Sounds Like Love by Ashley Poston: My Review

Check out my book review of Sounds Like Love by Ashley Poston to see what I fell hard for this romance with magical realism that made it hard to put down!

*Disclosure: This post may include affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.

Sounds Like Love Summary:

Joni Lark has a secret. She’s one of the most coveted songwriters in LA, and yet she can’t write. There’s an emptiness inside her, and nothing seems to fill it.

When she returns to her hometown of Vienna Shores, North Carolina, she hopes that the sand, the surf, and the concerts at The Revelry, her family’s music venue, will spark inspiration. But when Joni gets there, nothing is how she left it. Her best friend is hiding something, her mother’s memories are fading fast, and The Revelry is closing.

How can Joni write when her world is leaving her behind? Until she hears it. A melody in her head, lyric-less and half-formed, and an alluring and addictive voice to go with it—belonging, apparently, to a wry musician with an emptiness of his own.

Surely, he’s a figment of Joni’s overworked imagination. Then a very real man shows up in Vienna Shores. He’s arrogant and guarded—nothing like the sweet, funny voice in Joni’s head—and he has a plan for breaking their inconvenient telepathic connection: finish the song haunting them both and hope they don’t risk their hearts—or their secrets—in the process.

Because that melody, the one drawing them together . . . what if it’s there for a reason?

Sounds Like Love: My Review

Ashley Poston wrote a masterpiece! Now I get all the hype 😊.

Ashley Poston’s romance novels are so unique because of the way that she weaves in magical realism into her love stories and it is that element of Sounds Like Love that had me anxious to dive into this book and why it made my list of must-read summer romance books of 2025.  

It’s so thrilling when you start a book that you’re not only curious about but which sounds unlike anything you’ve read before and you can immediately tell that it’s going to be a good one after just reading the first chapter. The excitement percolated right from the start and then I just settled into the thrill hoping to read this as slowly as possible and yet unable to put it down because I was captivated.

I absolutely loved the meet cute Ashley gave Joni and Sebastian. I could easily picture them in the balcony of this small concert hall with him immediately sizing her up (wrongly) and her soaking in the fact that an up-and-coming singer was singing a song she wrote that became the latest hit on the charts.

I felt their connection before it even became apparent in their heads and loved their back and forth before they were even forced into an uncomfortable situation that changed them both.

Joni is a heroine I easily attached to and became a character that I really cared about.  She is a songwriter who has struggled for the past year to write another hit song, ever since learning that her mother has dementia. She travels back to her hometown on the coast of North Carolina to spend one last “good” summer with her parents and hopefully get her inspiration back.

I appreciated her so much, especially how she was questioning whether she made the right decision going to LA in the first place, what she wants out of life now at this stage in her life, what her dream really is in life and how that’s possibly changed from what it once was.

Sebastian was a bit more of an enigma, but I loved how his story slowly unfolded. The former boy band member with a famous singer for a dad, was carrying some heavy issues. He became connected to Joni, not only by their shared loneliness but for another reason that enabled them to hear each other in their heads.

I loved the moments when they “spoke” to each other telepathically because that was when we saw the “real” Joni and Sebastian because how can you hide from someone when they can hear your every thought?

While this book felt heavy given Joni’s mother’s illness and its impact on the family and their music venue, there were so many funny moments that took me by surprise but which brought some much-needed comedic relief.

Overall, this was such a lovely romance between two people who find themselves with a unique connection that helps them get out of their own “ruts” and really move forward in life in terms of their own careers, dreams and love.

It is so beautiful, one of the best of the year, and one I highly recommend.

*I received an advanced reader copy. All opinions are my own.

Related Book Lists:

• Best Summer Romance Books of 2025
  Best Fantasy Romance Books
• Best Paranormal Romance Books
• Best Rock Star Romance Books

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