Montreal Seasons · Book 1
Not His Girlfriend (Yet)
4 1/2 Dates and a Fracture
A literary-leaning contemporary romance about a graphic designer who says “girlfriend” before it's true — and then has to live up to it. Set in Montreal's winter, it's a slow-burn almost-relationship with practical care, emotional restraint, two opinionated cats, and a hallway that's exactly the wrong length.
Genre
Contemporary Romance / Women's Fiction
Setting
Montreal, Canada — Winter
POV
Dual POV (Nora & Ethan)
Tone
Warm, sharp, witty
Heat Level
Moderate (fade to black)
Ending
Happily Ever After (HEA)
Early Reader Reactions
What readers are noticing.
Selected public reader responses from Goodreads and Pen Pinery.
“I was hooked by the very first page and I couldn’t stop reading!”
“This was such a fun read! I can’t wait for the next one!”
“It’s a cute story. It had a great plot...”
“Both of their personalities were beautifully developed and were so good together.”
“I really loved how this novel exposed the cost of caregiving... Makeup is used beautifully as a metaphor for armor.”
“They both prefer the real version of them and not the mask they put on.”
Read more reviews
Synopsis
Four and a half dates. Two kisses — one accidental, one interrupted.
Nora Chen spends two hours before every date becoming the version of herself she thinks he wants to see. Ethan Morin is a Québécois firefighter who deflects the brave parts of his own stories. She performs. He protects. Neither knows the other is doing it.
Then a freak accident puts Ethan in a hospital bed — and Nora does something distinctly un-rehearsed. She stays. All night. In his jacket.
Care was supposed to be temporary. Instead, it makes everything visible: the work she is trying to keep invisible, the pain he is trying not to show, and the masks they both use to feel lovable.
Now she's in his apartment. With his two cats. And a hallway neither of them will cross.
He thinks she can't wait to leave. She thinks needing him to need her is the wrong kind of truth. Neither of them says it. Both of them are idiots.
The cats know.
“We're the same disease in different packaging.”