📝 What is The Kiss Countdown about?:
Risk-averse and struggling Amerie Price concocts a fake relationship with real astronaut Vincent Rogers to secure housing and boost her fledgling business. As their charade deepens over three months, Amerie grapples with the allure of safety versus the excitement of taking a chance on love with Vincent. With time ticking down, she must choose between playing it safe or reaching for the stars.
📚 Genre: Romance
🎧 Format: E-Book
💞 Feels: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
I liked that this book got right into the meet cute, fake dating, and forced proximity of it all. Amerie and Vincent have an instant attraction, but they’re trying to be friends. She doesn’t have the capacity for a relationship on top of everything else she’s trying to accomplish. Yeah right! Oh and Vincent is an astronaut (I’ve already recommended this book to my astronaut obsessed BF).
This is Etta Easton’s debut novel. I enjoyed her characters, their banter and personality ticks. I was glad Amerie had a friend, but Vincent seemed isolated. Where were his friends to help him sort out his feelings? I guess he had friends, but the book was single POV, so I had to fill in the blanks for him.
When he and Amerie were around each other his actions seemed pretty loud and clear to me. Amerie was a little blind to what he was doing vs. what she was telling herself. I mean they did say they were fake dating, so I can’t blame her for thinking he was playing his part extremely well.
Amerie’s best friend, Gina, was a great side story, I would’ve liked to see more of her. I didn’t like how Gina’s story was resolved. I want her to get her own spinoff, preferably with a different boyfriend. Even though we didn’t get much info on their relationship, I’ve decided he’s not the one for her. Somehow I ended up disliking him, and he’s not even really in the book. He has the same name as her dog and his mother hates her. All the other characters were great. Even when they were being overbearing (Vincent’s mom and sister), I didn’t dislike them. I could see their point of view; and I could sense that they’d come around eventually.
The Kiss Countdown kept a good pace throughout, once it was time for the third act breakup. I’m always bracing for the breakup, I was okay with it. It needed to happen because Amerie was in such an in-between state. Nothing in her life was solid – not her job, her mother’s health, or her living situation. Them breaking up was necessary. Amerie needed to be alone for a little while, gain some maturity and start being honest with herself and others. Vincent was definitely the more mature of the two of them.
I would recommend this book to anyone in the mood for a cute romance, where the female lead believes the lies she tells herself and likes to play it safe; and the male lead is a thrill seeker who keeps what he treasures most close to the vest.
✅ Spinoff novella nomination:
Gina and a new boyfriend lol
What are you reading? Let me know in the comments.