Review: Wanted - Bad Boyfriend (Island Classifieds #1) by T.A. Moore

His mother. His best friend. The barmaid at the local pub. Everyone is determined to find Nathan Moffatt a boyfriend. It’s the last thing Nathan wants. After spending every day making sure his clients experience nothing but romantic magic, the Granshire Hotel’s wedding organiser just wants to go home, binge watch crime dramas, and eat pizza in his underwear.

Unfortunately, no one believes him, and he’s stuck with lectures about dying alone. Then inspiration strikes. He needs the people in his life to want him to stay single as much as he does. He needs a bad boyfriend.

There’s only one man for the job.

Flynn Delaney is used to people on Ceremony thinking the worst of him. But he isn’t sure he wants the dubious honor of worst boyfriend on the entire island. On the other hand, if he plays along, he gets to hang out with the gorgeous Nathan and piss off the Granshire’s owners. It’s a win-win.

There’s only one problem. Flynn’s actually quite a good boyfriend, and now Nathan’s wondering if getting off the sofa occasionally is really the worst thing in the world.

I had trouble coming up with a rating on this one. There was a lot I enjoyed but just a bit too much distraction that muddled up my love for the story.

This author writes one of my absolutely favorite types of characters, helllllooooo Flynn. I love a strong, quiet hero and Flynn is just that and more. He’s the guy who never even looks in the mirror but has an inner confidence that makes him ridiculously appealing and he has no clue. And, he doesn’t really care. As I read through the story, I liked him more and more. There’s so much more to him than the reader is lead to believe from the blurb or from the beginning.

And since I’ve brought up the blurb . . . .

I don’t think it does the story justice and is frankly a little misleading. Nate isn’t anything like he’s described, I don’t think he sat on any couch for more than five minutes throughout, so I don’t know why anyone would need to convince him to get off his buns. Flynn’s description is more accurate though thankfully, but I expected him to be at least a bit of a dick because everyone in town hates him.

And since I’ve brought up the town . . .

What the hell? Why is everyone so terrible and why do Nate and Flynn want to stay there? The people sound awful honestly and unfortunately it made the town seem like more of a caricature than a true setting and that bummed me out. I love stories set in small English towns and this one didn’t do small English towns any favors.

I very much enjoyed Flynn and Nate when they were together. The push/pull as they got to know one another was delicious and I wish there was more. A good chunk of the story is spent focused on Nate’s wedding planning and Flynn’s rescues. Both things were ok, I liked reading more about Flynn’s rescues and that’s just me because I couldn’t care less about wedding planning. But the forays into their professions were time consuming and distracting. I wanted more investment into two characters I was growing quite fond of together and felt a little short changed as they were constantly interrupted by outside forces that didn’t add a lot to the story.

Flynn’s background is a mystery throughout most of the book, but there are enough clues to figure out what’s what. That does bring me back to the townsfolk again though. Their reactions were incongruous to what Flynn presented so I just didn’t get the animosity. Because I liked Flynn so much, the crap he put up with from people really bugged. He deserved better and if more of the secondary characters had been fleshed out, I don’t think the reactions from people would be so jarring because they wouldn’t be so extreme.

I feel like I’ve been too negative here, but it’s just because the bits I loved, I loved them pretty hard and wanted more. I wanted my beloved Flynn to have a fair and reasonable chance at happiness. The romantic bits were perfectly romantic and I don’t need copious amounts of fluff, I do just want it to be balanced and in the end I think that was my issue. The story was presented as a romance and so that’s what I wanted more of than anything else and some of the beauty of the evolving love story between Flynn and Nate was lost in amongst the rest.

As with every story I’ve read from this author, the writing is tops and the MC’s read realistic. I wanted everything good for them and was happy with, and believed in, their HEA. Thankfully I also believe that Nate will take good care of Flynn (and vice versa), so even though the journey didn’t exactly lead me down the path I expected, I was really happy with the destination when I arrived.

**a copy of this story was provided for an honest review**