Book: Chasing Smoke by Piper Rayne
Reviewed by scribsbookshelf
Rating: 5/5
Chasing Smoke has all the elements of a small-town romance that I want and greatly appreciate. To quote Collins, it’s “Like a big extended family” and that’s what the town of Echo Lake feels like throughout this novel. For the last 18 months, Collins has been surviving the loss of her husband Caleb. It’s not until one of his best friends, Ansel, makes it his goal to help pull Collins up and out of the grief that she’s in, that she makes the effort to also bring herself up and out. Piper Rayne handles the story of grief and loss with a level of delicateness that somehow makes the story hauntingly beautiful but also gives so much more strength to Collins as she reacquaints the world around her.
The story is very well paced despite being heartbreaking. The people in town are supportive in their quiet ways despite some being not too onboard but the ones who care and the ones who matter show up. The slowness and understanding of grief and moving on really stands out to me because sometimes those feelings can come out of nowhere and have a life on their own. The way Collins and Ansel recognize the weight of it in each other also shows a lot about their relationship and the evolution of it. Their process and internal conflict felt very real and the novel itself felt like it was just offering encouraging ways to help begin a healing process while also recognizing that healing isn’t always linear and that it can get messy, and that’s okay.
Thank you so much to Piper Rayne and Valentine PR for the gifted ARC! All opinions are my own.