“When the moon hits your eye, like a big pizza pie
That’s amore…
When the world seems to shine like you’ve had too much wine
That’s amore…”
I’m going to let you all in on a little secret. Shhh!!
It was a secret dream of mine to marry an Italian man, dance around our
kitchen singing that song, and making spaghetti. Yeah, I can hear it now, “That’s so cute,” or
“Kids have the best imaginations.” Ha! I
was daydreaming of this when I was nineteen.
Then I met my stubborn German, and fell in love. Even to this day though, I still look back at
that dream and smile.
THAT’S AMORE!
With stories by
Jenelle Denison, Tori Carrington, and Leslie Kelly
BOOK DESCRIPTION
It’s
way too late to elope!
MEET THE PARENTS by
Janelle Denison
Like all dutiful Hawaiian daughters, Leila Malekala is
expected to marry a Hawaiian groom handpicked by her parents. But guess what,
Mom and Dad? Leila has wedding plans of her own. The groom is California bad
boy Jason Crofton… and the bride is pregnant.
I DO, DON’T I? by
Tori Carrington
Efi Panayotopoulou is about to marry her childhood
sweetheart Nick Constantino. Everything should be perfect. But their families
seem hell-bent on turning the wedding into a farce – or Greek tragedy. And Efi
is about a baklava flake away from running off… without
her groom.
THERE GOES THE GROOM
by Leslie Kelly
Luke Santori is engaged to “a nice Italian
girl” from his Chicago neighborhood. But wedding plans get tossed –
like unbaked dough at his family’s pizzeria – when Luke
falls for blond-haired, blue-eyed Rachel Grant… the dressmaker designing his fiancée’s bridal gown.
MY REVIEW
4 out of 5 *Stars*
It had been so long since I read one
of these feel good books that does nothing but make you smile. I used to read a ton of them. Almost every short story romance book is one.
Once I got into the hard core suspenseful reading, I put them completely
to the back of my mind. When I picked this
book up, it took me a little bit to get used to the feeling of not having that
nail-biting suspense. It was as if I had
forgotten what it was like to just let loose and breathe easy while reading.
That’s exactly what this book
did. Each story was unique and
different, but yet it tied into each other through a company that had sent the
wrong wedding favors to each bride and groom.
Therefore, it made a book that technically was sectioned off into three
parts, be connected to make one single story.
All the stories were well written
and succeeded in drawing in the reader. We
get to see the many difference between Hawaiian, Greek, Italian wedding
traditions. Out of all of them, I
believe that the second story was my favorite.
I don’t know whether to be grateful or sad that I’m not Greek. Their traditions sound totally off the wall, extreme,
and maybe a little suffocating at times.
“The marital bed was prepared by the
single women. Rose petals for
romance. Sugar-covered almonds to
indicate the bitter sweetness of love and life.
Even her Cousin Helen’s baby was rolled across the mattress for
fertility reasons.”
However, then there’s the aspect of
being surrounded by family and so many people there to love and support you, no
matter how crazy they might be. Like a
crazy grandfather Kiriakos that is arrested the day before your wedding for
grand larceny.
“The officer stared at her. ‘It
means he crashed his car through the window of a local furniture shop and made
off with some of the goods. When the
responding officers caught up with him, he was dragging a dining-room table on
a blanket on the street behind him.’
Her wedding gift of a dining-room
table…”
I laugh even now remembering that
scene. I swear, the story was a lot like
the movie, My Big Fat Greek Wedding but with the added look into hidden emotions
and thought. I kept wanting to pull out
and read next to a bottle of Windex.
Anyways, I liked all three
stories. The first had some steamy love
scenes, and the love story in the third felt really rushed but still fun and
carefree at the same time. Once
returning this book to the library, I immediately walked back and got another
short story romance book. We’ll have to
wait and see if the new one has the same effect on me. Till next time…
22 books down, 30 to go!
Happy Reading, Everyone!!
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