Book review: Paper Hearts by Claire Contreras
June 15, 2018 June 7, 2018 6 Comments
Series: Hearts #2
Links: Amazon • Goodreads
Source: Freebie
I lost her. No, I didn't lose her. I threw her away. She was my best friend. I was never supposed to fall in love with her. I was careless. She was heartbroken. I thought I was doing fine. But here she is, years later, forced to work with me, reminding me why I fell in love with her in the first place. And this time I'm going to do everything in my power to never let her go.
If you recall from my review of Torn Hearts, I really was not looking forward to Paper Hearts. At all. I was skeptical, to say the least, and wished (not for the first time) that I wasn't doing this stupid reading challenge that forces me to finish terrible books from my TBR. But anyway, I soldiered on. I read Paper Hearts. It wasn't great.
Is it better than Torn Hearts? I guess. I mean, I wasn't raging while I read it. It was more like frequent eye rolls, heavy sighs, and setting the book down every three or four pages because I just could not take any more of its nonsense.
Let me talk about a few of the things I disliked:
Jensen really went and wrote a series of children's books about Mia? This would be cute if he didn't cheat on her and marry the other woman. What the hell, Jensen.
I don't think the author knows anything about NYC? Mia and Jensen take a quick motorcycle ride from Hell's Kitchen (Manhattan) to DUMBO (Brooklyn) only to turn around and take the subway to Coney Island (also Brooklyn). Why wouldn't you just drive all the way there? I don't understand. Also, Jensen can somehow afford a two-story house with a two car garage IN BROOKLYN as a freelance journalist? How do I get his job???
I honestly feel like the big conflict of Torn Hearts — the baby with another woman — was never really addressed. The characters say it was addressed, but unless I missed it, there was like one half-hearted conversation in which Jensen basically just says, "Um, we were on a break so I'm not really sure why you're mad."
Jensen keeps trying to make Mia feel guilty about her past! Like, you literally impregnated a girl and then married her and you're mad that your ex dated other guys while you were married with a child. Get over yourself.
Jensen's newspaper column about his relationship with Mia is so weird! Who thought this was a good idea? Her parents read that column and he's just going on about how they went out for dinner and had sex and whatever. So inappropriate.
Jensen is actually mad that Mia burned the love letters he wrote her while he was literally married to another woman because they were pieces of himself and he needed help putting himself back together? WHAT?? You don't get to do that, Jensen.
The plot twist that I saw coming at full speed from seventeen miles ahead? The plot twist that is my least favorite plot twist in the history of romance novels?
Things that are maybe better:
Jensen realized that he made a mistake and is no longer married to the other woman.
He seems like he's a good dad.
I'm sure that he loves Mia in his own way.
I actually more or less liked Mia when she wasn't being an idiot.
Olivia was really cute.
I guess that Paper Hearts is a smidgen better than Torn Hearts, but I wish I would've just stopped after Kaleidoscope Hearts.
Previously: Kaleidoscope Hearts • Torn Hearts
#killingthetbr: nine months on shelf