Simply Love Book Reviews's Reviews > Love Next Door

I love that Helena Hunting is writing more main stream contemporary romances not that I haven’t loved her previous works, but I love seeing authors break out of their norm and move in different directions. I adored Love Next Door. Two people both whose lives have taken strange turns end up in the small town of Pearl Lake where the heroine grew up and couldn’t wait to leave and the hero spent summers with his grandmother and hated when it was time to go home. Somehow the magic of this small town and the people in it, and probably a bit of growing up on both their parts have them realizing how special the town is and how at home they both feel there. There was a bit more angst to this story than I normally enjoy, but not so much that it turned me off from the book. It was a charming, enemies to lovers story that I found hard to put down.

Dillion Stitch left her hometown for college and basically never returned. She came home for holidays and such but spent it with her family. She left behind friends who she didn’t keep in touch with and a town full of people who had watched her grow up and who cared about her. After the company she works for moved out of Chicago, her boyfriend left for a job on the east coast, and the apartment she was supposed to rent isn’t available Dillion is trying to figure out her next move when her father calls and says he needs her help. Her brother had a wreck and broke his leg and without Dillion’s help running the office so her dad can take her brother’s place on the jobsites, they’ll be in trouble. With her life already in turmoil, Dillion agrees to go back home until the new year knowing full well she’s going to have amends to make with her friends she left behind, her family, and the people of the town. She just doesn’t realize she’s going to have to put up with a new neighbor that drives her crazy.

Donovan (Van) Firestone is in Pearl Lake to settle his grandmother’s estate and to work on the lake cottage she lived in most of her life. He has such fond memories of the town and while he knows he can get a lot of money for the place, he’s not sure he wants to sell it. He doesn’t expect to get a call from his father tell him that the foundation they run in his mother’s name is missing millions of dollars and he (Van) is the number one suspect. Advised to stay away from Chicago and let the investigators figure things out, the last thing he needs is some strange woman in his grandmother’s home walking around like she owns the place and to find out that she’s the executor of the estate he’s been communicating with for months. He also doesn’t expect to find her attractive especially when it’s obvious she thinks he’s only out to sell the place and take and money and run.

These two get off on the wrong foot and continue to fight and fling verbal assaults towards each other for awhile, then Van steps in when Dillion is obviously uncomfortable with some of the things her ex-boyfriend is saying and she begins to see him in a new light. I enjoyed watching them learn so much about each other, sharing stories about Van’s grandmother, and being there for one another when things were confusing and crazy. Their support of each other was something I loved so much so I was a bit disappointed when Van made a critical error in judgment sending their burgeoning relationship to pieces.

While I did feel like the ending was a bit rushed, I was also satisfied with how things turned out on all fronts. Helena Hunting has always been a go to author for me and Love Next Door was a delight to read!

Review copy provided for a voluntary review.