Love a Little Sideways by Shannon Stacey

Title: Love a Little Sideways

Series: Kowalski bk 7

Author: Shannon Stacey

Genre: Contemporary

Liz Kowalski is heading home to Whitford, Maine—this time for good. Eager for her family, a fresh start and some fun, she doesn’t count on being rescued by the chief of police her very first night back in town. Drew is everything she’s not looking for…so why is she still so attracted to him?

After a brief, forbidden rendezvous at her brother’s wedding, Drew Miller expects Liz to return to New Mexico and stay there. He’s searching for someone to settle down with, not a casual fling with his best friend’s sister. But when they’re stuck together on the annual Kowalski camping trip, things start going a little sideways. Keeping their hands off each other proves just as impossible as keeping their secret from becoming public knowledge.

Amid family, mud and melted marshmallow, Liz and Drew try to fight what’s growing between them. But a little time alone, a lot of chemistry and too many opinions might be just what it takes to bring together two people so determined not to fall in love.

Thoughts: You how when you are reading a series, and two secondary characters just seem to stick with you? You want to know more about them, but more importantly you want them to get their happily ever after. In the Maine Kowalski family books it was Drew and Liz for me.

My heart broke for him in All He Ever Needed when he found out his wife wasn’t just avoiding the whole kids issue, she’d out and out lied to him about it. Watching him go through his divorce made my heart ache for him, and I wanted him to get his HEA.

Liz was one of those characters we heard about but didn’t see. All we knew was her brothers hated the guy she was with and that she lived clear across the country. The tiny glimpses we got of her intrigued me, and made me want to know more about her.

When Drew and Liz had their quickie at Mitch and Paige’s wedding I had a feeling they would be getting together.

In Love a Little Sideways Liz is finally back home. She has a plan for her life. Sort of. She’s not really sure about anything, other than she wants to do something, or someone. And the someone she wants to do is the last person she should be lusting after.  Not because he’s married, but because he’s her brother’s best friend.

Drew hasn’t been able to stop thinking about Liz since their quickie at his best friend, her brother’s, wedding. While she lived clear across the country it was one thing. Now she’s home and he see’s her every day. Making his lust that much harder to resist.

I’ve loved all the books in the series, but Drew and Liz are my favorite books. I loved how they fought their attraction while building a new kind of friendship, one where her brother Mitch isn’t in the middle. That is until they have to spend a week camping with the entire Kowalski family. That is where things come to a head between them.

Once again Stacey has delivered a story that sucks you in and keeps you there. I was glued to the pages of this book, and read it one sitting. As soon as I was done I wanted to read it again. It’s that good.

If you are a fan of this series you won’t want to miss this book. It has everything we’ve come to love about this series and family.

Grade A