Glow Job

Last year I read Kristen Bailey’s book Big Nick Energy, nervous from the cheeky title that it was going to be too full of spice for my taste. To my very pleasant surprise, it was quite clean, as was the previous book of hers I read, We Three Kings. When I saw her newest suggestively titled book, Glow Job, I felt sure that the content would remain relatively clean despite the colorful euphemism of the title. It’s never smart to make assumptions, is it?

The idea of the book is very sweet. Three women: Zara, a wife and mom of three teens, Jess, a wife and mom of young twins, and Chloe, a single talented architect, whose work-life balance is way out of whack, go to Ibiza to stay at a resort that was bequeathed to single chef Ben by his late uncle Lorenzo. He’s testing the waters to see if he can make this resort a full-time business and these three ladies desperately need to restore their “glow” after losing it under the weight of all their family and work responsibilities.

The armchair trip to Spanish island Ibiza was so fun! The beautiful setting leapt off the page and I could almost feel the sand and smell the fresh air as I spent time with these characters.  Zara is hilarious, unfiltered and will never pass up a good (or I suspect bad) bottle of wine. Jess is sweet and thoughtful, loves her husband and kids, but is now struggling with her changed body. Chloe is a workaholic, who’s far more talented than her work peers, but is overlooked and underappreciated by them.  Ben is the baby brother to three very funny older sisters who have very definite ideas of what he should be doing with his life.

Starting with the first day of the trip when Zara, Jess and Chloe encounter the very nude (and utterly delightful) groundskeeper Miguel, an older gay Ibizan local who was long-time friends with Lorenzo, snorkeling in the pool while cleaning it, I knew this would be a colorful book … I just didn’t realize HOW colorful! It doesn’t take long after these ladies arrive for Ben and Chloe to discover each other, and once they do …. it’s far more than the island that’s being explored! It was insta-love at its peak, but I did like Chloe and Ben, and their connection was believable.

As spice standards go I’m sure there’s much worse out there, but this has way too much for my preference. Not even in my twenties did I want to see sex described in anatomically vivid ways, using more crass terms for body parts or reading cringey intimate dialogue. Hey … if characters want to go at it like rabbits, good on them. I just don’t need to hear about it. Thankfully, the charming parts of the book - and there were a lot of them - still made this an overall good read. 

If you enjoy a beautiful island get-away with well-written characters, some very sweet found family connections and you don’t mind your romance on the spicier side, this may be one for you. I’d give the story 4 stars, but it loses one because the spicy parts felt too different in tone from the rest of the book. Overall, though, the story was so sweet, the characters were all wonderful and the message was positive and life-affirming. The narration by Fran Burgoyne was excellent as well!

★★★ ½

 

Thanks to Storm Publishing, NetGalley and author Kristen Bailey for this digital ARC to honestly review and to Audible for the audio. It’s out now.