Thrown by Merry Farmer (The Art of Love Book #1)

TITLE: ⟫ Thrown

AUTHOR: ⟫ Merry Farmer

SERIES: ⟫ The Art of Love Book #1

RATING: ⟫ 2.5/5

BLURB: ⟫ The art of love is falling for your enemy without ruining everything…

Ceramic artist Robbie Hawthorne is dedicated not only to his art, but to keeping the arts center and school housed at his family’s ancestral estate vibrant and flourishing. But when the family runs into financial trouble and a heartless corporation offers to buy the estate to turn it into an amusement park, Robbie has to get creative to try to stop them.

That includes working together with a man he has nothing in common with and who instantly irritates him…

Toby Tillman has fought to overcome his working-class roots and to make a name for himself in the financial world. Now he finds himself pitted against his old mentor in the quest to save the Hawthorne House Arts Center, which is run by exactly the kind of entitled nobs he’s always hated. Worse still, he finds himself constantly hot for Robbie, a man he should utterly despise.

And then comes the road trip and a stay at a hotel with only one bed…

Can two men from opposite sides of the tracks find enough common ground to rescue a family’s heritage? And can enemies end up becoming each other’s salvation?

Thrown is an enemies-to-lovers gay romance that includes one tight-knit family and one family disaster, a Renaissance faire, a reality competition, a road trip, only one bed, constantly being mistaken for boyfriends, an unlikely rescue in a moment of humiliation, a familiar scene involving a pottery wheel, and a few things that would get this blurb flagged for naughtiness if I included them in the description. Oh! And a cameo by The Brotherhood!

REVIEW: ⟫ I wanted to love this book so much. I’ve enjoyed reading Merry Farmer before and thought I’d like what this offered – enemies to lovers, one bed, family – what could be better? But this just didn’t gel for me. There were too many characters to get a full grasp on – I kept mistaking the names of the kids. I found myself not liking the family at all – especially for the hotel thing – and for how they’ve let Robbie feel and treat himself for so long.

Toby was just too much – talk about chip on his shoulder. And as for Duckie and all of those shenanigans, it just left me cold. I don’t remember reading about the Brotherhood before which might explain why my reaction to them was verging on utter disbelief to just finding them too cartoonish.

I can’t say I liked the relationship between Robbie and Toby too much either. Everyone seemed convinced that they were hot for each other from the beginning, but to me they just seemed to find each other unendingly frustrating, and the declaration of love had me slack-jawed with disbelief because I simply couldn’t see where it came from.

I was considering getting the next one in the series but decided to wait and let this one fade from my mind first. This may well be where my mind is at and nothing to do with the book at all, but I didn’t enjoy it.