Michelle Blanchard Ardillo

A colleague of mine recommended a book to me at the start of this school year, Hello, Stranger by Katherine Center. She said it was one of her favorites and that I should read it. So, in December, I did. And I liked it. It was about something I didn’t know anything about, face blindness, and it was also something I know a lot about, searching for someone to share your life with. I searched a long time for my perfect person, and this June 10th, we will have been married for 35 years. 

When I finished Hello, Stranger, I was also making mid-term exams for the 6th grade English class I was teaching, which I then had to grade, so I didn’t take the time to write a review.  Even though at times I felt like the plot stretched a wee bit to the unbelievable, I still thoroughly enjoyed the witty writing style and the clever dialogue. So, this review will encompass my feelings from both of these, my 1st and 2nd–but certainly not my last–novels by Katherine Center. 

One thing I will point out here and now: the protagonist in Hello, Stranger and the protagonist in The Rom-Commers share an experience that informs much of their personalities: they both lost their mothers at an early age. Is this a Katherine Center “thing?” Sadie, from Hello, Stranger, is an artist–a portrait artist, which makes the face blindness thing even more poignant–while Emma, from The Rom-Commers, is a “failed screenwriter,” as she is described at the start of the book. Both young women are somewhat stalled in their respective creative professions, still undiscovered, still carrying the weight of their deceased mothers like a paperweight holding down their talent.  

Intrigued by Hello, Stranger, I read an interview in which Katherine Center said that her books, while described as romances by some readers, have virtually no spice because her husband is a middle school teacher. Having taught middle schoolers for nearly 20 years, I totally get that. When you make a pot of chili and taste it, and it is a little too spicy, you certainly don’t add a handful of Scotch Bonnet peppers to it. 

Back to the review at hand, The Rom-Commers. I loved this book. I actually liked it a lot more than Hello, Stranger. Yes, there are parts of it that also stretch the plot to the limits of believability, but for some reason, I didn’t mind it as much here. The dialogue was once again sparkling and witty, and there was an element to Emma’s character missing from Sadie’s, in my opinion. Sadie could not seem to get out of her own way, and took being independent to a whole new level. Emma came across as much more realistic with her feelings about the twists and turns life had dealt her. 

Perhaps, I could identify with Emma a bit more. I can’t draw a straight line, so forget about sketching a portrait of someone. But as a writer, I loved Emma’s take on the writing process. It summed me up–and most of my family as a matter of fact–pretty well:

There’s a joke that writers “don’t like to write—they like having written,” and that must be true of some writers. But it wasn’t true of me or Charlie. We liked the process. We liked the words. We liked playing around and trying things. We liked syllables and consonants and syncopation. We liked deciding between em dashes and commas. We liked figuring out where the story needed to go and then helping it get there.

My husband and I frequently argue over how to use a word that is new to us; we will go down the rabbit hole and google it, getting to the root of it if necessary. My younger daughter is a screenwriter in Hollywood (can’t get more cliche than that, right?), and my older daughter is well-known for her strong writing skills at work and among her circle of friends. We are all four “word people” who can’t play a game of Scrabble without a total falling-out. 

One of the things I liked most about The Rom-Commers was Katherine Center’s exploration of the “happily ever after” syndrome. Can damaged, broken-hearted people have a happily ever after? Emma’s dad expresses it the best:

My dad went on, “But I disagree. I don’t think marriage is hard. I think, in fact, if you do it right, marriage is the thing that makes everything else easier…Choose a good, imperfect person…and then appreciate the hell out of that person. Train yourself to see their best, most delightful, most charming qualities. Focus on everything they’re getting right. Be grateful—all the time—and laugh the rest off.”

This is something I try so very hard to do each and every day, not just in my nearly 35 years of marriage but also with my former work colleagues, friends, and other family members. It’s something I learned from my younger daughter, who has ALWAYS seen the best in people. She accepts everyone at face value–she doesn’t go on an archeological dig to find their faults and shortcomings.  Katherine Center seems to get this in a big way. Both Sadie and Emma come to this understanding along the way in their life stories. Despite their personal tragedies at a young age, or perhaps because of it, they move forward, looking for the best in people, and in the process, they find the best of themselves. 

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the e-ARC of The Rom-Commers, which will be published on June 11, 2024. Thank you to the Montgomery County Public Library system (shout out to my local branch, Aspen Hill Library) in Maryland for loaning the hardback copy of Hello, Stranger. And Katherine Center, if you are reading this, I promise to pay full price for your next one!