Book 874: Elliot, Song of the Soulmate (Love, Austen #5) – Anyta Sunday

OMG ya’ll, Anyta Sunday is going to finish her Love, Austen series!!! Can you tell I’m still bitter about the Austen Project? I mean who does four books and then just STOPS!?! Like WT-actual-F!? When this  review opportunity came in, it was an automatic yes.* I just had to wait for them to get me the actual ARC so I could start it and boy was I impatient!

I didn’t realize it at the time, but we actually met both characters in this novel in the last book, Finley Embraces Heart and Home, at their end of term/secondary school party. I may (or may not) have squealed a little when I connected those dots this book.

For the most part, I felt this book did a little better at adapting Persuasion, than Sunday’s last adaptation. I think it had more to do with the chemistry of the characters and the intense longing they feel for each other. I feel like that tormented second chance is a much easier trope to write than first love/forbidden love, but I’m just a reader not a writer.

Wentworth pulled them to their feet and drew out the stool under his piano. ‘Sit down, bumblebee.’
Elliot laughed. ‘Bumblebee?’
‘Because you’re cute, kind, and sweet like honey.’
Elliot raised his brows. ‘Really?’
‘And because one stinging insult from you would surely break a man’s heart.’ (Chapter 4)

My favorite part was how Sunday adapted Wentworth from being a naval captain to being a songwriter who lives/grew up on a boat. It just worked and kept the naval aspect without being a one-to-one translation. It also provided a few necessary plot points and introductions because of the tight space.

The book was full of over-the-top declarations and descriptions, and it worked because of the tormented second chance and the longevity between theirs seeing each other. Wentworth and Elliot had years to pine over each other after spending a couple of years deeply in love in their teens. And so of course it was only going to be bigger and more grandiose when they finally got together.

I wish for a love like the hazelnut tree. One that never stops growing, no matter the emotional landscape. Ups and downs, highs and lows. So long as we’re growing old together. (Chapter 10)

If there was one character missing that I was really looking forward to Sunday adapting it was Lady Russell. She was the accidental villain because of her bad advice and I just really wanted to see how Sunday handled it. Her adaptations of the bad guys have been decent but they’re all not as evil as Austen wrote them. So, in a way Lady Russell was made for Sunday to adapt . . . oh well.

Recommendation: This might be my favorite of Sunday’s adaptations for the Love, Austen series. A large part of that comes from it being a still common trope (second chance) in MM Romance today, but also, I think because of how the characters related to each other. Most of the others in the series were decent, but Sunday really played up the age difference or class difference, whereas in this one they seemed to be more on par with each other and it just worked better for me.

*I received a copy of Elliot, Song of the Soulmate via Gay Romance Reviews in return for my honest opinion. No goods or money were exchanged.

Opening Line: “Elliot Anneston certainly hadn’t expected his night to take such a turn.”

Closing Line: “Elliot clasped his nape and kissed him. ‘That is a yes.'” (Whited out to avoid spoilers, highlight to read.)