Isn’t It Bromantic?

The fourth rom-com—and possibly the best yet—of Adams’s Bromance Book Club series (after Crazy Stupid Bromance), sees beloved side character and pro hockey player Vlad Konnikov, aka The Russian, diagnosed with a gluten allergy, finally alleviating his intestinal distress and leaving him ready to step up as a hero. Nearly done with her graduate degree in Chicago, Elena, an aspiring journalist and Vlad’s estranged wife, reluctantly returns to the Nashville home she’s never shared with Vlad after he suffers an injury during the Stanley Cup playoffs. Elena and Vlad were best friends as children, but after a hurried wedding to get Elena a visa, they went their separate ways, each unsure of the other’s desires. In nursing Vlad through his recovery, meeting his friends from the Bromance Book Club, and making him his favorite Russian meals, Elena becomes more confident in her feelings for her husband—but unless he makes his own emotions clear, she plans to head home to Russia to pursue the truth about her father’s long-ago disappearance. Vlad must take the advice of the romance novels he’s read—and is now writing himself—to prove his worth and get Elena to stay. Readers are sure to fall in love with sensitive Vlad and root for him and Elena. This is an utter delight. Agent: Tara Gelsomino, One Track Literary. (July)