And I don’t think you can get that unless you’ve already established some kind of dynamic [the characters] have. In Astrid Parker Doesn’t Fail, Astrid Parker must ask herself what she wants the rest of her life to look like.

KT: One of the protagonists also seems to struggle with a need to please her mother, who seems impossible to satisfy. I pulled on a lot of personal experience because I was kind of a late-in-life realizer of my own sexuality. Astrid’s book is the second one in the series, so she was already locked in as an interior designer.

I knew I wanted her to really hold up to the title that she doesn’t fail — which means she must fail. But I wanted to balance that with [the idea of] I have these people around me — no matter who I am or what I am, or how I see myself, label or no label, whatever it is — [who] accept me and support me no matter what. AHB: I think that 30-somethings, older millennials as well as younger Gen Xers, which is just where I am, experience career changes [more frequently].

I like to intersperse steam and the actual hotness of sex with that emotional connection that’s going on.Is the world that I have built for myself, or claim to have built for myself that was really maybe made for me, is that the one I want? I think career changes, or thinking you want one thing and then you’d shift to another thing, is just something that’s really common with our generation that our parents’ generation probably didn’t do quite as much.

And I think it can still be very harrowing if you don’t feel like there’s people around you who can see you. Her discovery of what truly brings her joy is sweet and satisfying (satisfying in every way—this is a romance novel, after all), but the plot threads feel fairly familiar. BookPage is a recommendation guide for readers, highlighting the best new books across all genres as chosen by our editors. And my favorite romances to read are not only [with people] figuring themselves out so they can be with another person, but they’re also figuring themselves out for themselves. And at first, actually, [the plot] wasn’t a renovation show — it was just a magazine feature, like in a home design magazine.Astrid is beautiful, composed, organized, efficient—and also desperately unhappy, locked in a life that doesn’t bring her any joy. But I think they’re both at a point where they need to change what their normal everyday life is, career and romance [wise]. I felt like I discovered along with her what she needed to hear someone say to her, what she needed to uncover about herself and, ultimately, what she deserved from life. There are books that start with sex, but then you build that backwards, and you can see that building backwards as they start to realize it’s more than sex, or something like that.

Without these cookies, we won't know if you have any performance-related issues that we may be able to address. But filming the show means working with glamorous, ice-cold designer Astrid Parker, with whom Jordan has a disastrous meet-ugly. Ashley Herring Blake, the award-winning author behind multiple books, is back again with her Bright Falls series. For Astrid — well, I think for a lot of people and for me — [she was] just dealing with compulsory heterosexuality, where you just assumed that this is what you’re supposed to be like.A lot of the reason why sexuality can be really confusing, especially if you end up kind of falling under the bisexual umbrella, pansexual, or anything like that, is that you’re attracted to multiple genders. And while her professional image is pristine, her personal one is not: A failed engagement and a tough-to-please mother have sent her flailing. We read about kids that have come out and realize [their] sexuality, but what does it really look like as an adult? Is this a case of two characters needing to meet each other when their own lives are somewhat derailed, whether they realize it or not? I was familiar with shows like Property Brothers and the Joanna [Gaines] and Chip [Gaines] show, Fixer Upper — just all the really popular ones.