Release Day Review: Earning His Trust by Alicia Nordwell

Title: Earning His Trust

Author: Alicia Nordwell
Release Date: September 6, 2017
Category: Contemporary
Pages: TBD (Novella)

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Evin lost the only two men he ever loved. But he might get a second chance with one of them—if he’s willing to take the risk.

Following the death of his husband, Evin is living in Portland and raising the infant son they had through a surrogate. Six-month-old Micah is his life, and if it means no time for activities or friendships beyond his minuscule support network, that’s a sacrifice Evin is willing to make. When he suffers a burn baking teething biscuits, the last person Evin expects to encounter in the ER is Ben, his lover from college—and the man who left him without a word of explanation.

Ben knows it won’t be easy to earn Evin’s trust and prove he’s not the same man Evin once knew, but he can’t bear to watch Evin struggle to care for Micah, hurting and alone. He wants back in Evin’s life, as a friend and hopefully more, but Evin’s heart is fragile, and the years have changed him too.

3 Stars

This book had two very standoffish MC's. Evin, a widower, is raising his six-month-old son alone and ends up in the ER due to burning his hand while baking. To his utter surprise, his doctor ends up being Ben, his ex-boyfriend who up and left him years prior. Now Evin can barely stand to look at him. Ben is persistent though and convinced Evin to take a chance at rekindling a friendship. From friendship the two men find they may be getting a second chance.

Truthfully, I felt absolutely no chemistry between the two characters. From the moment they came face to face with one another after years apart until the very end. I did not find them being a couple at all believable personally. It was as if this wall or something existed between them that they were never quite able to knock down, a sort of tension I guess.

Overall, this story didn't really do it for me. The writing wasn't bad and the premise was good it just didn't feel like a romance story. It's hard to fall in love with a book when you're apathetic towards the characters.

***Copy provided to Bayou Book Junkie by Dreamspinner Press for my reading pleasure in hopes of an unbiased opinion, a review was not a requirement.***

*Copy provided to Bayou Book Junkie by Dreamspinner Press for my reading pleasure in hopes of an unbiased opinion, a review was not a requirement.*

Earning His Trust is a standalone novella by Alicia Nordwell. I think novellas are difficult because you have to get a full story into a short number of pages. Typically, some of the best novellas I have read are a second chance love trope. It's more believable that men with a previous history can find a HEA in 112 pages, at least in my opinion. I liked Evin and Ben and would have liked to have gotten to know more about them. I felt like there was so much backstory that I needed to make me connect with these characters. It sounded like Evin's dead husband was a really good man, and his death was hard on Evin but even though Evin misses him, there's not a lot of information about what happened. We do get a little of the backstory of Evin and Ben, but I just wanted more about them. I enjoyed the time of both men interacting with the baby, it gives a different look at the characters but in this novella, the interactions with the baby take away from Evin and Ben finding love again.

For me, there was just a disconnect to the MC's. I didn't hate their story, I just didn't feel their story. I wanted to feel their reconnection, their love, their romance and their HEA but I didn't. Again, I didn't hate this story, I just wanted more from it.

Rating: 3.5 stars