Release Day Review ~ Three Little Words by Allison Cassatta

Release Day Review ~ Three Little Words by Allison Cassatta

Title: Three Little Words
Author: Allison Cassatta
Release Date: August 26, 2016
Category: Contemporary
Pages: 200

Goodreads

Buy it at Dreamspinner Press

Blurb:

Is it better to keep some secrets locked away?

Matt thought his life was perfect, but he learns there’s no such thing when the man he planned to marry breaks his heart and leaves him holding the pieces. Needing to escape and lick his wounds, Matt heads to New England to spend time on his brother’s lobster boat. A one-night stand proves to him that empty sex does nothing to mend old hurt, and neither does running away.

So when Matt’s best friend, Luke, a firefighter, is seriously injured, Matt steps up, even if it means facing bigotry and ignorance. Luke has been hiding his feelings from Matt all their lives, and revealing them after so many years won’t make life easier for either of them. But nothing worth having ever comes easily….

**Copy provided to Bayou Book Junkie by Dreamspinner Press in exchange for a fair and honest review**

Matt comes home from a work trip to find a Dear John letter from his boyfriend of five years. In an effort to start fresh, he decides to take a break from his life and spend some time with his brother who owns a fishing boat on the east coast. Before Matt leaves, his best friend Luke decides to tell him how he feels for him, adding to Matt's confusion.  

Matt has crushed on and been in love with his best friend for years, but was unaware of Luke's sexuality since he didn't seem to date.  Luke is a firefighter and sees his chance to show Matt how he feels now that he's single.  He encourages Matt to go to his brother's home and to figure things about for himself and then to come back to Luke so they can explore their feelings together. 

While Matt is hanging out with his brother Mark, he works on Mark's fishing crew and works on figuring out what comes next.  And he spends the time learning about this brother's life as they don't seem to know a lot about the other.  It's also revealed during this time that Matt and Mark have an older brother who died before Matt was born and that he was never told about this brother until he discovered a picture of him when he was a child.  I thought this was an odd story line as it didn't seem to serve a purpose.  In addition, I thought it was weird that Matt would have been given his dead brother's name for a middle name, but the family never mentioned he existed.

When Luke is hospitalized with a work injury, Matt rushes back home to be by his side and to take care of him and he realizes what has been in front of him all along.  But things do not continue easily, as the reason Luke has never shared his feelings before is because he knew how his parents would react.  Luke's father is a homophobe and immediately refuses to have anything to do with his son.  My one thought about Luke's father being such a homophobe is that I couldn't imagine him allowing a friendship between Luke and Matt through school.

This book is entirely in Matt's POV and about how he deals with the breakup and the changes that are happening in his life.  Break-ups are hard and having minute by minute access to Matt's head while he's dealing with the break-up is a lot and quite depressing, but I imagine it's typically how people feel when going through these life changes.

I enjoyed the second half of this book more than the first half and the book wrapped up with HEA's all around.

Rating: 3.5 Stars