I wanted more groveling. Love Her or Lose Her by Tessa Bailey [ARC Review]

I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review.
This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Rosie and Dominic Vega are the perfect couple: high school sweethearts, best friends, madly in love. Well, they used to be, anyway. Now, Rosie’s lucky to get a caveman grunt from the ex-soldier every time she walks in the door. Dom is faithful and a great provider, but the man she fell in love with 10 years ago is nowhere to be found. When her girlfriends encourage Rosie to demand more out of life and pursue her dream of opening a restaurant, she decides to demand more out of love, too. Three words: marriage boot camp.

Never in a million years did Rosie believe her stoic, too-manly-to emote husband would actually agree to relationship rehab with a weed-smoking hippie. Dom talking about feelings? Sitting on pillows? Communing with nature? Learning love languages? Nope. But to her surprise, he’s all in, and it forces her to admit her own role in their cracked foundation. As they complete one ridiculous – yet surprisingly helpful – assignment after another, their remodeled relationship gets stronger than ever. Except just as they’re getting back on track, Rosie discovers Dom has a secret… and it could demolish everything.

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Heat Level: Steamy

Love Her or Lose Her is one of my highly anticipated books of 2020 and I am here to report that it did not live up to my hype – for me, at least.

I really, really, really wanted to love Love Her or Lose Her, unfortunately, I was really disappointed in Rosie and Dominic’s second chance romance. In Fix Her Up, the first book in the series, we are introduced to Rosie and teased with a hint of her relationship with Dom that is on the rocks.

What really disappointed me is that this book doesn’t really focus on Rosie and Dom’s relationship development. I feel like there needed to be more emphasis on the rekindling of their relationship since this is a second-chance romance and the second chance also happens immediately after Rosie leaves Dom.

I also think that there was more emphasis on the sexytimes (not that I am complaining) instead of relationship development. Another thing that I wanted more of is for Dom and Rosie to talk more and reconnect more because lack of communication was initially the root cause of their growing apart.

Love Her or Lose Her still has Tessa Bailey’s stamp of steam and romance, and it is well written. Unfortunately, I did not believe that Rosie and Dom’s relationship would survive the second time around because we weren’t shown that their relationship was indeed repaired. To be honest, I also think that Dominic should have groveled more. Especially about the secret that he was keeping from Rosie.

On a positive note, I appreciate the fact that Rosie and Dom are diverse characters. I liked the fact that there was really an emphasis on their culture and how they grew up – especially for Dom and Rosie. I also liked that Tessa Bailey made this book about Rosie realizing her dreams in the midst of everything she was going through.

Overall, I thought this was an okay read, but nothing in this book really wowed me, as the first book did. We are also teased with the next book (I hope) and the next couple, and I can’t wait to read it.

What is your favorite second-chance romance with a good groveling scene?