Emily's Reviews > The Art of Catching Feelings

I was completely taken aback and pleasantly surprised by how much I loved this book! I had never heard of Alicia Thompson before, but I thought this cover was absolutely adorable and the premise of the story really intrigued me. unfortunately, Daphne made some of the most aggravating decisions known to humankind in the first half of this book... but the slow burn and the tension between Chris + Daph was 😮‍💨🤌🏼!!! almost enough to make up for it!!!

I really loved the development both characters had over the course of the book and the fact that this was such an original concept for a romance - the plot had me on the edge of my seat, I literally devoured this in less than a day because it was like an impending train wreck I couldn't bring myself to look away from (in the best way, of course).

the undertones of grief and loss also literally brought me to tears - and considering the traumatic cocktail of books I am very much accustomed to reading, that was an IMPRESSIVE feat. I also LOVEDDD watching Daphne come into her own as a broadcaster and pursue the career path she wanted - I wish we could've seen more of that progression!

The one thing holding me back from considering this a 5-star read would be that I genuinely wanted to kick something (hard) numerous different times when Daphne would make *yet another* idiotic decision at the expense of this man... it was bordering on painful and my heart literally ached for Chris the entire time it was happening. There also wasn't quite enough depth to some of the side characters, I wanted to feel more attached to certain aspects of this book and a couple of those areas fell short for me.

All in all though this was a fun, heartwrenching, uplifting sports romance that delved into lots of important topics such as men's mental health, divorce recovery, emotionally abusive relationships, finding yourself and (of course) true loveee 😈😈 Daphne brought Chris back to life and I adored every second of it. I will definitely be keeping an eye out for future books by Alicia Thompson!!