May 5th 2020 | Sourcebooks Casablanca
Source: Library
When Graham Barnett named his diner The Tourist Trap, he meant it as a joke. Now he's stuck slinging reindeer dogs to an endless string of resort visitors who couldn't interest him less. Not even the sweet, enthusiastic tourist in the corner who blushes every time he looks her way…The Tourist Attraction is a book that I should have loved. Everything about the premise of this book screams Kailia. A romance set in Alaska? A grumpy hero? A really sweet, naïve heroine? I wanted all of that. But what should have been a really great reading experience ended up being incredibly frustrating. I’m not entirely sure what it was about this book but it felt like everything that could go wrong had gone wrong.
Two weeks in Alaska isn't just the top item on Zoey Caldwell's bucket list. It's the whole bucket. One look at the mountain town of Moose Springs and she's smitten. But when an act of kindness brings Zoey into Graham's world, she may just find there's more to the man than meets the eye…and more to love in Moose Springs than just the Alaskan wilderness.
Characters for the most part will make or break a story for me. The plot doesn’t have to be good and the writing could also be mediocre if I really truly love the characters. But God did I hate the characters in the story. From the moment we meet him, Graham doesn’t come off as a gruffy, lovable guy. Instead, he comes off as just an asshole. He’s one of those guys that you were in your friends against talking to because he literally is an asshole for no reason. All of the interaction he had with Zoe left me feeling like he was really sleazy. I didn’t ship him or Zoe together because I figured that she deserves better.
Zoe, on the other hand, was just too sweet and naïve a character for my liking. I fully understand that not everyone is going to be as vocal or as confident as others, but Zoe became incredibly frustrating. Maybe it was a combination of Graham’s character as well but I really could not get behind her at all. A lot of the times I wanted *more* from her.
I also won’t get into details about all of the other ridiculous characters in the story but they were so annoying. I was astounded to find out that Lana is going to be the main character in the next book and I will not be reading it. It’s been a long time since I’ve met someone so insufferable. Maybe if the author had developed her as a character more of this book I would care more. All I got was that she was a rich friend of Zoey’s who was actually an incredibly bad friend. I find it hard to support someone who will leave her drunk friend alone in a town that her friend has never been in.
The characters aside, the plot also could’ve been so good but it wasn’t. Maybe it was because there were so many random moments between Graham and Zoe that didn’t really do much. I already didn’t like them as characters and these random moments didn’t add anything to their development.
I think the main conflict in the story is an excellent one. Completely understand why a local of a tourist town would not want to get involved with the tourist. That part of Graham was completely understandable to me. But there wasn’t enough of a conversation around that for me. How am I getting up till 80% of the story and you’re still wishy-washy about wanting to be with this person? Why am I getting to the very end of the story and you’re still unsure about pursuing this relationship? I think this is where the plot suffered a lot.
This could go one of two ways, in my opinion. One, the local could decide halfway through the story that they want to end the relationship with the tourist. This could give the author a lot of chances to force the two characters together and really reckoned with their feelings for each other. Two, the local and the tourist decide halfway through that they want to be together. For the remainder of the story they could focus on how they can be together. Obviously a story doesn’t have to follow either of these instances. But for this book specifically, I felt like either of those options would’ve been better than what we got. I am not going to be happy in a story where I get almost to the end and your characters are still unsure about what they want with no resolution in sight.
I’m going to go ahead and in this review now. I think I’ve talked enough about why I wasn’t happy with the story. If you like the story, I am really happy for you. Anyone have any recommendations for a story similar to this I am all ears. Again, I love stories set in places like Alaska and I definitely want more of them in this world.
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