Face Blind

3.5 stars rounded up because I like J.L. Merrow's writing style. A little too much plot and not enough meaningful interaction between the two MCs. I could believe they were attracted to each other, but not that they had earned a HEA yet. Good use of secondary characters, including Adam's BFF Scratch, who is crying out for his own book.

the story took a little fumbling to draw me in, but once i made it past the first 10%, i was invested.

software engineer (Corin) x tattoo artist (Adam), an unconventional pairing but smashingly refreshing. what i liked most was that this was more than just a romance - it delved into each character's trauma with tantalizingly slow unraveling (the pacing of which worked sometimes and not others) and mesmerizing writing against the atmospheric Glastonbury backdrop.

this book is my first encounter with prosopagnosia (aka face blindness) in any medium, and Corin's experience had me reeling at the sheer dread of not being able to recognize family members or even yourself without relying on other identifiers, like voices or tattoos.

while the blurb hints at ghostly, supernatural notes, i found that it centered more around manifestations of grief and guilt, but they were still equally eerie in their own right. an ethereal, twisty ride with side characters boasting heaps of personality (i kid you not, they outshone Adam for a spell