48 pages • 1 hour read
Lauren AsherA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
The Fine Print is the first in the Dreamland Billionaires series, which tells the story of the Kane brothers. The three brothers, Declan, Callahan (Cal), and Rowan, are the grandsons of Brady Kane, who created the Dreamland Park and its accompanying business, generating wealth and status for his family. When Brady passes away, he leaves tasks for his grandsons to complete in order to receive their portions of the inherited shares in the company; with those shares, the brothers plan to make sure that their father cannot take over the company. Their plans are to put Declan into the position of CEO, with his brothers supporting him.
The Fine Print follows Rowan, the youngest of the three brothers. His grandfather’s will sets Rowan the task of becoming Director of Dreamland Park and creating a project for improving it. This plan will be voted on by a committee of Brady’s choice six months after Rowan takes the position. The novel explains the plans that Rowan and his brothers have concocted; they remain a united front against their father for the good of the company and themselves, despite Rowan’s decision not to become CFO as planned. The novel provides brief glimpses into the other two brothers’ tasks and trials as well, with Rowan’s choice to remain in Dreamland creating tension between him and Declan.
Each of the brothers fights to remain as emotionless as possible after the trauma of their father’s alcohol addiction and abuse, but each must face the trials and joys of love in their respective journeys to fulfill their grandfather’s will. They put increasingly heavy pressure on themselves and one another, creating heightened tension in the novels, both romantic and otherwise. The second book in the series, Terms and Conditions, focuses on Declan’s journey, while the third book, Final Offer, features Cal.
The Fine Print combines a variety of office romance tropes with the classic enemies-to-lovers narrative pattern. Because Rowan and Zahra work together and are forced into one another’s proximity, the office setting is used to show the various ways in which they must navigate the distinct power differential between them. However, The Fine Print differs from other office romances in that Rowan, as the park director, would not normally spend quite as much time with one of his Creators as a direct supervisor would; in the typical office romance, one romantic lead is often the immediate supervisor of the other. Yet because Rowan places such high value on Zahra’s plans, he initially sees her as an asset in which he wants to invest so that he can further his own success. This dynamic provides the pretense that allows the two characters to be drawn together in various ways.
It is also worth noting that although the protagonists of enemies-to-lovers stories often maintain their mutual dislike for quite a while, The Fine Print deviates from this pattern considerably, for Rowan and Zahra kiss by Chapter 9 and embark on a casual sexual relationship by Chapter 30, only a little over halfway through the novel. The enemies-to-lovers trope therefore functions primarily as an opening gambit in this particular novel, providing the tinder for the characters’ attraction and driving them together through conflicts that advance the broader plot. Once they both admit to their attraction, their mutual enmity subsides, and they begin to spend time with one another even beyond the context of Rowan’s alter ego, Scott, and his initial text-based conversations with Zahra.
By Lauren Asher