With Love, from Cold World

Not so patiently waited for this one, and it did not disappoint. Workplace romance at a Florida attraction called Cold World. Asa is the resident Christmas and all things Cold World expert. He has been working there since he was 18 and kicked out of his parents' house. Lauren is the introverted bookkeeper and a bit newer to Cold World. Grumpy sunshine meets, and they do not get along well, Asa likes to push Lauren's buttons and can not figure out why she doesn't like him or for the life of him why she is interested in the owners snooty self absorbed son Daniel. Lots of secondary fun characters. Good moments of lightheartedness, a few spicy moments, and lots of sweet moments to bring these two together. Big fan of AT writing style

This was everything I wanted it to be, and definitely builds on the style and tone of Alicia’s first novel. With Love From Cold World is the sweet story of two people who feel alone in a crowded room finding the person who makes them feel seen. Both Asa and Lauren are hiding their hurt behind walls - Asa is the flippant life of the party and Lauren is the all-business worker bee. It starts with them sniping at each other until a night trapped in Cold World reminds them to see each other as people, and they start to fall hard and fast. While there’s a lot of miscommunication, they are unaware of it. Both come from backgrounds that never taught them healthy communication and they are both so protective and defensive of their own well-being that it’s hard to let the walls down and give anyone the chance to hurt them. The banter is witty and funny, between both the leads and the secondary characters, Cold World itself has sweet nostalgia vibes, and the confrontations with each lead’s antagonist will make you feel a sense of justice and completion. There are no threads left hanging at the end, and it makes you feel really positive about their longevity in the future. Asa is bisexual and it is openly talked about, and Lauren is quick to correct anyone who denies his identity because he’s with a woman. He has a traumatic coming out story but there is a hopeful end note to that plot line. Asa is worth swooning over - every time he couldn’t hold in how he felt or what he wanted…

This is a sweet novel that absolutely hits the spot if you're looking for an enemies-to-lovers trope. This book is also unique in that one of the protagonists is bisexual. The novel gets along in the same comfortable formulaic way, but what really annoyed me was how once they are in their relationship, all of their other life problems are magically solved into a Happy Ending. The banter and conversation of the secondary characters also felt exhausting, and after a point, I just wanted the characters not to sound like each other after a while.

Oh, my heart. Lauren and Asa had so many wonderful things going for each other, if only they'd learn how to communicate. Miscommunication/lack of communication is one of my least favorite tropes, and unfortunately, Asa and Lauren had that in spades. They both had very valid reasons for acting the way they did, but it didn't make me want to shout at them through the book any less. I truly enjoyed the premise of this book. Both the main characters as well as the supporting cast were all fun to read. It's not often that I can say I'd read a book featuring any of the secondary characters, but Thompson wrote some fantastic, fully fleshed out roommates and coworkers, and I could definitely see myself devouring any of their own stories. With Love, from Cold World had one of those stories that was just easy for me to fall into. Asa and Lauren could easily be real people dealing with these very realistic situations while falling into a real-life romance with each other; there was no reaching to make their story believable. I loved how fully realized both Asa and Lauren seemed to me. Their backstories, and the way the past influenced them in the present, was both heartwarming and heartbreaking. These were two very lost souls who were able to finally find their person. Self-sacrifice might as well have been both their middle names, and I felt their experiences to my core. I think my only issue with the plot was how minimized the actual problems at Cold World seemed to be. The…

4.5 rounded to 5! Ok, let’s discuss this book. Sometimes I don’t know how to disentangle my thoughts to explain a book and that is the case with this book. I guess I’d say: slow burn + queer rep + childhood trauma + humor + friendship = this book It’s great! I don’t know what drops the book by half a point bc like I said I don’t know how to disentangle my thoughts on this one. There’s some angsty back and forth between these two. Some of the background plot is a little ridic but all in all, it’s a really likable main couple and a modern, meaningful romance. Ta-da!