Ugly Love

Brace yourself, for this one definitely gets ugly!
Rain

Outline

I am particularly not a fan of the romance genre and haven’t really read many. But, I like romantic books with plots which are slightly different from the usual boy-meets-girl kinda story. This is why I made an exception with this one. This isn’t the first book on casual relationships, but the synopsis actually made me believe that I could expect something different here.

The story revolves around Miles Archer and Tate Collins. Miles is an airline pilot. Tate is pursuing her master’s in nursing and also working part time at the nursing school. She comes to San Francisco to move in with her brother, Colin and that’s how she meets Miles for the first time. Miles happens to be the next-door neighbour and the story of their first meet is actually a funny one.

Tate and Miles have an undeniable attraction towards each other. They are both single. Miles works too much. He has tragic past and doesn’t want a relationship. Tate wants to focus on her career and doesn’t have the time for a relationship. Based on the lives they lead, they chalk out that they even if they wanted a relationship out of this, it wouldn’t be possible. So, the only thing that’s left is sex. They decide on a no-strings-attached relationship. They haven’t really been friends since the beginning, so they also don’t have to worry about their friendship getting ruined.

Miles has two rules for Tate :

Never ask about the past
Don’t expect a future

Tate agrees to both, though reluctantly.

The book starts out great, but gradually goes downhill to a point that there is no coming back. As you move into the story, you realise that it is nothing but a collection of borrowed plots stitched together. It offers nothing you wouldn’t already have read or watched in a movie. With the kind of progression the book offered, the ending wasn’t a surprise either but did make me go bleh. I had really given up on the book way before the end, but only kept going because once I start a book, I just have to finish it. No matter, how much I hate it. Which in hindsight wasn’t the best decision when it comes to this book.

The book has been narrated from multiple point of views, alternating back and forth between the past and the present.

It delves into Miles’ past to explore his backstory revealing what caused him to become the person he has become today. The present-time narration has been done from Tate’s point of view. I honestly feel that the author really went neck-deep into exploring Miles’ life almost wanting us to sympathise with him. However, we barely get to know about Tate even though she is the main character. We know about Tate’s present but it would have helped to know more about her as a person. It was almost like the book was primarily about Miles and had nothing to do with Tate.

I personally wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. In fact, I would want to go back in time and undo reading this.

Sorry fans.