Sleeper

* 2.5 stars ?? maybe ?? i can’t figure this book out. it started out amazing — the first book that’s made me actually smile in a while — but after about halfway through the drama just annoyed me. i loved shane & willa so much, but the whole “give up your dream to be with my demonic daughter and my cheating ex-wife and mother of said demonic daughter” ruined everything for me. i literally ended up reading the second half of the book with a frown on my face, because i felt like willa deserved SO much better and most of the other main characters just became so unlikeable and awful. i really thought this was going to be a new favorite, but i genuinely can’t stand unlikeable characters, especially when the love interest expects the protagonist to somehow want to be with these characters that are awful to her. i’m really sad that this disappointed me, but hopefully other people who don’t care about a protagonist’s dreams and feelings as much as i do will love this.

Glad I read Charmer first. This one just didn’t have as much charm for lack of a better word and I vastly preferred Charmer to Sleeper. Charmer was sweet and imho had deeper and better character development than Sleeper. And I just liked the characters in Charmer much more than the ones in this story. It was hard to feel sorry for Shane - I mean, here's a guy who lives in a McMansion with ocean views, has a housekeeper, money to outsource all the things, and doesn't have to work since he just wrapped up a film. But we're supposed to feel bad that he can't get his shit together enough to be a single parent for his twins because he has insomnia and his nanny quit. Bring me my tiny violin, stat! Willa was OK as a character - didn't love her, didn't hate her. Ditto for Shane. I thought it was strange that Nico is his BFF yet apparently they never talked about his sister because Shane didn't even remember her name. Seems weird that he didn't at least know that much. The kids though.... as I mentioned in my Charmer review, I read that book first and Summer and Lucky came across as little hellions in that book so perhaps I was predisposed not to like them. Lucky was mostly OK but Summer really got on my nerves. Unlike Tate in Charmer, these 2 kids are the reason why a lot of romance readers don't like kids as main characters in the story.