Book Review: The Unlikely Pair
Sometimes you pick up a book or movie, and you find out early on it’s going to be a pure popcorn eating, relaxing experience. It’s not going to be particularly deep, it’s not going to be perfect, it’s not going to live rent free in your mind, but it’ll be enjoyable. That’s ok. We need more of those experiences in the world.
The Unlikely Pair by Jax Calder checks those boxes.
Official Summary
What happens when you find yourself stranded in the wilderness with your political enemy?
Getting stranded in the freezing wilderness with my archenemy wasn’t on today’s to-do list. But somehow, that’s where I’ve ended up.
Harry Matheson, my political rival, has always been smarmy, arrogant, and entitled. It figures that even this plane crash has barely ruffled his well-coiffed hair.
It’s all fine, though, because our pilot has gone to call for help and rescue should be imminent.
Fast forward a few frigid hours…
Umm…maybe it’s not so fine, because it appears our pilot is part of an international terrorist group intent on kidnapping us.
Now Harry and I have to flee through the wilderness—together.
Unfortunately, being adept at political debates and parliamentary procedures doesn’t exactly prepare you for the basics of finding food, keeping warm, and evading the local wildlife while playing high-stakes hide-and-seek with armed terrorists.
The only way Harry and I have any hope of surviving is to stick together.
The problem is, the line separating hate and love has begun to blur, and the last thing I need is to fall for my enemy.
Quick Information
Author: Jax Calder
Published: August 7, 2024
Genre: M/M Romance, Contemporary Romance
Tropes: Enemies to Lovers, Forced Proximity, Opposites Attract
Review
Political rivals Harry Matheson and Toby Webley crash land in the Scandinavian wilderness and must escape the clutches of terrorists. The two must overcome their differences if they hope to survive.
This book is the second in the Unlikely Dilemmas series by Jax Calder, and the author lets you know this very quickly by interjecting the main characters from the previous book early on in this one. I didn’t mind it too much but it was very clear what the author was doing. If you enjoyed that book, you would probably enjoy the cameos. If you hadn’t read the first book, there is nothing preventing you from enjoying this one as it focuses on an entirely different couple for the majority of the book.
When I first came across this book, I was immediately interested in the premise of political rivals lost in the wilderness together. The political banter and differences between Harry and Toby was a highlight of this story. There is no shortage of funny banter and quippy lines where both characters take shots at each other, only to put aside their differences when pushed into a life or death situation. The rivalry starts off as extremely aggressive, with both characters slinging barbs at one another. Over time, this gradually progresses to playfulness and teasing. Their political differences remain for the entirety of the book, which was refreshing to see since a lot of stories resolve by having one character change their opinions drastically to suit the other's taste.
The pacing of the book is a little erratic at times. The book starts off slow, and we’re forced to sit through the “see how much the characters hate one another Olympics” which was almost a bridge too far for me. Thankfully the plane crash happened, and we were able to move onto the survival portion of the book. The majority of the book is spent in the wilderness, which for me was the best part, before the author speed rushed the ending. The final few chapters needed more time in the oven to prepare something meaningful. There was a twist and several loose ends that were both tied up in the safest way possible and others which were left to dangle.
I’m a pretty big stickler when it comes to realistic scenarios in contemporary fiction, but the author did a decent job of keeping my disbelief suspended and not jettisoning it into orbit. I did laugh and shake my head at times because of the decisions and actions the main characters made, but I was able to push through for the sake of the overall story that I found entertaining. When I started picturing the “terrorists” as no better than Saturday morning cartoon goons, I was able to push aside my criticism.
What I did not enjoy, however, was the author's forceful attempts to keep the scales “even” between Harry and Toby. For everything Harry provided, Toby had to do “something” to make sure he was contributing. The most outlandish things come from this status quo which I could have done without in some of these scenes. There are ways people are helpful, even if they can’t immediately fish or have adequate knowledge of the outdoors. If the author had leaned into a more natural balance between the characters, I would have enjoyed it more than the hamfisted tallying.
For the most part I enjoyed the romance between Harry and Toby. Harry takes great care in providing for Toby and protecting him (even at cost to himself) which is also reflected in his upbringing. Harry also knows what makes Toby tick, and he goes so far as to enter debates with him when Toby starts to lose his grip during a difficult situation, thus bringing them back to a sense of normalcy. This is the kind of detail I crave in stories. I would have appreciated this even more if Toby wasn’t constantly trying to one up Harry’s compassion.
Toby however was hit or miss at times. Over the course of the book, he does not grow as a character. If he never was on that plane and never was forced into a survival situation, I don’t think Toby would have been any different aside from appreciating a microwave more. In contrast, Harry drastically changes as a character and makes several sacrifices to be with Toby. For me, I would have preferred a little more balance in this department if they’re trying to keep score on that front.
As for the spice, there are several scenes, but they aren’t particularly deep in terms of descriptions or emotional depth. Your mileage may vary. For me, I thought the acts of kindness and kissing descriptions were more romantic than the actual bedroom scenes. I also had a hard time suspending my disbelief that these characters were having sex every time in a life or death situation.
Readers should be warned that there is switching in this book. If you’re not a fan of that, you will have to stomach it if you want to make it through to the end.
The ending is where the book really lost steam for me. I was about half-way through the book when I started to wonder just how the author was going to wrap up this story in a meaningful way to get the Happily Ever After as well as explain a major plotpoint. For the latter, we completely miss out on a resolution… unless you read the next book, so says the author's notes at least. As for the HEA, your mileage will also vary here. I didn’t particularly agree with the author's choice of resolution, but I understand it was probably the most simple thing to do given the book’s already long length.
This is the first book I’ve read of Jax Calder, but I will probably try the first and third book in this series at some point to see more of their style, how they develop the other characters, and how all the dangling plot threads are (hopefully) resolved. Despite the issues I had with the book, I walked away entertained by the majority of it. If you can suspend your disbelief for the entirety of this book and instead enjoy the banter and overall message that even if you have differing opinions, anyone can come together for the decisions that truly matter, then you will enjoy The Unlikely Pair.
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