Not going to lie, when I saw a character was named Boof, I was like immediately no. But then I found out it was a woman and that this was a sapphic romance and I made an exception. This was legit the conversation I had. Keep reading my book review of Love and Hot Chicken for my full thoughts about Boof.
Summary
The Chickie Shak is something of a historical landmark. Red clapboard walls, thriving wasp population, yard-toilets resplendent with sunflowers. My best friend Lee Ray and I used to come after our softball games and snag a picnic table while our mammas ordered the home team special. Truth is, most people around here order the same thing until the day somebody throws their ashes off a roller coaster at Dollywood. The line snaked around the building far as you could see, a real parade of diversity hobnobbing in the parking lot from noon until night.
When PJ Spoon returns home for her beloved daddy’s funeral, she doesn’t expect to stick around. Why abandon her PhD program at Vanderbilt for the humble charms of her hometown, Pennywhistle, Tennessee? She tells herself it’s to help her brokenhearted Mamma, but PJ’s own heart’s not doing too good either. She impulsively takes a job as a fry cook at Pennywhistle’s beloved Chickie Shak, where locals gather for Nashville-style hot chicken.
Then fate shakes up PJ’s life again. While the town rallies around the terribly retro and terribly fun Hot Chicken Pageant, PJ finally notices her cute redheaded coworker Boof, a singer-songwriter with a talent as striking as her curly hair.
While PJ and Boof fall for each other, Boof’s search for her birth mother—a Pennywhistle native—catapults the budding couple into a mystery that might be better left unsolved. When the Chickie Shak pageant takes off, old rivalries and new friendships in Pennywhistle lead to unexpected fireworks, and new beginnings.
Review
(Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher. This has not impacted my review which is unbiased and honest.)
Okay so the first thing I want to get off my chest is could we just not have, in 2024, these casual very small references to Harry Potter? I think we can all agree JK Rowling has 100% deserved the deletion and we can leave the cultural legacy in the past. Now, I enjoyed Love and Hot Chicken. It’s incredibly setting driven – which feels weird to say about a romance – but the setting is so clear and vivid. The community, Chickie Shack, the Elvis references, feels so detailed and alive. And this setting makes the book vivid and alive.
I enjoyed the relationship between PJ and her mother. They’re both reeling from the grief and PJ is afraid if she leaves, the truth of her dad’s death will sink in. That alone felt very poignant. And I adored watching PJ and her mother’s relationship change in this post-father space behind. Especially as PJ has to navigate her mother’s support. But unfortunately the side characters basically stole the show. I ended up wanting to read to find out more about Boof, her mother, and her best friend. I wished we had seen more of them.
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And then I realized that they stole the show from PJ. I liked PJ on paper. I liked her love of history, her navigating her relationship with her dad, but at the end I was thinking, “do I like PJ?”. Plus the themes didn’t ring as strong considering the action of the ending and the pageant scenes. All in all, Love and Hot Chicken was entertaining and my favorite element was the detailed setting. But I wish that PJ had stolen a bit more of the show for herself.
Find Love and Hot Chicken on Goodreads, Storygraph, Amazon, Bookshop.org, & Blackwells.