Review: Puppy Love by Lucy Gilmore

Puppy Love
(Service Puppies #1)
by Lucy Gilmore
Publisher: Sourcebooks Casablanca
Publication date: May 28, 2019
Genre: Romance
Rating:

A brand new series from debut author Lucy Gilmore, featuring service puppies who might just be matchmakers in the making…

Sophie Vasquez runs Puppy Promise, a service puppy training organization. Sophie’s always been treated as the frail baby of the family—a thing she hates but doesn’t know how to change. Until, that is, she meets her newest client.

Harrison Parks is a wildfire firefighter who isn’t allowed back in the field unless he finds a service dog. Reluctantly, he agrees, never expecting to be assigned a skittish Pomeranian and the equally skittish woman who’s supposed to wrangle them both into order. As it turns out, they all have something to prove…and more than enough room in their hearts for a little puppy love.

Puppy Love is the adorable story about a firefighter who gets paired with a Pomeranian as his service animal. Harrison has battled with diabetes since he was a kid. He’s usually pretty good about checking his levels, but when he’s on the job, he sometimes gets wrapped up and forgets to make sure everything is okay. So, with this last scare of him passing out, his boss has demanded he seek help and get a service dog who can at least help alert Harrison when his levels get too low. What he was expecting was a Great Dane or a German Shepherd, what he wasn’t prepared for was his new companion to be a pint-sized Pomeranian.

I really liked the idea of this big, surly man getting paired with this dainty dog. He wasn’t really thrilled with the idea of needing a service animal to begin with, but he was not at all happy with getting saddled with a tiny yapper named Bubbles. However, when he agrees to take the dog on as a trial run to appease his boss and the dog handler, Sophie, he ends up becoming attached to Bubbles. The progression of Harrison as he began to lower his guard and try to work with Sophie and Bubbles was probably what really made this book work for me.

Now, of course there is a romance between Sophie and Harrison, but I honestly was more invested in Bubbles and Harrison. I suppose Sophie and Harrison’s romance felt so random and not fleshed out enough for me to really get on board with it. I wish I could have seen more of a spark or connection with them. However, I still liked the story.

This was a great debut novel by Lucy Gilmore. I liked that she wrote real characters. These characters have battled some serious health issues starting at a young age, and those hurdles in life made those characters who they are today. I can’t say that I’ve ever read a book that dealt with a character having diabetes before. If you’re in the mood for a slower-paced romance with some real down to earth characters, you might want to give Puppy Love a read.