Review: 4.5 Stars - A Delicious Trifle At the End of the LEGAL BRIEFS Meal
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 06 23, 2014
LEGALLY WED is "Lawyers in Love" series author N.M. Silber's novella-length story of the impending wedding of lifelong enemies turned devoted couple, Assistant District Attorneys Adam Roth and Lily Adler. I loved it, but then I readLegal Briefs (Lawyers in Love Book 3)first, so I'm not certain if the story will make sense without the longer work for context.Adam and Lily announce to his family they're engaged at Thanksgiving dinner - and their problems multiply exponentially as first his Mother, and then HER Mother, a feared litigator known as "The Ice Queen" steamroll the wedding plans! Lily discovers that the best way she can ease the stress of escalating wedding plans, dealing with her Always-Finding-Fault mother, and numerous other hassles of coupledom (which I won't elaborate as I'm sure Amazon will reject this review outright then!) is (well, I guess Amazon will censor this review for THAT, too!) as quickly and as often as possible. This results in many, many hot and funny scenes - use your imagination as to what those scenes might be about.But there's MORE! A "fabulous" wedding planner Lily's and Adam's gay friend Bruce crushes on; adjustments that couples have to make as two people become a single unit (including a nasty fight reminiscent of their earlier antipathy, that shocks them and their friends!); brief character bits that set up N.M. Silber's future books WINNING APPEAL (Public Defender Mark and Braden's kid sister Beth - with Braden unsure that his Old Player Pal Mark is ready to settle down!) and POWER OF ATTORNEY (Adam's older sister Abby and Lily's ex-boyfriend Jacob the A*hole Federal Prosecutor - who apparently confuses "Courtship" with "Sexual Harassment"!) - all culminating in a funny and touching wedding at the (fictitious) Marrakesh Resort and Casino in Las Vegas in January, and which shows Lily and Adam finally asserting themselves as a couple over their Mothers.What really works well here is that you see Lily and Adam building their life together even before marriage, so what might have seemed like a Romance Novel contrivance (hooking up two unlikely and feuding people) feels organic and loving and built to last. What works a little less well, and the reason I can't quite give this a full five stars, is some of the hints of character development basically mentioned and then dropped - mostly involving Lily's parents - who aren't given any shadings or character development other than Cold Unsupportive Professional-Class Jews who can't even let their daughter get married without making it about themselves. From my time living in New York City I've met people just like that, as I'm certain Silber (being Jewish herself) has - I just wish she'd gone a bit more under the surface with them, as she does with her major characters.Even with that, I really loved this book and would recommend it to fans of humorous romance, legal romances, or just fun reads in general. Just read LEGAL BRIEFS first, m'kay?