Review of The Shippers by Katherine Center

Center's newest rom-com involves a ship full of potential romance and heartbreak, a destination wedding, childhood crushes, long-term misunderstandings, zany moments, and the possibility of fresh starts for multiple couples.

In Katherine Center's newest romance, JoJo Burton is finding her way from being in love with the idea of love to finding a real relationship.

The reappearance of her childhood best friend Cooper helps JoJo begin to get more centered, but she moves from a broken engagement to what is probably an ill-advised attempt to shift a youthful crush on Finn, a former neighborhood boy, into a real-life romance.

Her sister Ashley's cruise-ship destination wedding feels like the perfect opportunity to put into action her zany plan to conquer Finn. But is Finn the right one for JoJo? And will JoJo be brave enough to find out why Cooper disappeared without a trace for the past four years, breaking her heart?

Katherine Center writes romantic, non-steamy stories, and she includes frequent zany, slapstick-feeling hijinks--which, by the way, seem tailor-made for big-screen rom-com adaptations. The Shippers is no exception; JoJo is faced with sometimes absurd scenarios (some of which she orchestrates herself), and the reader shouldn't expect the details of these scenes to add up to real-life logic or to adhere to practical limitations, but to enjoy the wild ride.

Subplots include JoJo's parents' potential split, large-scale collusion around romantic matches, and a sister's pop psychology-driven path toward set-ups.

The misunderstandings and omitted communication that allows for the best friends' dilemma and obtuseness aren't overdone, which I really appreciated.

The Shippers offers up one of my favorite premises, in which old friends realize that their love is more than platonic.

I received a prepublication version of this title courtesy of NetGalley and St. Martin's Press.

More from Katherine Center

Katherine Center is also the author of The Love Haters, The Rom-Commers, Hello Stranger, What You Wish For, Things You Save in a Fire, The Bodyguard, and other books.