Published by St. Martin's Press Genres: Fiction, Rom-Com, Romance
Format: ARC, eBook
I always get excited when I see a new Katherine Center book coming out! When I saw The Shippers I was over the moon! Diving in with high expectations, I found that the first half of the book was a bit of a letdown. The female main character, while certainly book smart, felt very immature and more like a YA character to me. Whereas the other characters felt their age. This made me shake my head but not enough to make me want to stop reading.
After calling off her own wedding after her childhood best friend, Cooper Watts, arrives and tells her not to get married. Cooper declined to attend her wedding but showed up unannounced, and JoJo followed his advice. Months later it is her sister’s turn to get married – a destination marriage on a ship! JoJo is determined to woo the man who gave her an amazing first kiss. A kiss she has been fixated on since that time. Once again, Cooper shows up.
Katherine Center pulls out all the troupes for The Shippers. While their first half of the book had me worried, I did enjoy the second half of the book much more. I enjoyed the banter, the miscommunication, the missed chances, the family secrets, and the the journey the characters went on along the way.
Cooper was my favorite character, and I rooted for him the entire time. I found that JoJo grew on me as the book progressed and as more was revealed about her childhood and her parent’s issues, some things began to make sense, but I still felt she had some growing up to do. Plus, I didn’t think she could see the forest for the trees! Come on already, a man flies all the way from London to tell you not to get married and you don’t explore that more?????? But again, she was a little immature at the beginning of the book.
Despite my rocky start with this book, I did enjoy it and was happy with the resolution. I am happy that I didn’t abandon ship and stuck with The Shippers. It did become a delightful read by the end.
Thank you to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley who provided me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All the thoughts and opinions are my own.
