Product Description: An irresistibly delicious novel about the power of love… and dessert.
Like other well-meaning mothers, Julie Mueller’s believed she did the right thing when she secretly ended her teenage daughter’s crush on Michael Slayton, a wild older neighborhood heartthrob with a penchant for Shakespeare and the pedigree of trailer trash.
Twenty years later, Betty Mueller has come to realize that was a big mistake. Her daughter Julie – divorced and raising a teenage daughter alone – is a workaholic obsessed with her career. And Michael, the one man who could make her happy, is the one man to whom she won’t speak.
Now dying and determined to make amends, Betty stages her last great feat of motherhood by reuniting the couple in a dessert class where she hopes the sweetness of a chocolate almond Torta Caprese will erase the bitterness of a wretched misunderstanding.
“Sweet love, renew thy force; be it not said thy edge should blunter be than appetite,” Shakespeare once pleaded—though it will require more than poetry and passion fruit for Julie and Michael to renew their love.
It will, in fact, require the sweetest sacrifice of all.
Sweet Love by Sarah Strohmeyer This was quite an enjoyable book, hard to put down probably read within a couple of days, easy to read. Sarah Strohmeyer is highly recommended to anyone as an author - all her books have been enjoyable to read from Bubbles escapades to Sweet Love.
Good beach read! Sarah Strohmeyer's "Sweet Love" focuses on Julie Mueller, a single mom who works as a reporter for a local TV station. Julie's life centered around her work and taking care of her daughter and parents. Due to Julie's non-existing love life, her mother Betty, decided to enroll her in a dessert class hoping that Julie will reconnect with her first love and high school crush, Michael. Julie and Michael's relationship was strained due to a previous work-related misunderstanding. Things did not work out the way Betty thought, as Julie may be relocating to Washington D.C. for a network position, and Michael seemed to be involved with another woman.
I have read all of Sarah Strohmeyer's previous novels, and this was I thought her best effort. The main focus of the book was relationships - particularly between Julie and her mother. The romance between Julie and Michael was rather restrained, though more "realistic" between two older adults. This wasn't the best in the genre, but certainly above average. A good beach read.
Not her typical story line I bought this sxpecting it to be another light and funny book. It still had funny parts but was also very srious. This was a great book but wasn't like her last two. As long as you don't expect Sweet Love to be a silly romance you will enjoy it.
Sweet, Sexy, and Totally Delicious Sarah Strohmeyer's Sweet Love is a paean to both sweetness, as in desserts, and love, romantic and familial. Betty Mueller starts off the tale by buying her daughter Julie and Julie's one-time crush Michael, who she hasn't seen in six years, slots in a local dessert class. Julie rolls her eyes but agrees to go, not realizing how easily she will be seduced into the thrill of making these masterpieces from scratch, a far cry from her mother's back of the box recipes.
Meanwhile, reporter Julie is grappling with a possible promotion at her job as a TV news reporter while trying to hold off the woman gunning for her job. Throw in a tragic murder, an overeducated homeless man, sizzling passion and jealousy between her and Michael, and various family health crises, and you've got yourself a story that's full of snappy drama as Julie grapples with her own heart's calling, which she's kept buried for a long time.
The tension between Julie and Michael is built to perfection, and the supporting characters, from Julie's daughter Em to her best friend Julia and eccentric work crew, are all masterfully worked into the story. The fraught mother/daughter relationship, a battle of wills, is one that will be recognizable to many moms and daughters of various ages. And let us not forget desserts, about which Betty Mueller waxes so enthused at the story's start. Strohmeyer makes sure to infuse sweetness of the edible variety in most every chapter, from chocolate orgasms to crème brulee and beyond. How to craft these mouth-watering deserts is a source of generational tension between Julie and her mom, and also a path to seduction.
This is a sweet, tender, sexy and wonderful romance that I raced to get to the end of, even as I was sad to put it down. The title is fitting on many levels; Strohmeyer looks at the highs and lows of different types of love, and ultimately at how strong the pull of it is. This is the first book of Strohmeyer's I've read, but it certainly won't be the last.
Crushes, coincidences, and cupcakes Sarah Strohmeyer was inspired to write SWEET LOVE as a way of honoring the memory of her beloved mother, but also to gain closure after she passed away. The book opens with a prologue, written from the viewpoint of Betty Mueller, who feels a need to correct a wrong she thinks she did to her middle-aged daughter many years ago. Betty did not approve of Julie's budding crush on Michael Slayton, a family friend who was a bit older than Julie's teenage years. In the same breath, Betty also confesses that she loves desserts (and cooking in general) and believes it's what helps make the world go 'round. She admits that her own daughter hates to cook because she was a slave to her kitchen. Julie will have none of that.
Looking at Julie today, Betty sees an unhappy, divorced, middle-aged woman with a teenaged daughter. This, she believes, is all her fault. Through some finagling, she manages to get Julie into a very exclusive cooking class focusing on desserts. What Julie doesn't know is that Michael also has been given this same gift. When the two attend their first session, Julie is shocked to find the love of her life there. It's the beginning of a renewed acquaintance, in which both Michael and Julie are reminded of their joint pasts, the friendship they shared, walking down memory lane and thinking of what had ruined their relationship --- a misunderstanding that occurred between them in their professional lives.
Julie is embarrassed to even see Michael, because her feelings for him --- the crush she had when she was growing up --- was never reciprocated, as he only saw her as his best friend's little sister. And obviously those feelings still remained, because why would she be reacting this way to him after all these years? To make matters worse, Michael doesn't come to class alone. He brings a very attractive woman with him, and Julie is convinced they are involved.
Betty continues her manipulating, hoping to get the two of them together. But as she's doing this, she's also dealing with her own issues that will bring Julie and Michael even closer together.
SWEET LOVE is written in a very humorous tone, but there are also a lot of touching emotional scenes. I believe this is the best book Sarah Strohmeyer has written thus far. While her earlier novels, which comprised the Bubbles series, were light comedies with one-dimensional characters but still a lot of fun, her stand-alone titles have an added depth to them. SWEET LOVE continues to showcase her humor, but there is a serious side to this book --- with the characters being much more rounded and three-dimensional, changing and growing from their mistakes, and a few heavy themes that definitely bring more to the story.
As always, I was not disappointed by Strohmeyer. Her book especially rings true for me because I too have recently lost my mother.
Anything Goes Trivia
Megaton Man
Tony's Online Tips
Trevor
