Novel Of The Week: Nash (Marked Men #4) by Jay Crownover

The song that could best sums this 4th book of the Marked's boys is "Everybody Needs Love" by Drive-By Truckers (mentioned in the novel) and if you're going to read this book, you'll understand why.
Ladies and Gents, here's my (not so brief) review and (not few) thoughts on Nash by Jay Crownover.

Nash Donovan has always been considered the quietest and nicest of his group of friends, but there's someone who doesn't think of him that way: Saint Ford.
She has always been the outsider: too shy and overweight during high school, now the only moment in her life she feels confident and powerful is when she's in the ER, working as a nurse... and it's at the hospital where she meets Nash again.

In high school Saint thought Nash was different from the kids who made fun of her...He always said 'hi' to her and actually tried to be fair, but eventually he disappointed her and made Saint think every man was like him...and further experiences kept on confirming this conviction.

Now both of them have grown up and have their own problems and difficulties: Nash finds out that Phil (the only firm point in his trouble childhood) has not only been keeping an huge secret from him but also is very sick. Plus he is still looking for his mom's approval and thinks since his own mother doesn't love him, why should any other woman?
On the other part, Saint became who she always wanted to be: a nurse. She's now an attractive and fun young woman, but has no proper friends outside work and still have problems dealing with men.

Nash thought that, given her shyness, Saint was out of  his league, but after seeing her so confident in the ER he can't get her out of his head and the two of them start to getting close. Despite having always felt something for him, Saint doesn't want to be involved 100%: she's sure that eventually Nash is going to make a mistake or to get tired of her weirdness, and she wants to protect herself from getting her heart broken by someone she cares of.

What I liked

This has been probably the funniest and, at the same time, the saddest of all Crownover's books I've read (Rowdy & Asa, I'm coming for you!). Nash is a good guy, smart, creative and he doesn't take anything for granted. He understands Saint's low self esteem problem and tries everything to help.
But what, or better who, I adored surely is Royal Hastings, Nash's new neighbor! She's carismatic, outgoing, witty and way too hilarious! 

What I did not like

I did not like Saint's excessive pessimism in mankind and her "yes, I could feel something for you, but you've already hurt me once so I don't know how to deal with it" kind of behave. I can understand it, of course, after everything she went through (emotionally speaking), but so do Nash, given his catastrophic relationship with his mom. 
Grammatically speaking, I would have appreciated a few more commas...some paragraphs felt like I was reading in apnea.

I haven't post them here, but between "Rome" and "Nash" I've also read Rule and Jet's books. Even if I liked those two, I have to say that Nash is probably my second favourite of the series, he's such a beautiful and positive character.
On first place I still keep Rome, because of his strength and fragilities and...because I'm Italian!

I keep on reading this kind of novel because they're about imperfect people, hurt with (oh! so many) whims...in short: humans!
I find extraordinary (expecially in male characters) their ability to overcome what's between them and their "soulmate" and succeed. This is what I love about them...oh, and also I'm mesmerized by Jay Crownover's characters original names. When you think she won't be able to find more unique names than the ones you've just read...BAM! She does!

Salem Cruz....seriously J.? 

My vote: 8/10

Ph: gooodreads.com