Review: "Windswept" by Patricia Evans

Windswept by Patricia Evans
Published October 2023 via Bold Strokes Books
★★★

Sabine has lived in New Orleans her whole life, and she pretty much expects to die there—with her mother's instability, there's no way she can ever leave. Until, that is, she's given an ultimatum: stay in New Orleans and carry on as she has been...or upend her life, move abroad, and inherit half a million dollars and then some. It doesn't hurt that when she picks the latter option, there are plenty of hot women ready to jump into bed with her...

There's a lot to like here, including the setting and the book's refusal to have the characters fall into a misunderstanding plotline. Also, I was basically sold by the part of the description where Sabine buys an abandoned lighthouse and has to restore it.

But other things...don't make a lot of sense. Let's start with the book description:

When Sabine Rowan moves home to New Orleans after a family tragedy, she escapes into her theater career as she cares for her mother, a pampered former actress with a flair for the dramatic. Thoughts of finding love start to fade until her favorite aunt passes away and leaves Sabine with the equivalent of a ticking time bomb and a nearly impossible choice—to gain her inheritance she must leave New Orleans within three hours and board a flight across the Atlantic.

This is mostly accurate, though it leaves out the part where Sabine's mother has (not a spoiler; it's apparent within the first pages) severe alcoholism and has pressed Sabine into something of a codependent relationship. But then we get to this:

Everyone in the tiny village of Muir Rothesay, in the Highlands of Scotland, turns to Alden Wallace when they need an expert to help restore their historic homes. Still reeling from her latest romantic disaster, Alden barely notices the most recent American tourist to swan into their village. Until she buys an abandoned lighthouse and Alden is the only one who can save the crumbling disaster from disappearing into the sea.

Uh...Alden barely thinks about her ex. She definitely doesn't 'barely notice' Sabine, who also definitely doesn't 'swan'. After a rocky intro, they're into each other almost from the word go. But more to the point: abandoned? The lighthouse isn't abandoned; it's been meticulously restored and is sold fully furnished and ready to go; the most Sabine has to do is learn to light a fire. Where is the renovation romance I was promised? Where are the fanciful lighthouse details and the vicarious move-into-a-characterful-house experience?

Can the windswept shores of Scotland weave enough magic to bring them together?

Ah...yes. It takes about three minutes before they decide they want to be together. The rest of the book is just window dressing.

But I digress. The description probably wasn't written by the author—it may have been written by someone in the marketing department who skimmed the book? I'm not sure. It's inaccurate, but that's an oversight on the part of the publisher, not the author.

Some of the plot things, though...Sabine is sent off to Scotland for a year with no planning, cool. Except: she's going on a US passport, which means that to stay longer than six months she should need a visa, no? I actually really like the 'off you go to another country with no planning' setup, but I don't love the waving away of legal and logistical matters. (She also buys a piece of property with pretty much zero effort or red tape, which seems sus, but what do I know—I'm a millennial; I'll never be able to afford property.) Sabine has a fling with a woman in Edinburgh, but to what end I don't know; it doesn't seem to serve any plot point, and there's nothing to suggest that Sabine had inhibitions that she had to work through. Later, there's a scene full of sexual violence that is barely ever referenced again and makes zero sense in context—in a village of a few hundred people, nobody is worried about a couple of men running around ready to rape a hypothermic woman? (Which brings me to another point: nobody seems worried about the fact that said hypothermic woman would rather resign herself to dying from hypothermia than, like, ask for help.) Alden doesn't recognize them, and nobody makes an effort to pursue them or bring them to justice or...? The sexual violence blasts onto the page and then fades from the book's memory. Similarly, Alden's sorority-girl ex shows up for two scenes to wreak some havoc...but goes out with neither a whimper nor a bang, just a conversation between Alden and Sabine and then the sorority girl is never seen again. For all that I'm glad to (mostly) avoid the 'oh no, what if she's secretly still in love with her ex' plot, I just don't understand what it added here; I'd much rather have seen a deeper dive into Sabine's family revelations.

So I don't know. The writing was good, I liked both the heroines, but the asphalt of this plot is real full of holes. I hope the next book goes through a few more rounds of editing.