Book 1,096: Deck the Palms – Annabeth Albert

I somehow forgot that Annabeth Albert writes a low angst cozy mm holiday romance, which means this year I got to read TWO of them 😀 Albert is definitely in my top three MM romances authors of all time, especially when she goes low-angst, but her military/uniform romances—especially her Out of Uniform series—are perfect.

Deck the Palms takes place in Hawaii, where Broadway performer Nolan has moved to help care for his niblings while his brother is deployed, he finds a temporary job covering the music class and program at their middle school where he meets the grumpy shop teacher Merrick “Merry” Winters, a single surfer dad just trying to keep his twins out of trouble and protect his home from tourists and rich people.

The story is super low-angst and the only thing that needs to happen is Merry and Nolan need to get out of their own way. They are brought together because Nolan is put in charge of hosting the school’s musical performance fundraiser and Merry has to help with the sets. The chill begins to thaw, especially with the help of Merry’s twin boys.

When in doubt, wear them out. It applied to dogs, kids, students, and unruly cadets equally. And sixth graders might be middle schoolers, but they were definitely not too old to shake their sillies out. (26)

I appreciated that Albert didn’t have Nolan make the big exit to go back to NYC, only to realize he shouldn’t have left and have Merry chase after him. Instead, she had Nolan accept the full time job offer and Merry finally pulled his head out of his ass and agreed to try and make things work with Nolan.

The one thing that put me on caution, though, was Merry’s constantly treating Nolan as a foreigner/non-Hawaiian. I think the primary reason this bothered me is because Merry wasn’t native Hawaiian. It’s not that he needed to be, but he’s only second generation Hawaiian (I’m pretty sure), but it just made me feel a bit icky that she leaned so far into that when his family clearly hadn’t been there for generations and generations. I mean, yes he is Hawaiian, he was born there, his kids were born there, but for some reason it just put me on edge a little bit.

There was the perfect amount of cheese and spice in the novel, but I did struggle with the emotional whiplash. Something I’ve noticed more and more recently as Heated Rivalry has exploded the popularity of MM romance (and specifically hockey romance) is just how overly emotional these books can get. It’s not a bad thing and one of the reasons I enjoy them, but it’s definitely a signifier of when they’re written by women and for women.

Kissing him was like diving into my favorite shaved-ice flavor after a decade of not tasting it. I’d forgotten how much I liked this, simply kissing. Nolan was sweet with layers of sensation, and I couldn’t get enough. (70)

(I am writing this SO LONG after I read this but,) For the most part Albert continued her walking the walk when it came to sex and positioning. So kudos to her for that, because there is nothing more annoying than an author saying a character is versatile or having a character say they want to do the other position and then not following through.

Recommendation: Overall, I enjoyed this one. It was the perfect low-angst novel that I needed after wrapping up the creepy AF (but amazingly written) short stories. Albert is an amazing story teller and she builds her characters in a way that even when they’re too much, you can’t help but love them or at the very least appreciate them for what they’re there for.

Opening Line: “I stared down at the colorful newsletter distributed to students during last period and sent to parents via email.”

Closing Line: “I’d won the starring role of a lifetime, and I couldn’t wait to make the part my own.” (Whited out to avoid spoilers, highlight to read.)