Author: Mia Sosa
Narrated By: Rebecca Mozo and Wayne Mitchell
Genre: Romance
Actual Rating: 4
Spicy Meter: 5 fire emojis
Narration: 4 mikes
Content Warnings: Explicit sexual content. Weird relationship (female character + almost-ex-brother-in-law).
“The Worst Best Man” follows Lina Santos, a Brazilian-American wedding planner (and jilted bride), and Max Hartley, Lina’s almost brother-in-law and the best man who tore her wedding apart (although he has no recollection of this), as they try to work together to stick it up to Lina’s ex fiancé and Max’s brother in a professional competition for a very exclusive job in a 5-star hotel, 5 years after the fated disaster wedding-that-wasn’t.
This book was nothing like how I originally envisioned it would be, but that wasn’t necessarily the worst thing in the world. I clicked on this audiobook pretty much off the cover. So when I read the title, “The Worst Best Man”, I thought it would be about a hidden romance between the best man, ideally the fiancé’s childhood best friend, and the fiancée. And then obviously I thought the best man would be coming in the day of the wedding and just opposing to it. They would runoff into the sunset and they would have their happily ever after. And, well, this wasn’t the case.
Instead, this book took a weird turn making the main female character a jilted bride and making the best man the ex fiancé’s brother. Which, honestly, I thought would bother me more than it did? That’s why writing this review has been so confusing. I would usually hate any kind of romance that involves secret dating between common friends of an ex, so imagine how usually repulsed I am by actual almost-family dating. That would usually be a big no-no for me… but we hate Andrew, Lina’s ex fiancé and Max’s brother, so honestly, I really think Lina was with the wrong brother all along (which in retrospect is a horrible thing to say). But oh, were the spicy moments worth the wait.
This book goes into quite a bit of Brazilian culture, which was so fun for me to hear. I’m latinx, but have actually been minimally exposed to our Portuguese-speaking brothers and sisters. And now that we’re talking about listening to this book, I would say I really enjoyed the narration in this one. I feel like Lina‘s voice was more in-tune with what I would’ve imagined, but Max’s voice was always okay (although I hated Andrew’s perceived voice in that narration, hence the 4 mikes instead of 5).
I would recommend this book if you’re open to learning a little about different cultures and if you can give and ex fiancée and almost brother-in-law a chance. It’s truly a beautiful and pure romance that starts as an enemies to friends to lovers, but ends up being all about soulmates, I swear. I could read 10 more books all about Max and Lina, they’re the sweetest.
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andrea's galley 