Review of ‘Love at Cooper’s Creek’ by Missouri Vaun,

Audiobook narrated by Brittni Pope

When Shaw Daily escapes San Francisco to her grandparents’ town of Cooper’s Creek to decompress from the stress of her corporate career, she finds there more than she bargained for. In the rural town, she meets Kate Elkins, a beautiful school teacher in a sabbatical year to care for her aging mother. Along with love, Shaw discovers unexpected family secrets. Will Shaw be able to make peace with her past and take her budding relationship with Kate to the next level?

This book goes beyond the typical sweet romance and explores difficult subjects such as life choices, bereavement, aging, and dementia. The author touches all these issues with tact and, at the same time, keeps our focus on the beautiful love story. The chemistry between the mains, the multi-layered secondary characters, and the well-structured plot contribute towards a very pleasant read.

I’ve read this book a while ago and this time I’ve listened to the audiobook narrated by Brittni Pope. I have to admit that I’m not a fan of this narrator but I understand that it’s a matter of taste. While I like Ms. Pope’s voice, I find that her pace is too laid-back for me. That shouldn’t be a major problem as I could easily play the audiobook at a faster speed but I don’t like some of her pauses in the middle of a sentence or a paragraph, maybe it’s me so just take it with a pinch of salt. I’ve listened to her narration of Kris Bryant’s ‘Listen’ and I felt the same way. However, I thought that in this book her voices are marginally more distinctive (though not at all in the case of male characters) but not enough for me to appreciate it fully. Having said that, I liked her southern drawl performance of Kate, I think she got that character spot-on.

Length: 8 hours and 13 minutes

Overall, even though I think that the book is so much better, this is a very good return to hometown lesbian audiobook. 5 stars for the story, 4 stars for the narration. 4.5 stars.