her dreams, her family, and sent her fleeing from her home where she hasn’t returned.
Griffin James knew almost the minute he told Stella they were through it was a mistake and after several months of being a broody a$$ barely able to function, he drove to Dallas where she was working and found out that she was on her honeymoon. Dejected, angry, and not sure what to think Griffin returned home to get over her and get on with his life including at the moment being the guardian to his best friend’s 14 year old son while he’s stationed overseas. Griffin is happy to be there for Austin, but Austin’s maternal grandparents don’t like Griffin for something he did as a teenager and are waiting for him to screw up so they can get their hands on Austin. While Austin loves his grandparents, their rules and what they feel are best for him makes him a runaway threat something Griffin worries about every time he’s with them.
Stella’s impulsivity has her and Griffin pretending to be engaged to keep Austin’s grandparents at bay, but Griffin isn’t happy about it because he doesn’t trust her and while he can see that she’s good for Austin he knows she isn’t good for him, or he wants to believe she isn’t good for him. There was a lot of push and pull in this story between Stella and Griffin, the incident that had Griffin from going to wild, bad boy to upstanding citizen weighs heavily on him and Stella constantly pushes his buttons. On top of that Stella is trying to make amends with her family and lying about their engagement doesn’t help at all. I did like Stella and Griffin together, it was easy to see that the familiarity they have with each other comes from all the time they spent together as friends and then more, but Griffin holds himself back because he doesn’t want to feel the pain when Stella decides to bail again.
I really loved the side story with Austin and watching him come into his own under the encouragement of Stella and Griffin once he began to see the changes in Austin’s demeanor. I also think watching that helped Griffin realize how much he held back and needed to be more vulnerable with Austin. I think them dealing with everything going on with Austin also make them realize that together they made a good team and helped Griffin realize that Stella would be a great life partner to have.
It was fun to see couples from past books especially Stella’s sisters as well as the Bowie brothers and their wives. While at times I got frustrated with them revisiting the past so much and not concentrating on the future, I also know that Griffin needed that closure from the past in order to move forward.
You’re Still the One is another amazing story in the Calamity Falls series and a delightful contemporary romance.
4 stars
Purchase from
AMAZON
