Affogato (BrewBiz Book 1) by E.M. Lindsey

Affogato has exceptional detail and representation of both the deaf/hard of hearing communities, along with fantastic awareness on someone who's on the autism spectrum. 

From the blurb:

Despite finding success in his career, the BrewBiz Deaf Café owner's love life is another story. Because Caleb's longest relationship just came to a screeching halt when his ex cheated.

Then dumped him.

Publicly.

And the video of it went viral.

Resigned to his fate of being famous only because the world saw his public humiliation, Caleb turns sour and bitter. It's easy to hide his feelings after that, and it's even easier to ignore what his heart really wants: the new hire who's so anxious, he jumps at his own shadow.

It also doesn’t help that Bodhi is too young, too good looking, and too sweet for a man like Caleb to ever deserve him.

Especially when Caleb's been nothing but terrible to him from the moment they met.

But there's more to Bodhi's story than meets the eye, and he might just be the man who can teach Caleb the meaning of love without strings. Love without expectations.

And the kind of love that leads to real happily ever afters.

Affogato is the first book in the BrewBiz series. It's a boss/employee enemies to lovers romance featuring delicious baked goods, crêpe loyalty, late night snacks, first kisses, first times, and the swooniest HEA.

Angel's Review:

I have always love EM's books, I don't think I've read a book of theirs that I haven't liked. And this book just made me appreciate their writing even more. 

Their writing and their characters is what inspired and encouraged me to learn ASL, I never really realized before how underrepresented that community is. And how secluded some hearing people make them feel, so I was inspired to learn ASL. So, I signed up for classes and I am not fluent at all, but hopefully some day I'll get there.. or maybe I won't. That's something that I really appreciated about Bodhi's character. His character wasn't perfect, no one is, but he accepted that. He accepted that his ASL might improve, but that it also might not because his brain might never function that way. What I could relate to; besides brains not functioning like others, was that feeling of being uncomfortable signing in front of others. I worry I'm not signing things correctly or that I'm signing something different than what I intend to. I wasn't expecting to relate to Bodhi's character as much as I did, and I loved that. 

Since I've started my ASL journey while I was reading this I tried to sign the words I recognize and have learned, and that was a very unique and interesting experience! It was like I was.. interacting with the characters? If that makes sense, which was very cool.

EM is known for their impeccable world building, their depth of characters as well as the relatability of those characters, along with having a terrific plot with wonderful story building. I never quite know that to expect from EM other than the fact that I'll enjoy the journey they take me on. 

Caleb's character took me a while to warm up to, mainly because he was very harsh towards Bodhi in the beginning. But he eventually redeemed himself, and after that point I warmed up to his character more. I also liked the side characters that were very prevalent throughout the story. Jori, Khai, Wren, Ravi, and of course seeing Peyton's character was a pleasant surprise!! I was so happy when his character got involved in this story, it made me so happy. I cannot wait for what's next to come in this very promising series. 

Rating: 5 Stars

Affogato is available to buy as an ebook, paperback, or to read with Kindle Unlimited subscription.