ARC Review: Overdrive (Offtrack #2) by Esha Patel

Racing starts. Rapid hearts. Revved engines.

Shantal knows one thing in life: that success means everything. So when she gets the call to move from London to Brazil, to test out her racing simulator on high performance Formula One racing drivers, she leaves her life behind, and goes. Because she’ll do anything to succeed.

Darien knows one thing in life: passion is everything. It’s his passion for driving that has led him to the heights of motorsport, a coveted seat as a Formula One driver. When his team insists he moves to Brazil to trial a new racing simulator and racetrack, he goes. Because the one thing he is more passionate about than cars, is Brazil, his home.

When Shantal and Darien meet, sparks aren’t just flying from the gearbox. Darien knows from the moment he meets Shantal that she sends his heart into overdrive, and Shantal can’t keep her eyes off of the gorgeous driver. But in the high stakes world of Formula One, there’s no room for error, and there’s definitely no room for romance on the racetrack…

Title: Overdrive (Offtrack #2)

Author: Esha Patel

Publisher:

Expected Publication Date: November 21, 2024

Review:

Thank you to Avon Books UK and NetGalley for providing me with an egalley of this book to read and give my honest review. The opinions expressed here are my own.

I will start by saying I didn't realize this was the second book in a series. That being said, this one can definitely be read on its own but it seems it will spoil some stuff from the first book. It's more like an interconnected stand alone with cross over characters and relationships. I see that the MMC, Darien,  from this book appears in the first book and perhaps if I had read that, I would have understood and liked his character a bit more.

I know F1 is the hot thing right now and I've been craving those books because I really enjoy the races. This is my third book in this type of world and I was hoping it would be the one to hit the spot. I have high expectations of what will happen in these books, of how things will play out, of what the authors will present when it comes to racing. I think Patel did a fairly good job of this overall. This sport is tough and highly competitive. Plus, very technical. I will say there were some areas that confused me, even being an F1 fan. Some technical stuff that didn't necessarily need to be included as I'm not sure the regular reader would really get it without more of an explanation.

Overall I liked Shantel and Darien enough to want to know where things went. I did struggle at times with their personalities. I definitely liked Darien more than Shante. I can see Darien is kind of the golden retriever type, though there wasn't as much joy coming from him as I would have liked. I didn't necessarily feel the chemistry between them, either. It felt a bit like insta-love with no growth. It felt like the author was forcing the characters to have a connection and become romantically involved. I wanted to slow build burn the author was trying to establish but it just felt flat. And nothing truly happened until about 3/4 of the way through the book. Normally, I'm good with this if the author shows how the characters are becoming connected and forming a relationship, but that wasn't the case with this book. Also, I didn't necessarily feel the characters' growth as I'm sure the author intended. Both are going through a grief process, which should help them connect, but it didn't. This theme was very heavy but it felt superficial in this book. The author continuously told us how sad the characters were but didn't really show that to us in a meaningful way. And I didn't see them developing and learning from what they were at the beginning of the story.

I feel like the author included a lot of the F1 information to try and move the story along. But it just made it boring, to be honest. It felted forced on the reader than than a way to show them the sport.

I will say the author describes the settings well. I liked that she took us from race to race and showed us some parts of where those races take place. And she did make me want to perhaps visit Brazil, it sounds like an interesting place.

Lastly, this author does a lot of telling rather than showing. Every little detail of what the characters are doing is told to the reader rather than making the reader feel like they are in the scene and experiencing what the characters are going through. It killed the pacing for me and I often times felt like I needed to skim the scene, rather than immerse myself in it to find out what was going on. It took me out of the story and didn't make me want to pick it back up. Often the author added information to the story which did nothing to move the plot forward. There were a lot of things that were mundane and unnecessary. At times it was even confusing when the characters were speaking or when the author was trying to show a scene but it was all described to us in minute detail.

I don't think I will be continuing with this series. This one was truly a struggle for me. The author has some potential but needs to hone things better to make the story more cohesive and enjoyable. The execution was poor and just didn't work for me. I do think that F1 fans may enjoy the depth the author goes into regarding the sport but if they are looking for a great romance with amazing character growth to go along with that, I think they will be disappointed.

Author:

Esha Patel is a contemporary romance author with a love for diverse romances and empowering stories. She is a full-time college student in the Midwest, and loves spending time with family and friends, dancing, watching sports (Ferrari and Real Madrid are her favorites), and baking lots and lots of stuff that can probably feed multiple eleven-man soccer teams.

Feel free to follow Esha on Instagram and TikTok @eshapatelauthor!

To contact: email at authoreshapatel@gmail.com with any inquiries.