I was a bit disappointed with this one.

It's slow, nothing much happens, except for bad things for Ollie and Hank. Their bad luck made me feel so impotent, I wanted them to be mad, to react and lash out, but they just took it.

 

Then, things happen so fast and when they finally have a break and everything seems to be going well, the past comes for them and all is going down the drain again.

I would have loved it ig things had gone different and Hank sister and niece had stayed instead. I don't see why they had to be all the way across the country when supposedly they have not family left but themselves. Talk about unnecessary plots to thicken the story that ends up not making sense.

Damn it Goodreads! I want half stars! *shakes fist*

Rating 1.5 stars, rounded to 2.

It's time to let the reign of bitchiness continue.



Dinner at Home should have been a slam dunk for me. I'm a foodie and God knows I love books with food involved. However this book? Um....

Please, I need to know! How do you have a book that starts just about every chapter with a recipe (which I wrote down and will try just about all of) and have paragraphs of cooking descriptions, down to detail about chopping onions, yet have no food smexyness AT ALL? EVER? I mean I expected at least one smexy scene while Ollie and Hank were cooking but...I don't think we even saw them cooking together on page?!



And then there is Olli and Hank's relationship. Where did the actual relationship development go off to? One page Hank is breaking into Ollie's car and several pages later they are living in the same house, have an excellent working relationship and what seems like a good friendship. Then BAM - they're lovers. No on page progression. No gradual getting to know each other, no angsty silent yearning, no covert looks. Because of that I didn't believe their romantic relationship at all. Which meant what little sex there was fell flat. Gahhhh.... So much good shit missing!!!!



I was totally thrown off and pulled out of the story by Hank's mother and sister when they showed up on page. Hank's mom is portrayed at first like this shrew of a woman who kicked Hank out and doesn't want the responsibility of caring for her granddaughter, she wants to send said granddaughter to Hank even though Hank has no job and is living in a homeless shelter. Then suddenly there is a big thing, they are holding each other and crying and it's all "Mommy I love you". Dude, you can't go 180 like that! It almost physically hurts to get yanked out of the story!

And then the sister Stacey? Like a few paragraphs of a religious nut and then oh, maybe not so much? It's like, my daughter can't live in this house of homosexual sin but hellz yeah I'll take a plane ticket for me and my kid to come for Thanksgiving with you gay guys and oh...a few lesbians too.. No problem....



To top off the crazy sauce sundae we also have Rose. She delivers a horrible back story towards the end of the book and then...that's it! It's a horrible story. Awful. But..um...why did we need it? In my opinion it didn't do anything to move the story forward (much like the excessive food preparation paragraphs) but rather filled up space between characters actually doing something!

Oh, also, I can't forget to mention the 4-year old niece that shows up periodically in the book. The way she talks? Way too old for a 4-year old. Even a 4-year old with a shitty, hard life. She sounds more like a 70-year old crotchety bitch. So, while I'm thinking she was supposed to provide some levity and comic relief it totally missed that mark for me.

Much of the emotion was told rather than shown which is a huge pet peeve of mine. Things along of the line of saying that Ollie was too depressed and/or upset to eat rather than giving us a few lines where he is picking listlessly at food he prepared. Whatever, I can't even be bothered to go back and look up instances but they're there. Trust me.

So overall, I didn't like this book. I didn't hate it either. It got half a star because the recipes were delicious looking (can't wait to try to spaghetti sauce and meatballs because I love to experiment with that). I guess this was more effective as a really short cook book than it was a work of M/M romance for me...

Good read, but nothing spectacular. I liked it though and the recipes were nice.

Dinner at Home, the book, creates the same feeling of contentment in the reader that Dinner at Home the business portrayed in the book tries to create in its customers. It is warm and cozy and fulfilling. Everything one expects from a Rick R. Reed novel.

Ollie D’Angelo loses his boyfriend of one year, the house said boyfriend owns, and then his job. All in the course of four days. But Ollie is surprised by how little he is emotionally affected by the losses, especially the loss of his job. Instead of feeling bereft, he realizes he wasn’t as happy with his life as he thought. He suddenly feels free for the first time to do what he wants, be who he wants and love whom he wants. Thankfully, he has a healthy savings account and wealthy parents to fall back on if needed. He decides to follow his true passion: cooking.

Hank Mellinger is living and working at Haven. Haven is a half-way house that also functions as a career training center. Hank works in the kitchen and is training to be a cook. While there, an unpleasant surprise shows up from his past and brings along his four-year-old niece. He isn’t able to take care of her, but is forced to when he’s the only family there for her.

Ollie and Hank meet under less than ideal circumstances. Hank is trying to rob Ollie’s car. Hank and his niece are living in a hole-in-the-wall attic room, and literally have nothing to eat. This breaks Ollie’s heart and he feeds them, and hires Hank to help with his business, preparing old-fashioned home cooked meals and taking them to people’s homes to serve them.

It broke my heart to watch Hank deal with his family issues way more than it did when Ollie lost his boyfriend. I don’t know if Mr. Reed should have given more emotional weight to their break up or not. I thought it may have gone a little too easily. He more than made up for it while writing the drama surrounding Hank and his family, though.

I fell totally in love with Addison. That little spitfire of a girl just won over the hearts of everyone around her, including Ollie. Hank knew from the start that Ollie’s gay, but didn’t come out himself, so when Ollie is attracted to Hank he doesn’t act on it. It is really hot when Ollie first becomes aware of Hank’s reciprocal attraction. It happens while they are serving dinner to one of Ollie’s former lovers. Hank trying not to be jealous when he was green with it was in turns funny and sad. I wanted Hank to just tell him already. But it never happens that easily!

Mr. Reed did a great job of keeping the angst to a manageable level so it didn’t drive me insane. Just enough to add drama without making me scream at my Kindle. Don’t judge, you’ve all done it. As an added bonus, there are great recipes included in the book. They are for the food that Ollie and Hank prepare for Dinner at Home. Dinner at Home is a sweet, satisfying beach read.

Reviewed by Tina at The Novel Approach

~ Review by Paisley

Don’t expect a light and easy story. It is not. The characters are troubled, and at times have some really serious shit going on both in their pasts and in the present. Despite some of the interesting road blocks and diversions I found the journey to be a pretty entertaining one.

One of the things that really struck me about this book is the idea of family. Families are complicated, no parent is perfect, and some are pretty freakin’ terrible. Adding a child into the mix of an adult love story is always a risk, but I think that it can also add some interesting dimensions. Hank’s four year old niece plays a significant role in the book and she has quite the potty mouth. I am not sure how realistic it is that a small child would talk like she does, but I will say she was an unusual character...

Read more at Prism Book Alliance