Tracy Goodwin | With Neighbors Like This

The Book:

With Neighbors Like This by Tracy Goodwin
Published August 2nd 2022 by Sourcebooks Casablanca
Date read: August 2, 2022

The Characters:

Amelia
Kyle

Buy it on Bookshop.org | Amazon

The Plot (from Goodreads):

A single mom fighting for what’s right to make a new home for her kids

Enemies-to-lovers romance by way of the Homeowners Association

Building a community of friends and neighbors

What makes a house a home is the people inside, not the decor outside

When divorced mom of two Amelia Marsh relocates to a northern suburb of Houston, all she wants is a bit of normalcy for her children. The last thing she needs is to be the center of community gossip. But when a disagreement between Amelia and the HOA representative over whether or not her children’s garden gnome violates the association’s rules, Amelia doesn’t back down. HOA President Kyle Sanders would begin to be a good friend-and something more-if Amelia wasn’t gearing up for battle with the HOA in her determination to make her house a home and her neighborhood a community.

The Review:

I love me a good mommy drama! There’s something about a single mom standing up for herself and her kids in the face of a snooty neighbor that I just can’t resist.

With Neighbors Like This reminded me of The Truth and Other Hidden Things, Welcome to the Neighborhood, and Mom Jeans and Other Mistakes. Wow, this genre loves its long titles!

The scenes of Amelia putting Carla in her place were, of course, my favorite.

I enjoyed Amelia as the main character. She was strong, confident, and a great advocate for her kids. I liked her wit and sarcasm. I’m not sure how she balanced a full-time job, single motherhood, researching tenant’s rights and still had time to organize Easter egg hunts, but somehow she stayed on top of it all! In fact, she was such a good mom that her worst offense was having to move her kids’ gnome from the front yard to the back.

Kyle was so sweet, especially with Amelia’s kids. I wish we got to see more of his backstory and what hurt him in his past. I do think I wanted a little more out of the romance than we got. Both Amelia and Kyle were frustratingly wishy-washy about whether they wanted to be together. I liked that the romance took a back seat to Amelia’s relationship with her children, but I feel like there still could have been a little more, given that we got to see a decent amount of Kyle’s thoughts!

Audio Review: This audiobook was narrated by Eva Wilhelm. This was the first production of hers that I’ve listened to. I enjoyed her performance overall, and thought she was a good fit for Amelia’s character. However I didn’t like her “man-voice” for Kyle–it’s so important that a voice actor be able to do any gender’s voice well, but Kyle’s voice missed the mark for me in this one.

QOTD: Do you have an HOA? What’s the most ridiculous rule they have?

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