Hot Under His Collar

I am obsessed with horror and when I do pick up romance I generally prefer dark romance. I am more of a Jane Eyre kind of gal than a Jane Austen kind of gal. When I pick up more of a modern romance Sierra Simone and Colleen Hoover write the kind of stories I love. However I fell hard for a romantic comedy!

Hot Under His Collar is a romantic comedy where a Catholic priest, Patrick, falls in love with Sasha, a woman who grew up in high society. I read some criticims that Hot Under His Collar is more of a slow burn romance but that is why I liked it. It did not gloss over discussions and deliberations that came with a Roman Catholic priest being in a romantic relationship. As someone who has been unpacking a lot of religious trauma through literature this is an excellent story. I felt there was a tremendous amount of sensitivity to characters with different perspectives and it was certainly a sex positive novel. There was a minimalist approach to hot scenes. A lot of built up tension between the characters resulted in the sexy scenes being more sexy.

My biggest complaint about the novel is a major spoiler.

The public declaration of love really did help reconcile the tension that  Patrick had between his love for Sasha and his love for his parishioners. However,  that is the sort of scene that always makes me cringe. When characters do,  it strikes me as an added pressure it puts on their love interest. Patrick does acknowledge that he didn't feel called to ministry regardless of how the relationship worked out. But it still put pressure on her to give the relationship a shot. Fortunately, in true rom com fashion that is exactly what she wanted. This gesture serves the purpose of the announcement that he was leaving ministry. However, he could have made the announcement that he was no longer going to be serving his congregation and then privately declare his undying love to her. But it did lay the groundwork for the warm fuzzy feelings and the happily ever after that make readers love the romance genre.

But that was a pretty minor flaw for me. I don't usually fall for book characters but I thought Father Patrick was the perfect book boyfriend. While I do understand the criticism of the book that Father Patrick is trying to be a white savior, however a lot of religious leaders are not nearly as progressive as he is. The fact that he was really invested in saving the PreK program for the community and baptized the infant of a lesbian couple because he saw that as the right thing to do really made me swoon for him. How he is continously protective of Sasha adds to his charm. As someone who is deals with deep religious wounds, a crush on a fictional priest is a very loud statement of approval! 

I am also posting this review on Goodreads