The Ex Talk – Rachel Lynn Solomon

I’m a big fan of Rachel Lynn Solomon – I loved Weather Girl, and I loved Business Or Pleasure even more. I got impatient waiting for her to publish again, so I decided to dip into her backlist and check out The Ex Talk.

The Ex Talk was Solomon’s first adult novel (preceded only by her debut, a young adult novel called Today, Tonight, Tomorrow). Naturally, then, it’s the one that seems the closest to her real novel. Solomon used to work in public radio, as her heroine does in this romance, and lives in Seattle where the story is set.

The premise of The Ex Talk flips a common romance trope on its head. Instead of fake dating, the main characters are fake exes. Shay, the heroine, has the brilliant idea of starting a dating show hosted by ex-lovers, an idea that might just be good enough to save the fledgling public radio station that employs her. Her boss insists that she host it herself, and suggests that her co-host be her workplace rival, Dominic – despite the fact that they’ve never actually dated.

After a bit of hand-wringing and soul searching, Shay and Dominic agree to go ahead with the show. Their boss threatens to fire them if they don’t, after all. They concoct a realistic-sounding dating history, and convince themselves that their fake former romance is just one step beyond ‘creative storytelling’ for the audio medium. And so, The Ex Talk begins – and it’s an instant smash.

As the listeners and downloads tick over the thousands, then the tens of thousands, the pressure to keep the lie going grows. This is more-than-slightly complicated by the fact that Dominic and Shay’s rivalry has turned into the sexy kind. Their flirty banter progresses to actual intimacy, physical and emotional, all the while they must pretend that they’ve already broken up. What a kerfuffle!

If The Ex Talk sounds a little unrealistic in summary, I’m sorry to say it’s not much better on the page. The preamble feels a bit rushed and convoluted, though the rhythm does improve once the show starts. It seemed like Solomon had the idea to write about fake exes – which is a great one, in and of itself – but tied herself up in knots trying to backwards engineer a scenario where that would happen.

I did appreciate the effort to do something different, though. As well as the twist on fake dating, in The Ex Talk the heroine is actually older than her love interest (gasp!). It didn’t really occur to me until I was reading this one how rarely I find that kind of age gap in contemporary romances. It’s not a disturbing difference – she’s 29, he’s 24 – but it’s still noteworthy in terms of the gender role reversal. Even better, Solomon doesn’t just depict the age difference by telling the reader about it, she actually reflects that difference in the way that the characters talk and behave.

Unfortunately, a few other aspects missed the mark. There was a wildly uneven pining pining-to-sex-scene ratio that irritated me (at some point, you want Shay to stop yearning and just get on with it). See also: the alarmingly frequent mentions of Dominic’s forearms and his half-smile/mouth twitch/small smirk – I started to roll my eyes every time I saw it on the page.

The Ex Talk is a fine novel, but not the knock-it-out-of-the-park romance I’ve come to expect from Solomon. If you’re just starting out with her oeuvre, this isn’t the one I’d recommend. In retrospect, it’s easy to see The Ex Talk as Solomon’s warm-up act, the gentle trot around the track before she truly got off to the races.

My favourite Amazon reviews of The Ex Talk:

• “The sex scenes remind me of the old Harlequin romances but with added details about old disgusting sports bras.” – Jackie Dailey
• “The dreadful parts are worth it. Also, this book contained no mention of lube and for that I am grateful.” – Katy
• “this was for book club with my mom and the soft porn sex scenes really were unnecessary. I don’t mind some spice but this was ghost pepper. Can’t wait to discuss this with mom.” – Arthurs