If only love was like the movies... Waiting for Tom Hanks by Kerry Winfrey (Review)

Waiting for Tom Hanks
By Kerry Winfrey
Adult Contemporary Romance
Paperback & ebook, 320 Pages
June 11th 2019 by Berkley

Summary

A rom-com-obsessed romantic waiting for her perfect leading man learns that life doesn’t always go according to a script in this delightfully charming and funny novel.

Annie Cassidy dreams of being the next Nora Ephron. She spends her days writing screenplays, rewatching Sleepless in Seattle, and waiting for her movie-perfect meet-cute. If she could just find her own Tom Hanks—a man who’s sweet, sensitive, and possibly owns a houseboat—her problems would disappear and her life would be perfect. But Tom Hanks is nowhere in sight.

When a movie starts filming in her neighborhood and Annie gets a job on set, it seems like a sign. Then Annie meets the lead actor, Drew Danforth, a cocky prankster who couldn’t be less like Tom Hanks if he tried. Their meet-cute is more of a meet-fail, but soon Annie finds herself sharing some classic rom-com moments with Drew. Her Tom Hanks can’t be an actor who’s leaving town in a matter of days...can he?

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My Review

WAITING FOR TOM HANKS is a quirky, romcom about a girl who hopes for romance to come in the form of one of Tom Hanks' romantic movie characters, or the like. With plenty of nods for romance movie buffs, fun characters, and one heart-throb actor, romance readers are sure to enjoy this story with plenty of smiles and laughs.

Annie was super sweet, quirky, and much too invested in romance movies. Her mom developed Annie's love for While You Were Sleeping, Sleepless in Seatle, You've Got Mail, etc. when she was quite young and spurred on by her own love story to Annie's father who Annie never knew. She just knew they had that one-of-a-kind, everlasting love. She was pretty much stuck. She lived in her childhood home with her uncle who took over as her caregiver after her mother passed away when she was 14. She finished college, but just never went anywhere after that. Dating wasn't successful for her, much to her best friend's best efforts. Then queue this hot actor who was going to be filming in her small town where she found herself with a job on set and an awkward meet-cute (one of my favorite scenes from this book). At this point I was loving this story. The characters were interesting and the dialogue was funny. Of course a drop-dead gorgeous guy didn't help either. Annie also was so scatterbrained and clumsy sometimes that it made for some rather hilarious moments. The romance was sweet and slow, with plenty of tension. I also loved all the movie references as I've pretty much seen them all and had several favorites in those referenced. It was an overall great premise for a book with fun characters and sweet to sizzling romance.

I also had a few issues. Annie was a little too radical in her movie outlook on romance. Like asking guys if they own a houseboat (because Tom Hanks' movie character does) and other things that just seemed too unrealistic. Her one date was also so drastically out there. I would have liked a little more norm in this to tone things down so it made it more believable. There was a point at the end that was also a little crazy, along with some other things that didn't quite work for me.

In the end, was it what I wished for? For romantic movie fans who enjoy quirky characters, a small-town setting, a great cast of side characters, and sweet romance with some sparks may enjoy this one. Definitely entertaining.

Content: Tons of innuendo, some swearing, a closed-door love scene.
Source: I received a complimentary copy from the publisher, which did not require a positive review nor affect my review in any way.

Check out an excerpt from the book here. Have you read this? Will you be?

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