[ARC Review] Sweet (A Love Stories on 7th and Main Novella) by Elizabeth Hunter

Daisy has been under pressure from her family to transfer to a good college, finish her degree, and make something of herself. But all Daisy wants to do is stay in the area and take over her family's café downtown. And the young, hot tattoo artist across the street doesn't help her hesitancy to leave. Despite his looks and his past, Daisy feels drawn to Spider Villalobos. The tattoos down his arms, across his chest, and around his neck don't scare her away. Neither does Spider's past in an L.A. gang. He's talented and caring, but he knows enough to know that he's no good for Daisy. But Daisy has other plans - plans that could finally free Spider from his criminal ties and give them both the future they'd been dreaming of. 

Sweet is a short (and... sweet) novella taking place in the 7th and Main world created by Elizabeth Hunter. While the novella primarily focuses on Daisy and Spider's story, there are a lot of references to other locations and cameos from characters that readers meet in the first three books. If you want a cute little opposites attract romance, and the other context doesn't matter to you, Sweet works great as a standalone. However, if you'd like to fully understand all the people mentioned and their connections to Daisy and Spider's story, then I would recommend at least reading Ink before reading about Spider's connection to Metlin Books in Sweet. 

I really enjoyed the underlying meaning in both Spider and Daisy's stories. On the surface, Spider thought that everyone saw him as the kid from the wrong side of the tracks. But the more Spider interacted with people, the more we could see how everyone really saw him; everyone looked past his tattoos and his troubled history and saw the helpful, good-natured person he had become. I also loved Daisy's story: everyone knew she was smart and could be and do anything she put her mind to, so her family saw it as a waste when she wanted to stay in Metlin and run the café. But that was where her passions were, and I loved the parts of Sweet where Daisy had to figure out how to balance her desires with her family's expectations. 

While at its heart, Sweet is a fast little read and a nice addition to the 7th and Main series, it's also deeper than that for those looking for more. I thought Hunter covered a lot of dilemmas for a shorter novella, all while creating Daisy and Spider's happily-ever-after and adding to the larger 7th and Main world. 

A huge thank you to Elizabeth Hunter and Social Butterfly PR for providing an advanced copy of Sweet for review.

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Release date: 12/14/21
Format: eARC
eARC provided via: Social Butterfly PR