Review: Melting Point by Cici Williams
Thank you Avon Books UK for my copy! All thoughts are my own.
I have always had a fascination with the Olympics and I love a good sports Romance so I was very excited to see this book end up on my shelf! While I did finish it and enjoy it, I don’t know if it’s one I’d recommend as a must read. It took me a bit to get into it due to some crafting issues but I did find myself wanting to know how the story would play out.
Synopsis:
“There’s a Winter Olympic medal on the line. But their toughest challenge is resisting each other…
February 2026: the Italian Winter Olympics. The only thing on Sam Harrington’s mind is winning her first medal for snowboarding.
Enter Finn Bradley. They've had a 'friends forever' pact for, well, forever, so Sam pushes her growing feelings aside and tries to focus on training.
But when a major team sponsorship falls through, Sam needs to find funding, and fast. When they're told that pretending to be a couple will give them a better chance at finding sponsors, Sam and Finn agree to fake a relationship. They spend all their time together already, surely pretending to be a couple won't be a slippery slope…
There's only one problem. Finn's secretly been in love with her for years, and this Olympic season, he's decided that as well as a medal, he wants to win Sam over.” —NetGalley
What I Liked:
The Tropes—Friends to Lovers can be so underrated but it has SUCH high stakes! I love reading this trope.
The Setting/Stakes—Italy! The Olympics! Her dad is his coach! All great ingredients for a Romance novel.
What Didn’t Work for Me:
The Writing—Unfortunately, I felt like the writing didn’t match the intensity of the story or the characters’ stage of life. It read a little young, and could have been a fantastic YA novel, but since i knew the characters were in their mid twenties, it kind of soured the experience for me. Everything felt in conflict with one another, especially the open door scenes since the characters read so young.
Felt a Bit Under Researched—I’ve read a lot of memoirs from Olympians and while I can suspend my disbelief to enjoy a book, there were a number of elements that just didn’t seem possible at the Olympic Games.
Underutilized the Coach Element—A major plot point is that her dad is his coach and that he told him to stay away from his daughter years ago. Yet they in a fake relationship for social media to land a lucrative sponsorship. I didn’t feel the stakes of this situation at all and it could have been left out and not changed the story at all.
Character Authenticity: 2/5 Spice Rating: 3/5 Overall Rating: 2.75/5
Content Warnings:
N/A