Hook, Line, and Sinker

Hook, Line, and Sinker (2022) is a contemporary romantic comedy by bestselling American author Tessa Bailey. It is the second book of the Bellinger Sisters series and follows the first book, It Happened One Summer.

Hook, Line, and Sinker follows the developing romance of the younger Bellinger sister, Hannah, when she returns to Westport, Washington, to film a movie and stays at the apartment of king crab fisherman Fox Thornton. Hannah and Fox agree to be just friends, but deeper feelings grow as they come to know more about one another.

The novel was a number one New York Times and number one USA Today bestseller. This guide refers to the paperback edition published by Avon Books in 2022.

Plot Summary

The novel opens with a series of text messages that Hannah and Fox exchange over the winter while Hannah is in Los Angeles and Fox is in the fishing village of Westport, Washington. The messages are funny, lightly flirtatious, and hint at a growing attachment. Hannah works for a film company, and when the director is looking for a new place to film, Hannah suggests Westport. Hannah is unable to stay with her sister, Piper, and her sister’s fiancé, Brendan, but Fox has a spare bedroom, and Hannah agrees to stay there. Brendan warns Fox not to take advantage of Hannah during this arrangement. Fox doesn’t reveal that he, the man with a reputation for having flings, hasn’t had a hookup since he met Hannah.

Hannah doesn’t succeed the first time she asks the director, Sergei, if she can be part of creating the music for the movie. She feels better when Fox welcomes her to Westport with ice cream. Hannah is curious when her grandmother, Opal, gives her a folder full of songs written by her father, Henry Cross, a fisherman who died when Hannah was a baby. Hannah feels like she is a supporting actress in her own life, but she wants to be a leading lady. She lets her sister style her and goes to a cast party.

When Fox comes home from a fishing trip and finds her, Hannah is struck by how the women at the party objectify him. She stakes her claim by kissing him. Fox enjoys the kiss but is unnerved by the way Hannah seems to enjoy simply being with him, talking to him, without sex. Fox has been convinced by the betrayal of a college girlfriend that he’ll never be able to escape his image as nothing more than a good-time guy. When he tries to show Hannah this by flaunting his body and informing her that he’s available, she refuses to let him be simply a sex object.

Cautiously, Fox tries to explore being friends with Hannah. He makes her dinner and sings one of Henry’s sea shanties for her. Hannah is moved by the music and, for the first time, feels a connection to her dead father. They spend the evening together, without sex, sharing stories of their childhoods. Fox tells Hannah how he was pushed from a young age to be sexually active, how that was all people saw or seemed to value about him. His ability to relate to Hannah without sex is a turning point in how Fox sees himself.

Hannah suggests that Henry’s sea shanties might provide the soundtrack for the movie, and she finds a band that she hopes will set Henry’s songs to music. Fox takes Hannah to meet his mother; they have something like a date, followed by a passionate kiss. When Fox puts up his guard and tells Hannah it will be just sex to him, she decides to be a leading lady and show Fox he’s worthy and capable of more. She kisses him goodnight, and joins him for breakfast the next morning, and Fox has to face the idea that Hannah might actually accept him, even with all his flaws. He accompanies her to Seattle to watch the band record Henry’s songs, and then takes her to a place called the Sound Garden, where human-built towers make music. There they confess their attachment to one another and make love for the first time in the car.

The sex is explosive, but Fox is leaving the next morning for a five-day fishing trip. Hannah’s movie will wrap in that time, and it feels too soon to make lasting promises. Fox is surprised when Brendan wants him to captain the voyage; inspired by Hannah’s faith in him, he steps up to the responsibility he hadn’t wanted before. Hannah is thrilled when the director decides to use Henry’s sea shanties for the movie, and she shares the good news with Opal.

Fox has a successful fishing trip, but his new confidence is shaken when the crewmen, on their return home, give him a hard time for being with Hannah, who they think is too good for someone like him. Fox, fearing the same thing, finds her at a party at Cross and Daughters, the bar that Henry owned, and which Hannah and Piper restored. He tries to break up with her, thinking he can protect her that way. Hannah says she’s not giving up on them but that she will give him time to think. Fox visits his mother and, in revisiting his past, realizes he doesn’t have to be limited by his reputation. He rushes back to Westport to find Hannah and apologize. She takes him back, and an epilogue 10 years later shows them happily married with two children and a home in the country, where Hannah has a comic encounter with a moose.