Review: The Girl From The Paradise Ballroom // This Disappointed Me

This book did not exactly exceed my expectations. I usually enjoy historical books a lot, although I don’t read them often. I feel like I might have went into this book with high expectations after reading wonderful books by Ruta Septys and Pam Jenoff, and sadly it might have ruined the book for me.




The romance just didn’t really captivate me. In the description, it mentions that the “electricity” between the two, Antonio and Olivia, when they first meet. There was hardly any electricity, and I saw no real connection between them. The main basis of their first meet was them exchanging a beer bottle and two rude remarks. Where’s the electricity, if I may ask?




What the description did not mention was that Antonio was married at the time that he met Olivia, and it annoyed me that he was thinking about Olivia and how Olivia was “different” and “stood out” from the other dancers. I absolutely hate this trope of girls being “different” from other girls, and how somehow all other girls are worse than the main heroine.




Besides this, the historical backdrop wasn’t as “epic” as I thought it would be. I completely love most historical stories because of the incorporation of the historical events into the story, but in this story they only mention the events.




However, a good point were the characters. I rather liked Olivia and how independent she was, although Antonio wasn’t really likeable. The characters were quite fleshed out and I enjoyed that.




Thanks to the publisher for giving me a review copy of this book.