Title: Don’t Brake my Heart
Author: Leonie Mack
Publisher: Bedford Square Publishers
Pages: 320
Genre: Romance
My Rating: ❤️❤️❤️🖤🖤
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Don’t Brake My Heart
A year ago, Leesa Kubicka’s professional cycling career came to an abrupt end after a disastrous final race. Now, she’s working for a sports marketing company and is given the opportunity to lead a major project during the Tour de France. Her assignment seems simple: follow one of cycling’s biggest talents and create content around his journey throughout the race.
The problem? That talent is Colin Gallagher. Leesa already knows Colin from their days on the same cycling team. Back then, he was constantly pulling pranks on her, and she never quite knew what to make of him. Now, they’re forced to spend weeks together during one of the biggest sporting events in the world.
What Leesa doesn’t know is that Colin has had a crush on her for years. With the Tour de France underway and their paths crossing once again, he sees this as his last chance to prove that he’s more than the immature prankster she remembers—before she disappears from his life for good.
Review
First, I want to thank the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC of this book!
The main reason I requested this book is that I’m from the Netherlands, and it’s centered around cycling. If there’s one thing you should know about the Dutch, it’s that we love our bikes. We use them for transportation every day. I cycle to work daily, so a sports romance about cycling immediately caught my attention.
I ended up giving this book 3 out of 5 stars for several reasons, but I’d like to start with the positives.
I really enjoyed the cycling theme. There are so many sports romances these days, but most of them focus on hockey, baseball, football, or Formula 1. I don’t think I’ve ever read, or even seen, a sports romance centered around professional cycling. This book revolves around the Tour de France, one of the biggest sporting events in the world. It’s hard to avoid during the summer, and I’ve watched it several times myself whenever I had the chance.
That said, I don’t think this was ultimately the right book for me. The biggest issue was that I never felt fully invested in the story. In fact, it felt like the most interesting part didn’t begin until around the 70% mark, when the Tour de France actually started. Until then, I found myself struggling to stay engaged.
The second reason was Colin. Unfortunately, I really didn’t like him as a character. Although he’s 25 years old, he often behaved like a 13-year-old boy. His constant pranks on Leesa felt incredibly childish and immature. I understand that his actions were supposed to show that he had a crush on her, but he was an adult during most of these interactions. There are far more mature ways to get someone’s attention, and instead of finding his behavior charming, I found it frustrating.
Overall, this book wasn’t for me, and I’m unfortunately not its biggest fan. However, if you’re a fan of sports romances and are looking for something different from the usual hockey or Formula 1 romances, this book definitely stands out. The cycling backdrop makes it feel fresh, unique, and original within the genre.