Review of ‘Thursday afternoons’ by Tracey Richardson
This was a good read. I have been in a mini reading slump of books that were just average or slightly above. Lots of potential but they haven’t been executed well leaving me feeling very blah this week. I’m so happy to say this book wasn’t like the rest. This read came at the perfect time to cheer my spirits up and was exactly what I needed. Richardson has been writing lesfic for over 20 years, she knows what she’s doing and it’s easy to say that I enjoyed this one.
Amy and Ellis are two busy professional women, who have prioritized their careers over relationships. While both women are happy in their professional life, they miss being intimate with another person. Is a casual hook-up, no strings sex with a stranger in a hotel every Thursday the way to go? And what happens when these two women are not such strangers after all?
As soon as I saw Richardson’s name and doctors on the cover, I knew I wanted to read this. I love anything even remotely medical romance-ish. I would not call this strictly a medical romance because plenty of the story takes place outside of the hospital but it is still a lesbian medical romance mixed in with a little family drama.
What I really enjoyed about this book is that it was not cookie-cutter at all. The book just doesn’t have the formulaic romance feel. And while I love a traditional romance as much as the next lesfic fan, I also like different and get bored of the same old thing. I don’t think it’s easy to start a book with the two mains having sex right off the bat. You have to use those sex scenes to help build a connection for later on in the book, instead of building the connection first before the sex. Luckily for us readers, Richardson was successful.
While I enjoyed the few medical scenes and also what I call the family drama scenes, this book shined for the romance. The mains had this great angsty chemistry between the two of them that really worked well. They don’t always see eye to eye, to say the least, but the sparks were always flying no matter what. And while there is some angst, the characters actually try to communicate even if they were not always successful.
Communication is sometimes the unicorn in lesfic romance, almost never showing up, so I’m happy when I see a book like this. There are other ways to add angst and drama to a story besides using the old fallback of no communication. Anyway, back to the romance, not only was the chemistry good but the sex scenes were too. They were not really what I would call steamy, but because of the good chemistry the characters had, it seemed to add to the quality of the sex scenes.
This book came at a perfect time for me. I was getting tired of writing only so-so reviews. I would defiantly recommend this one to romance fans especially if you want a story that is a bit different and not so cookie-cutter. Richardson knows how to write and I’m hopeful others will enjoy this as much as I did. 4 stars.
An ARC was given to me for an honest review.
