The Proposal

"I really did pick it because of that opening. I’ve never seen or read anything like it before, this surprise proposal via jumbotron at Dodger Stadium. It goes spectacularly wrong. It’s not meant to be funny—you’re kind of shocked, actually, and a little worried about Nik, who is the heroine. This guy proposing, Fisher, spells her name wrong; he didn’t really discuss any intentions with her. She didn’t know that he liked her this much, allegedly. And then it unfolds in front of, like, 45,000 people at Dodger Stadium. There are some onlookers who feel sorry for her and just as the camera people are about to descend on her, so Carlos and his sister Angela whisk her away to spare her this further embarrassment. As the story continues we learn that Fisher had an agenda all along. Get the weekly Five Books newsletter Carlos and Nik find themselves in a fling, but then it becomes something more. Just like anybody spending time together, they share food and treats and booze. It’s really nice to read those moments. It’s like people who need to heal from something, where they’re not really sure why it all happened to them. Real life comes into their spending time with each other. Jasmine Guillory’s secondary characters become as important as her main characters. Her first book was The Wedding Date , and this one, The Proposal, is her second. There’s a new one coming out soon in the summer, The Wedding Party , and she has another title towards the end of the year. And the characters she chooses weave nice connective threads."