Breakaway Books

Authored by Cindy Steel; Published 2022; Romance

⭐️⭐️ / 🏖️🏖️🏖️🏖️

If you like your romances Hallmark-style and completely predictable, you might enjoy That Fine Line. It’s exactly what you would expect from the story of a farm girl who comes home from her big city life the summer before her wedding.

In That Fine Line, Kelsey is excited to start her life with fiance Parker after one last summer at home in Idaho. But as soon as she arrives at her parents’ ranch, she begins to feel conflicted and worries that Parker doesn’t fit into her family’s idyllic rural life. To make matters worse, Kelsey’s old nemesis Cade has taken a job on her family’s ranch and quickly reignites the prank war the two had waged all throughout their school years. Perhaps those pranks are exactly what Kelsey needs to get in touch with what she really wants.

Look, I know that there are many, many people who love living in the country, having their own space, and not feeling crowded in with their neighbors. I am not one of them. I like being around people, and I like living in cities. Reading this book, I felt borderline offended at how poorly “city” people are represented. Parker and his family are ultra-focused on physical appearance and work, and just like Kelsey’s family, I don’t like them. I don’t love that their poor qualities are the stand-in for what it’s like to live off the farm. But I was most troubled by the way Kelsey is described—growing up on the farm, she’s said to be fun and lively, but when she goes to college, her father complains that she loses her spark and works too hard. It felt like a condemnation of her ambition and her desire to have a career in the city. 

I cannot say that I am a fan of either of Kelsey’s suitors, either. Parker is certainly a jerk–what moron doesn’t realize it’s a bad idea to keep talking to your bride about her weight in the lead-up to the wedding? But neither do I particularly enjoy Cade, who seems, at best, an emotionally immature jock, and at worst, a bumbling fool. I understand there are people who enjoy playing tricks on each other, but for that to be the entire basis for a relationship that very quickly evolves from friendship to marriage? That does not seem like a steady foundation to me. Not to mention the many times that Cade’s pranks border on sexual harassment. Couldn’t he have just told Kelsey that he liked her after, I don’t know, maybe five years of pranks, instead of nearly two decades? Then again, Kelsey’s not ranking high on the emotional intelligence scale either, so perhaps I just struggled to enjoy either of them.

If you love Hallmark-style farm romances, That Fine Line may be perfect for you. It wasn’t for me.