I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

“It takes a village,” someone at a wedding once said.

The Small Stuff tells the story of how circumstance, fate, and all those little choices, we and others make, work and conspire to bring together Josh Allen (no, not that one Bills fans) and Maggie Mills. We start off getting introduced to a young 4yr old Josh and the moment his childhood innocence is killed off when his mother tells him just because he wants something, doesn't mean he'll get it and not to have unrealistic expectations out of life. This, along with a kindergarten friendship gone awry will become Josh's baggage that he takes through life and keeps him working at the same job for years when he is first rejected from his dream job. Maggie's upbringing is different with a father that is more supportive and she has a personality that has her wide-eyed asking “What, I was just being honest?” because she hasn't learned that sometimes honesty needs tact. We don't fully learn the big piece of Maggie's baggage until later in the book but her philosophy regarding love is that soulmates don't exist so why bother looking.

The small stuff, it seemed after the fact, wasn't so small after all.

The first half had a beat that was a little tough to get into, after we're introduced to Josh, the second chapter jumps to his parents and we get an abridgment of their lives, giving us that trail of all the little choices that bring Josh and Maggie together that is the theme of the story, and this jumping to secondary/side character synopses continues throughout the book, heavier in the first half. This ended up giving the first half more of an uneven beat as it kept breaking up the connection I was trying to build with Josh, Maggie, and their relationship starting to build. I know numerous flashbacks can be tough for some, but since I kept in mind the underlining theme of the book, I worked harder to stay engage with these seemingly intrusive side-characters, looking for how they could be connected and/or help Maggie and Josh come together in the future (I also had fun flipping back to the cover to see if I could find if the illustrated characters on front to match who I was reading about, A+ cover art connection).

They had been simply waiting for each other.

I thought the story hit it's stride around the 45% mark and the jumping around beat smoothed out as the focus settles more on Maggie and Josh. As far as their romance, they get a meet-cute at the most romantic of places, an auto-body repair shop, numerous teasing fun moments, Easter egg past moments, fade-to-black bedroom scene, that third act angst moment, and ultimately their HEA. They were a couple that showed how finding that certain someone can support and give you the strength and courage to go after what you want in life, in this case their dream jobs. It takes a little while for them to emerge from some of the side-character synopses that seem a little butt-in unless you keep in mind the underlining theme and numerous Gen X pop culture references that were at turns fun, nostalgic, (I'm of the wonderfully named elder millennial group so I could bond with vast majority of them) but also too much. I missed some of the emotional thoughts and feelings that lead to romantic leads picking each other because, at the end, they had that easy fall back to physically be able to point to the signs that, yes, the universe obviously wanted them to be together and I felt like some of the work was missing at that ending moment.

If you're a linear reader, this would probably feel like an ADHD nightmare but if you can handle time jumps (the latter half has a couple paged chapter that jumps 31yrs into the future only to return to present in next chapter) and off-shoots that have some Easter eggs, then this would be a fun off-beat romance beach read to pick up. ( )