Title: Picture Winter
Author: Amy Aislin
Publisher: MLR Press
Length: 167 Pages
Category: Contemporary
At a Glance: Thought it wasn’t my favorite of Aislin’s books—it did get off to somewhat of a slow start for me—it was still a worthy little read.
Reviewed By: Jules
Blurb: Do something new today.
Why he looks at his horoscope every day, Elias Hood doesn’t know. It’s all garbage, and no nickel fortune ever helped him climb all the way up the corporate ladder. He’s about to make Vice President. Rocking the boat with “something new” is the last thing on his mind.
But there’s this guy.
Ty Green can make friends with a tree and Elias can’t help falling for his easy-going vibe and his perfect smile. He’s a fellow Capricorn, like Elias, but that’s as far as their similarities go. Ty works to live–he doesn’t live to work. When Elias takes his horoscope’s advice and asks Ty out, both men are in for a shock. But as Elias’s walls start to come down, they might just realize that they have more in common than they think. In fact, they might even want the exact same thing.
Who knows? Maybe horoscopes aren’t just trash after all.
Review: I have now read all of Amy Aislin’s books, and have enjoyed every one of them. They all have a similar vibe—sweet MCs, maybe friends-to-lovers, or a meet-cute—and typically a pretty fast-moving, i.e., ‘insta love,’ type relationship, but sometimes a cute, feel good story is exactly what you need. In the case of Picture Winter, I didn’t get that smooshy feeling I was looking for until about halfway through the story, unfortunately, but Aislin did deliver in the end. 😉
Elias is a mid-level exec at a big corporation, who, after seven years with the company, is finally on the way to getting the promotion to VP that he has been working toward. The thing is, though, he isn’t fulfilled by his job the way he is by his hobby and true passion of photography. Elias is an amazing photographer, more comfortable behind the camera than in any other aspect of his life, and his wildlife and nature photos are in high demand by several national travel magazines. In fact, CanadaTravels magazine has offered him a full-time position as their Director of Photography, if only he could allow himself to make the leap. However, so far, his security and permanence issues, stemming from childhood, have kept him from following his dream. His whole world gets turned upside down one day, though, when he meets Ty Green.
Ty, who works for the city in waste management, gets into it with Elias one morning when Elias throws his newspaper into the waste bin instead of recycling, and then refuses to listen to Ty regarding the importance of separating the two. Ty is surprised by the stuffy businessman, however, when he approaches him the following three mornings with beverages and pastries in an attempt to apologize for his rudeness. At first Ty tries to keep up the charade of being angry, but eventually Elias sees him quirking a smile, and Ty has to admit that he has just been busting Elias’s balls and agrees to have coffee with him for real.
I really liked these guys together. Their attraction is undeniable from the beginning, and things do escalate pretty quickly between them. Elias helps Ty move into his new house, and though Elias tries to put the brakes on as far as getting physical right away—he’s not looking for another one-night-stand—they do end up spending the night together. They had excellent chemistry; Elias was especially sexy. And, Ty’s habit of falling asleep immediately after orgasm was a cute running joke throughout the book. I liked that they bonded over their shared love of the same tv show. And, even though Elias made a couple of lame assumptions about Ty’s level of education and his job, they were always quick to talk out any issues that arose.
I did have a couple of little problems with the book… On their first coffee date, Elias asked Ty what he did for a living when clearly he knew, as they met when Ty was doing his job. I found Elias’s co-worker, Rachel, to be fairly annoying. And, when the inevitable conflict arose regarding Eli’s issues with Ty’s job, I thought Ty gave in a bit too quickly. I actually felt like he deserved to stay a little mad about it.
As I said, however, in the end the good outweighed the bad, and I quite enjoyed the book. Ty was totally adorable. I loved how close he was to his family, and his dad was awesome. I was definitely sucked into the story, especially regarding Eli’s job and how that was going to play out. What happened wasn’t a surprise, by any means, but I still found it satisfying. And, the end was pretty darn cute. Thought it wasn’t my favorite of Aislin’s books—it did get off to somewhat of a slow start for me—it was still a worthy little read. There is no doubt that I will continue to follow this author’s work.
You can buy Picture Winter here:
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