E-galley Review: Past Tents (Teachers’ Lounge #4) by Stacy Travis

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

Past Tents by Stacy Travis
Series: Teachers' Lounge #4
Published by Smartypants Romance on October 10, 2024
Genres: Adult Contemporary Romance
Pages: 339
Source: the publisher
Format: E-galley
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My Rating:

Blurb:

Love isn’t past tense—it’s the future.

Clay Meadows runs a fast mile, but that hasn’t helped him catch the one who got away.

His jam is teaching Shakespeare, coaching track, and camping in the mountains.
The last thing he wants is a scaredy cat art teacher with wild blond hair and devilish charm joining him on the Green Valley High senior retreat.

Or is it?

When his lifelong crush and best friend’s sister is assigned as his co-chaperone, Clay sees an opportunity.
He’ll cure her fear of bugs, bears, and flimsy tents. She’ll fall in love with the wilderness. He won’tfall in love in the process.
Even in close quarters—and a shared tent—Clay vows keep his school crush firmly where it belongs—in the past.
Until she edges open a crack in his heart and allows him to believe she likes what she sees.

Ally Dalbotten is stubbornly self-sufficient and determined to protect her heart from unreliable
men.

She hates camping. And dirt. And wild animals. And the wilderness, for that matter.
The last thing she needs is the gung-ho hottie of the English department revealing his Clark Kent alter-ego and flexing his camping muscles—along with his pecs.

But under the façade of a man who runs from commitment Ally finds a vulnerable soul with a
secret he’s carried for years.

Ally has a choice—risk that Clay is another guy destined to break her heart…or trust that he’s
the one who will love her forever.

‘Past Tents’ is a full-length contemporary romance and can be read as a standalone. Book #4 in the
Teachers’ Lounge series, Green Valley Chronicles, Penny Reid Book Universe.

My Review

So this book started out with one of the most hilarious scenes I’ve read in a while. When Ally decided to surprise Clay by running up to him on the track, and she was going to do a hurdle and splits in the air, and yeah, that didn’t go anything at all like she planned! I was laughing so hard. It wasn’t a meet cute, since they already knew each other so well, but it fits that type of scene perfectly.

I really adored so much about these characters, as well as the school they work in. They had some great banter and some really major sexual tension going between them. Both had pasts and family history/issues that made them not sure about being in a relationship at all. There was a lot of humor in all the different situations that Ally ended up in. I loved her worry about bears, and how Clay got her to overcome her apprehension when she was assigned to help him chaperone a camping trip with the students. I also loved the way Clay worked with his students. And when Ally was talking with a student going through some things, it was just perfect in how that went, in my experience as an educator.

What kept me from giving this a full 5 stars is the frustration of the two of them going back and forth about why the other one obviously didn’t like them, or didn’t mean something in the way it seemed to come across. Or why they weren’t the right person for the other one. It was one of those things where I began to skim parts because it was kind of the same thing. However I felt this was a great addition to this series, and overall it was a really fun read!