Island Affair by Priscilla Oliveras

I received a new CGRP drug to try as an abortive for pain. I'm not sure if this hurricane (or the multiple ones in the Atlantic) will affect me in any way but it'll be a trial by fire for this new drug. My triptan works fine but it does knock me on my butt (or the drug + migraine does). 

​Hopefully these hurricanes will leave off and putter off into nothing but I don't think 2020 has been my year. Or anyone's year. 

I received this book in The Book Drop's June 2020 mailer. I have the "Books for Bubbly" selection, which covers friendship and romance.

But oh...the cover. It's so pretty.  I love a pretty cover!

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Title: Island Affair (Keys to Love #1)
Author: Priscilla Oliveras
Page Number: 298 pages (paperback)
Genre: fiction, contemporary, romance
Publisher: Zebra Books, an imprint of Kensington Publishing Corporation
​Year: 2020

Sought-after social media influencer Sara Vance, in recovery from an eating disorder, is coming into her own, with a potential career expansion on the horizon. Despite the good news, her successful siblings (and their perfect spouses) have a way of making her feel like the odd one out. So, when her unreliable boyfriend is a no-show for a Florida family vacation, Sara recruits Luis Navarro—a firefighter paramedic and dive captain willing to play the part of her smitten fiancé . . .

Luis’s big Cuban familia has been in Key West for generations, and his quiet strength feeds off the island’s laidback style. Though guarded after a deep betrayal, he’ll always help someone in need—especially a spunky beauty with a surprising knowledge of Spanish curse words. Soon, he and Sara have memorized their “how we met” story and are immersed in family dinners, bike tours, private snorkeling trips . . . sharing secrets, and slow, melting kisses. But when it’s time for Sara to return home, will their island romance last or fade with the stunning sunset?

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​There's four or five storms in the Atlantic. So....yay? I'll have to stock up and resupply my hurricane supplies if one comes my way. That's a link to the hurricane print out that's pretty useful in case anyone needs one. 

And T.D. Rene means Tropical Depression Rene, it's the category before Tropical Storm. In case we're not in the know of hurricane knowledge. I know crap all about earthquakes. Every time my friend calls me from California and mentions and earthquake, I assume it's the BIG ONE. The numbers mean nothing to me. 

Right, the book! The two main characters are Luis Navarro and Sara Vance. Most of the action (really all of it) takes place in Key West, Florida. I've never been to Key West, so I'm assuming that Oliveras described things fairly accurately. The setting was super cute and made me more interested in visiting down that way. I tend to avoid South Florida like the plague. It's a cool place but the heat gets to me. Maybe with the medicine working I can be more adventurous. 

Luis Navarro is a Cuban-American from Key West. His family has been there for a few generations so they're fairly established on the Island. He has two brothers that are mentioned (one who he works with and one who he is estranged from). Luis is an EMT-firefighter but is on forced vacation. He's restless and a little on edge when he runs into Sara Vance in a parking lot. 

Sara Vance has just spectacularly broken up with her boyfriend who has bailed on a planned family vacation. I know the ex is the bad guy but a family vacation can be straight up hell, but we can all agree that if you're going to bow out of an event, you give more notice than...just not showing up to  your flight. 

Anyways, this has put Sara in a bind as she's in recovery from an eating disorder and is also the black sheep of the family. She feels that she needs to show a stable relationship in order for her family to not judge her so much. Her family are all medical doctors and Sara is a social media influencer. 

Upon talking to Luis, Sara asks if he'd be wiling to stand in as a fake boyfriend and Luis agrees with some misgivings. I think I've watched too many murder shows because when Sara got in Luis' car I thought she was dumb as hell. Are we just ignoring personal safety here? 

Well, I mean yes. For the plot's sake. This is a fake romance to real romance plot so obviously that's what happens. I thought it was a sweet and slow burn between Sara and Luis. I wasn't as interested in their families but I fully understand the necessary of them to the plot. What's the point of a fake romance to please your family...if they aren't there. 

I would say there is angst (between Sara's eating disorder, her family's disapproval of her career, and her mother's illness), obstacles of former relationships, family issues, and the fact that Sara doesn't live in Key West. The plot mostly pings between time spent with Sara's family or Luis' family as they settle their issues. For instance, we discover why Luis and his brother are estranged (it's a woman, what else?) and their future reconciliation is set up. 

Oliveras takes some big themes in this book. We have Luis' former relationship and how that made him cold (go to therapy Luis!), we have Sara's eating disorder, and Sara's mother's illness. I was a little worried about how Oliveras was going to handle these as they're quite serious all on their own. Sara is in recovery to some degree and I thought the discussion around it was okay (it wasn't pro-ana or anything). Sara's mom is in remission/late treatment for cancer. I don't enjoy cancer story lines as that's how my mom died and would have avoided this book if I had known. That's me though. The mom's cancer and Sara's hope of keeping her mom's stress low is the reason why she's so keen on this fake relationship. Overall, Oliveras takes some deeper dives for these themes but it's overall light/happy ending. It might be something to know going in as eating disorders/drunk driving/cancer story lines could be rough. It also (for me) set a heavy tone at the beginning of the book. 

There is a bit of a misunderstanding/grovelling between Luis and Sara. I'm an unforgiving jerkface, but they work it out with minimal fuss (and semi-maximal family interference). 

Parts of the book are in Spanish. Like, sentence parts are in Spanish. Does that make sense? Forgive me greatly for my botched Spanish/English mashup as it won't be natural, but it's something like "Mi Familia is having a BBQ on Friday, they're also cocinar pescado que fue capturado." 

I'm sure that was not great on my end. It's far more natural (and better) in the book. Oliveras tends to double her information here when this happens. So we'll get the Spanish and then the next sentence she'll translate it fairly seamlessly. Basically, you don't have to speak Spanish as Oliveras takes care to make sure that the meaning is understood. Luis is bilingual (at the minimum) and Sara knows some amount of Spanish because of her babysitter (I think?) growing up. I think the goal here with the book is to capture how bi/tri lingual people can speak at times. My flatmates in the UK did not speak English as a first language, but they might speak it as a second (of fifth) language. I speak French, un-fluently, so sometimes it was a mishmash when we couldn't remember words. I appreciated the translation as I don't speak Spanish and couldn't follow along with everything, I thought it was well done. There's examples below in the book pages.

The writing itself was okay. It was easy to read, sentence construction was well done, and I didn't see any mistakes. To be fair, I'm fairly rubbish as finding mistakes unless they're glaring but there were no glaring mistakes to me. At times there were some overwrought sentences (too angsty, too dramatic, too unrealistic). I wrote one down because I just sighed after I read it: When Sara is talking to Luis in the first couple of chapters, she introduces the topic of her mother, "Here's the bottom line. My invincible mom has been battling a nearly invincible foe for a while now." 

It's just...who talks like that? It's unrealistic for a conversation. For an essay, sure, go for it. For a romance it was a bit cringe. So there are moments like that but the writing is overall fine, just not as tight as I'd have wished for. That's personal there though. I wish my writing was tighter too. 

The cover is stunning, the back cover is stunning, and I received a letter from the author in the book mailer. I love stuff like that. I'm not sure if I'll continue with the series but I might. The things that knocked the book for me (occasional overwrought writing and cancer/eating disorder themes) might not continue in the next book. It's something I might take a look at regardless.  

This is a 'not quite meet-cute' as they were both in bad moods, fake to real, romance. It was a nice read and my personal issues with the book were 1.) personal and 2.) stylistic preference. It was entertaining and I think the rest of the series will follow the same theme (cute, tropical romances).