Narrated by Greg Boudreaux
Book four in Roan Parrish’s Garnet Run series, The Rivals of Casper Road is a sweet, charming and superbly narrated opposites-attract romance featuring two neighbours whose rivalry in the local Halloween Decorating Contest engenders a prank-war and leads to love.
Bramble Larkspur left Olympia, Washington after his boyfriend and former best friend betrayed him in the worst way, leaving him “a broken person who had to get away in order to keep things together.” He – accompanied by his yellow Labrador, Hemlock – has just moved to 667 Casper Road in Garnet Run, and on his first morning there, he takes an early morning walk around the neighbourhood and then returns to his new home and takes a seat on the porch to watch Casper Road wake up. He sits there quietly whittling (something he’s done since he was ten), and it’s not long before his new neighbours are saying hello and stopping to chat. The subject of the annual Halloween Decorating Competition quickly comes up, and Bram thinks it sounds like fun. He’s just asked when he should get started, when a man emerges from the house diagonally opposite (which is, of course, number 666!) – a very striking man dressed in a suit and tie even though it’s a Saturday – who comes over and introduces himself as Zachary Glass.
Zachary, an architect, has won the Decorating Competition for the last six years, and is determined to win again this year, despite the introduction of this new variable and his dog. But it doesn’t matter – he knows his designs far surpass anything else the other inhabitants of Casper Road can come up with; they treat it as a bit of fun and usually put up shop-bought decorations, whereas he takes it very seriously, selecting a theme each year and designing a unique installation. This year, he’s going with “Ghost Ship”, inspired by his friend Wes’ experiments with bioluminescence (Knockbridge Lane).
Rather like the previous book, this story features one quirky character with social anxiety and self-esteem issues and a sunny-natured one who likes him exactly as he is. Zachary lives a very routine-oriented life and is uncomfortable in social situations; growing up poor, gay and Jewish, he was bullied a lot when he was younger, and a tragedy when he was thirteen destroyed his family. By contrast, Bram comes from a large and loving family with parents who always encouraged their kids and made sure they never doubted their love for them, and he misses them terribly, this being the first time he’s ever lived away from them.
Generous, open-hearted Bram and creative, thoughtful Zachary are easy to like and their romance is kinda sweet (bonding over designing shelters for stray cats is so cute!), but their chemistry is lukewarm and their ‘rivalry’ just – isn’t. The inciting incident is really spiteful, to be honest, and the pranks are childish at best and ill-advised at worst. And they have so little in common – Zachary isn’t a fan of having pets and Bram has a dog; Zachary eats because he has to and isn’t at all interested in what he eats and Bram likes to cook; Zachary loves horror movies and Bram has never seen one, mostly because he gets scared easily and just doesn’t see the attraction. That’s fine, each to his own, but having Bram run away from a kids’ Halloween ride because he’s scared when a few people jump up and yell “boo!” just makes him look like an idiot. Opposites attract is one thing, but they usually discover they have things in common beneath the surface; these two just don’t. Plus, given that Bram is still reeling from being horribly betrayed by the two most important people in his life, he does fall for and come to trust Zachary very quickly. In fact, both men have experienced emotional trauma in their lives, but this isn’t explored beyond the superficial – and I had to wonder how Bram could afford to live as comfortably as he appears to when he has no discernible source of income!
I enjoyed catching up with the couples from the earlier books and meeting Bram’s boisterous and supportive family; the author has created a real sense of community and given a nice Autumnal feel to the story, but I have to be honest and say that I found the overall premise really difficult to relate to. Halloween just isn’t a thing here in the UK (despite attempts by retailers over the last couple of decades to push it) so I found it difficult to credit the emphasis placed on the decorating competition because the idea is so completely alien to me. (I have similar problems with the same theme in Christmas stories.).
I suspect I enjoyed the book to the extent I did because of the narration. It’s no secret that Greg Boudreaux could read me the phone book and I’d listen to it; fortunately, this is more engaging than the phone book! The performance is well-paced, clearly differentiated and skilfully acted, and the two leads are superbly characterised with clearly defined personalities. Bram’s warmth and geniality are there in the slight huskiness of his tone and the almost perpetual smile in his voice, while Zachary’s deeper pitch and his clipped, precise speech works well to reflect his more controlled and uptight nature. Mr. Boudreaux fleshes out their emotional connection strongly, and is especially good in the later, emotionally fraught scenes with Zachary and his mother. The Garnet Run series has had three narrators – Mr. Boudreaux narrates books two and four; James Cavendish and Michael Dean the others – and from what I remember, Rye and Charlie are portrayed consistently from Best Laid Plans. All the secondary characterisations are nicely judged, and the performance as a whole really breathes life into the story and takes it up a notch.
I’m a fan of Roan Parrish’s work, but like Knockbridge Lane, The Rivals of Casper Road has a very different feel to it that I can’t help but suspect is due to the move to the Harlequin Special Edition imprint; it’s less… edgy and more typically ‘Harlequin’ – wholesome, low-angst and inoffensive. And although the imprint’s guidelines say heat levels can go from “subtle to sizzling”, the sex scenes here feel uncomfortably ‘soft-focus’ and I’d honestly have been happy had they not been there at all.
I’ve said quite a few negative things in this review, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t things to like here, and I think if you know what you’re getting before you start, and you’re actively looking for what this book delivers, then you’ll enjoy it. I found it to be a bit of a mixed bag, but the characters are likeable, the romance is cute and the superb narration carries the day.
Caz
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The lack of chemistry between the romantic leads and the lack of real common ground that you describe here are part of the reason why Knockbridge Lane didn’t work well for me. Adam’s loathing of Wes’s menagerie kept me wondering how they would ever be able to live in the same house, for example. I love Greg Boudreaux, but I think I’ll give this a pass. The pranks and the competition just don’t interest me much.
It’s one of those “okay” listens that is kinda comfortable and doesn’t rock any boats.