THE SUNDAY REVIEW | DELILAH GREEN DOESN’T CARE – ASHLEY HERRING BLAKE

Do I need to say it? You already know. I’m not a big romance reader. I like to try the genre every once in a while though, particularly when I hear about a particular book over and over, and it’s mostly positive feedback. This book definitely fit that, and on top of that it’s a Sapphic romance – which I haven’t tried before. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to give it a go.

This book has been a BookTube baby over the past year. It keeps popping up – and yet I’d never heard of Ashley Herring Blake before. So I had absolutely no idea what to expect out of it. It’s the story of two stepsisters. One, Astrid, appears to be perfect from the outside and her mother (Delilah’s stepmother) is always proud of her. Delilah doesn’t like her much, and has plenty of memories of being excluded from her cool girls’ posse and compared unfavorably to her.

For Delilah’s part, she got out of Bright Falls, her small town, as fast as she could and never looked back. She is building a life for herself far away from her childhood home town and making damn sure she’s not going to get hurt again by never sticking with one woman for long. She’s a photographer, and while she’s got talent, she’s at the beginning of her career and broke. Which is where the two collide. Astrid has offered to pay Delilah to photograph her wedding which is happening in Bright Falls. Delilah needs the money, even if it means going back to the town and house she never wanted to see again.

The romance enters the picture not with the wedding (Astrid’s fiancé isn’t really a romantic lead type of character), but with one of the wedding party. Claire is one of Astrid’s best friends, and knows Delilah from high school. But the two are no longer the same people, and sparks immediately fly when they run into each other at a bar. It’s one of those situations that often seems to arise in romance stories – they have reasons not to be together, but they also have an attraction that neither can deny.

The romance part of the book was good, it was sweet, mostly believable and more realistic in some ways than I had expected. Aside from some subterfuge that got a bit annoying, I didn’t have any major issues with it. But the thing that actually worked best for me in this book was the information that is slowly revealed throughout the novel that adds a whole new backstory to everything. I liked how it was handled, and I liked how it shifted some of the characters and their relationships. I enjoyed this read – it was a fun, light, entertaining read and I think will definitely appeal to anyone who enjoys Sapphic romance.

A clever and steamy queer romantic comedy about taking chances and accepting love—with all its complications—from the author of Astrid Parker Doesn’t Fail .

Delilah Green swore she would never go back to Bright Falls—nothing is there for her but memories of a lonely childhood where she was little more than a burden to her cold and distant stepfamily. Her life is in New York, with her photography career finally gaining steam and her bed never empty. Sure, it’s a different woman every night, but that’s just fine with her.
 
When Delilah’s estranged stepsister, Astrid, pressures her into photographing her wedding with a guilt trip and a five-figure check, Delilah finds herself back in the godforsaken town that she used to call home. She plans to breeze in and out, but then she sees Claire Sutherland, one of Astrid’s stuck-up besties, and decides that maybe there’s some fun (and a little retribution) to be had in Bright Falls, after all.
 
Having raised her eleven-year-old daughter mostly on her own while dealing with her unreliable ex and running a bookstore, Claire Sutherland depends upon a life without surprises. And Delilah Green is an unwelcome surprise…at first. Though they’ve known each other for years, they don’t really know each other—so Claire is unsettled when Delilah figures out exactly what buttons to push. When they’re forced together during a gauntlet of wedding preparations—including a plot to save Astrid from her horrible fiancé—Claire isn’t sure she has the strength to resist Delilah’s charms. Even worse, she’s starting to think she doesn’t want to… – Goodreads

Book Title: Delilah Green Doesn’t Care
Author: Ashley Herring Blake
Series: Yes – Bright Falls #1
Edition: Audiobook
Published By: Berkley
Released: February 2, 2022
Genre: Fiction, Romance, Family, LGBTQ+
Pages: 375
Date Read: April 30-May 1, 2023
Rating: 6/10
Average Goodreads Rating: 4.13/5 (57,348 ratings)