Dee Ernst

A sparkling romantic comedy starring a bestselling author who goes to Paris to overcome writer's block and rediscovers family, independence, and love along the way. All Maggie Bliss needs to do is write. Forty-eight years old and newly single (again!), she ventures to Paris in a last-ditch effort to finish her manuscript. With a marvelous apartment at her fingertips and an elegant housekeeper to meet her every need, a finished book—and her dream of finally taking her career over the top—is surely within her grasp. After all, how could she find anything except inspiration in Paris, with its sophistication, food, and romance in the air? But the clock is running out, and between her charming ex-husband arriving in France for vacation and a handsome Frenchman appearing one morning in her bathtub, Maggie’s previously undisturbed peace goes by the wayside. Charming and heartfelt, Dee Ernst's Maggie Finds Her Muse is a delightful and feel-good novel about finding love, confidence, and inspiration in all the best places.

A Novel

Maggie Finds Her Muse

debre

I received a complimentary copy of this ebook ARC from the author, publisher, and Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

My rating: ★★★★


I think I've read it somewhere that this was similar to Beach Read, and Emily Henry's book was one of my faves from 2020, so of course, I had to check Maggie Finds Her Muse, and I wasn't disappointed.

Maggie Bliss is a romance author who has writer's block. When she finds out that her live-in boyfriend thinks he is more important than her, she leaves him and decides to go finish her book by going on a trip with her agent Lee to Paris. Will she be able to find her inspiration and find love again? Read on and find out for yourself.

The premise is great, and I love that the MC was in her late 40s, it's not every day that you find romance books with older women finding love again, and this one was light-hearted and entertaining. Definitely recommend!

Swati Raisinghani

Maggie Finds Her Muse by Dee Ernst is my first read by this author and I thoroughly enjoyed it! The storyline was pretty simple but it had the right mix of humor, drama, and emotion to keep me going till the end. 

I liked how each character had their own unique quirks and was flawed like a normal person. It made some of the scenarios seem more realistic and not just something one would read in a fictional book. Yes, the whole flying off the Paris to get out of writer's block and having an unlimited budget is something we all dream about but the way the characters were weaved into this story was very appealing

I liked Dee Ernst's writing style and would definitely try more of her works...

Thank you #NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for this entertaining read. I found a new author to add to my list!

Readometer rating - 4*/5

Kim 

Rating: 3/5 stars

Huge thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for sending me this e-arc for an honest review. 

If you love to travel, always wanted to go to Paris, love reading romance books, or want to know the life of an author, then this is the book for you. 


When I first read the synopsis of this book, I was hooked and excited to read this book. However, the execution of this book was lacking for me. Throughout the book, I felt that there was a lot of filler scenes that could be cut, but also there were scenes that I wish had a little bit more depth. In those scenes where Maggie was writing the book, I wish we got to see a word count or chapter count of her progress. On the other hand, the descriptive writing of the food to the atmosphere is what caught my eye, as I was reading this book. 

Throughout the book, Maggie was annoying, cringe, and made poor choices while she's in Paris. I couldn't care less for the other characters except for Nicole (Maggie's daughter). 


Overall if you're in the mood to read a fast-pace book with travel and romance, along with diving into an author's life, give this book a chance to read.

I feel like I would give this book 2.75-3 stars because there were some tropes included that I didn't like.
(view spoiler)[I love the representation of an older protagonist and a person with Asperger's. I thought that those elements made the book feel more realistic and likable. I did not, however, like the misinformation and lying to get what you want tropes. those really killed the vibe of the book. I understood that her motivation for lying was to keep her career, but I honestly think that Max would not have minded being her muse for her book and that he probably would have understood. I also didn't like that Max was the one to do the big romantic gesture. Maggie, in my opinion, was In the wrong, and therefore should have been the one to do said romantic gesture. 
One thing that I did like was the atmosphere. Paris and its many cuisines were described in great detail. I also loved Max's mom and her dog, they were honestly my favorite characters in the book. I honestly feel that I would have liked the book more had there been more honesty.
 (hide spoiler)]

Caitlyn DeRouin

Trigger warnings: Sex (somewhat detailed descriptions), mentions of a teacher-student relationship (20-year-old college junior and her professor), divorce, mentions of parental death (car accident), mention of cancer, ableist language 

Maggie Finds Her Muse focuses on forty-eight-year-old author Maggie Bliss as she struggles to write the third and final book in her bestselling trilogy. When her agent suggests that she travel to Paris with him and his partner she takes him up on the offer in the hopes that she'll be able to finally get started on her book. While in Paris she not only finds her muse, but she finds it in the handsome Frenchman, Max.

The premise of Maggie Finds Her Muse drew me to the book right away. I absolutely adore Paris (well what I know of it as I have never been) and since quarantine has the travel bug in me itching even more than usual, I thought that this book would be a great escape. While I found the book to be easy to read and follow with good descriptive writing, it fell a bit flat to me. I found myself getting a bit annoyed with Maggie throughout much of the book. While I understand that she's feeling just a little bit lost, especially when it comes to her book, and looking for something to spark her creativity I found her to be a bit childish. In fact, I felt like she came off as someone in their late 20s-early 30s and not a woman in her late 40s. I found her to be a bit flaky and aloof. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but in this case, it made me get a little annoyed with her.

I also felt that she made some very questionable choices. While this happened in the past, it made me very uncomfortable that her first husband she met when she was a junior in college and he was her professor. They in fact began a relationship when she was still in school and were married shortly after she had finished school. Her ex, Alan, is a very nice man and respectful and clearly still cares about her (as she does for him) but the origin of their relationship, even though she was 20, made me uncomfortable. She also had a lot of communication issues and it bothered me. In fact, she talks about how in her books she doesn't like to use the Big Miscommunication trope, but that's exactly what she does in her own life. I kind of just wanted to shake her and say "Maggie, if you used your words this wouldn't be an issue"

While yes, you know right away that there's a spark between her and Max, I wasn't very invested in them. I found myself thinking, "alright, when are they going to get together?" but when it happened I didn't feel too strongly about it. I thought "finally", but not in the 'YES I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS" kind of way, but in the "well we knew that was going to happen it just took forever"

For me, the side characters were the best characters. In fact, I think my favorite character was Maggie and Alan's daughter Nicole. Nicole lives in France, has good relationships with both of her parents, has a great boyfriend whom she clearly adores, and is portrayed as a confident, intelligent, and kind person. We find out in the book that she has trouble in some social situations and Maggie tells us that in her junior year of high school they found out that Nicole has Aspergers. Now, I'm not a parent, but I think that waiting until your child's junior year in high school is a bit neglectful especially if the entire reason why you had them go to a psychologist is because of how much trouble they were having socially. They were definitely having that trouble before then, so why would you wait that long? Really though my issue was that sometimes Maggie would say things about her daughter that would rub me the wrong way. Part of Nicole's personality is that she just straight up tells it like it is. She's not rude or brash, she simply says what she's thinking and moves on. She doesn't ever intend to upset someone. There's one point where she's teasing her mom because, as Maggie has said herself, she's not great with directions and Maggie says (not to her), something along the lines of "I love my daughter but sometimes she can be a real bitch." I found that so odd. I can state for a fact that even if I was being a bitch to my mother, she would never say that about me. That sounded like someone talking about their 'tell-it-like-it-is' best friend and not their daughter. There was also some ableist language that just bothered me. Sometimes Maggie made it seem like she had to try so hard to make sure that she was looking at things through her daughter's eyes and how difficult that could be for her, but not acknowledging how things could be difficult for Nicole. Furthermore, I don't think Maggie would've actually owned up to some of her actions if it weren't for Nicole, and when it backfired for Maggie, Nicole felt like she had done something wrong when in fact, she'd gone out of her way to support her mother.

Overall Maggie Finds Her Muse is fine. Really the 3rd star is because the book had an easy-to-follow writing style and I read it all in one sitting.

Yana Khalid

This was light and funny and really short i guess. It REALLYYY made me homesick for Paris even tho I’ve never been to Paris in my whole life. :( 

The author’s writing pulls you in with her mindful descriptions and easy flow.

Irin 

3.75/5 ⭐
I think I'm finally out of my reading slump, and I've to thank Maggie Finds Her Muse for that! This book was addictive and fast paced through and through. I couldn't keep it down an all! 🧡 The blurb pulled me in from the first time I read it ~  Maggie, a bestselling author visits Paris to find the motivation (ie. her muse) to finish the third book in her trilogy. It sounded very interesting, and I'm very happy to say I enjoyed Maggie's journey with my whole heart! :') Swipe to read full synopsis. 

🌻 Things I loved about MFHM : 
1) Maggie's writing process was just the best thing ever. I know that all authors have their unique way of writing books, so getting to experience Maggie pen down different incidents for her book was such a treat! 
2) The descriptions of Maggie's day in Paris were 💯 All the talk about food and  different scenic spots made reading MFHM such an enjoyable ride. 
3) The humor and comedic situations made me laugh my heart out a lot of times! Maggie was very funny and charming; her sense of humor made me love her even more. 
4) All the supporting characters were such amazing additions to the story! Max, Solange, Alan, Nicole won my heart. I loved how the author gave each of the characters their own space to influnence Maggie's life choices, which was very necessary for the storyline. 

🌻 Things that disappointed me : 
1) Nicole, Maggie's daughter had Asperger's Syndrome, but it didn't get proper representation throughout the story. It was just talked about twice, which was really disappointing since Maggie was really concerned about Nicole. 
2) The romance and the love triangle lacked the depth it needed. I felt as if the relationship started out of nowhere, without a proper foundation. The main hero didn't have a lot of scenes with Maggie too. :( 

MFHM lacked a bit on the romance + representation department, but the backdrop of Paris, fascinating characters, plotline and character development made it a very enjoyable book. I'm glad I read it! 

Many thanks to the publisher for the free book in exchange of an honest review. 💙

Maggie Finds Her Muse A Novel

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