If You Ask Me

Honestly, it was just okay. a little heavy-handed at times and I could see the author creating scenes to push certain messages out, beyond the advice column. I couldn't get pulled in, and for some reason, even with the backstory, Dez doesn't seem like a real/full character.

Four and a half Stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭒ If You Ask Me by Libby Hubscher is a romantic comedy with an emotional punch. This is not your typical light romcom, but a fun story that also deals with bullying, gaslighting, and mental health issues. Violet Covington writes an advice column for the local Raleigh newspaper under the pen name Dear Sweetie. She writes good solid advice and her column is popular in South Carolina. When she comes home from work early and finds her husband in bed with the neighbor, she goes off the rails a bit. When she burns her husband’s things in the road in front of her house a handsome firefighter, Dex, shows up to put the fire out. The betrayal of her husband puts Violet on a revenge path and her column becomes more bitter and direct than her previous polite advice. Because of this, the column goes viral, and everybody in the country starts reading her blunt advice. But eventually, everything spirals out of control and Violet finds herself almost out of a job, alone, and bitter, and she doesn’t like it. This book is quite the roller coaster of emotions. At first, I thought it was a cute, and predictable romcom, and then it got a bit crazy, and I didn’t like Violet and the choices she was making. But, then Violet realized she was being self-destructive and her path to redemption made this book a very enjoyable and emotional story for me. We had to see her at her worst, in order to appreciate her journey, and I loved how she grew and changed throughout the book. I highly recommend this book to lovers of romance and women’s fiction. I received a complimentary copy of this book. The opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.