Breakaway Books

Authored by Tessa Bailey; Published 2023; Romance

⭐️⭐️ / 🏖️🏖️🏖️🏖️

Secretly Yours is everything that I was taught romance novels are. Full of tropes—inexperienced ingenue heroine, exceedingly competent hero, etc.—that may not be the most empowering for young female readers. It was also *very* spicy, almost gratuitously so. That being said, there were some bright spots.

In Secretly Yours, Hallie is enjoying her messy life running a gardening business in Napa Valley when her old crush Julian comes back to town. Unfortunately, his family has hired Hallie to beautify their vineyard, so she is forced into his proximity and feels—at best—incredibly awkward about it. She takes shelter behind the guise of a secret admirer but ultimately proves to be an unfortunate distraction for Julian, who is supposed to be devoting himself to drafting a novel back home.

Who doesn’t love to imagine themselves in Napa Valley in California? I did enjoy letting my imagination run wild through an expansive vineyard and Hallie’s beautiful flowers adorning the elegant buildings. It felt like a vacation of sorts just to be able to read about Hallie planning different elaborate floral arrangements; my mind was enthralled with the beauty. If only I had been equally enthralled with the romance…

The obstacles between Hallie and Julian are not, I would say, particularly serious—miscommunication, yet another trope, is the primary hindrance for the two. Yet, Julian does have a clinical anxiety problem, which presents its own issues for him. I didn’t love the way his anxiety was portrayed, but I did like the way that it made clear that anxiety shouldn’t be considered a defect that prevents a person from taking on real responsibility. I can only hope that’s a concept that has disappeared with the times. Apart from Julian’s anxiety and Hallie’s shyness, the romance progresses predictably and inexorably toward its inevitable conclusion, but what else would you expect when you pick this book up?

Secretly Yours borders on a vibes romance. Take a vicarious vacation to California, have a glass of wine, and enjoy!