Tag Archives: Romance

ARC — Something Bright and Burning — Whitney Amazeen

“He does the most dangerous thing a person can do; he lets me hope.
And this kind of hope-the kind that makes me feel like somehow everything’s going to turn out okay in the end-will only end in disappointment.”

Genre: New Adult, Romance, Women’s Fiction
Actual Rating: 4.5 stars
Spicy Meter: 1.5 fire emojis
Content Warnings: Is all about teenage pregnancy, discusses rape and blackmailing leading to sexual assault, sexual content in general, suicide, underaged drinking, incest, miscarriages, financial hardships, parental death and abandonment, and religious guilt.

“Something Bright and Burning” follows Everly Martin, as she finds out she’s pregnant at 18… and she’s not sure who the father is. Her whole future is ahead of her, she’s taking college classes and working and barely making ends meet. The father could either be Vaughn, the douchebag coworker who’s forced himself on her, or John, the older man she met at a bar. But then there’s also Nicolai, her best friend’s brother, and someone Everly had an instant connection with. In this world, where there are no right answers, will Everly choose to follow what she things if best for her or her baby? Or for both?

Told through journal entries, poems, and a first-person narrative, “Something Bright and Burning” is an ode to hardship and self-improvement. Some characters were a bit cartoonish but, in general, almost all were well-defined, with their diverse personalities, stories, and beliefs.

“I often feel like she willingly allows me to shoulder the weight of our family’s responsibilities. When she leaves the parent role empty, I have no choice but to fill it.”

The only thing I wasn’t 100% sold on was the poetry… It was simply not my cup of it. It was just some instagram-worthy prose, just like the next guy. No poem really spoke to me. It just felt like a little something added to give the main character some hobbies and personality traits.

But oh, was the plot twist so so wild. It has been months, maybe even years, since a plot twist had hit me so hard. Just that plot twist makes this book worth reading. I wish I could go back and read it for the first time all over again.

This book kind of reminded me of Lauren J. Sharkey’s “Inconvenient Daughter” and maybe even a bit to Hanya Yanagihara’s “A Little Life”. It just undertook some very heavy subjects. It did an amazing job of portraying life, with some of its extreme threats.

I would highly recommend this book. “Something Bright and Burning” is a complex read, with a ton of triggering situations (and therefore a ton of content warnings), but if you find the heart to read through them, you won’t regret it.

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ARC provided by NetGalley and Swan Pages Publishinf in exchange for an honest review.

Publication Date: September 20, 2022

“It’s not you, Nicolai. It’s me, I want to tell him. But
those words have never worked for anyone. So, I don’t look back. I grab all my shit, I take a deep breath, and leave.”

Better Than The Movies — Lynn Painter

“Sometimes we get so tied up in our idea of what we think we want that we miss out on the amazingness of what we could actually have.”

Genre: Romance, Comedy, Young Adult
Actual Rating: 5 stars
Spicy Meter: 1.5 fire emojis
Content Warnings: Underage drinking and smoking, other than that can’t really think of anything else.

“Better Than The Movies” is a rom-com style novel all about rom-coms. Liz Buxbaum and Wes Bennet have been next door neighbors their whole lives, sounds cute, right? Well, it doesn’t help that Wes has been trying to be a pain in Liz’s butt for as long as she can remember. But then in comes Michael, her childhood crush that moved away to Texas when they were younger, and she can’t help but fantasize about dating him. But Michael thinks Wes is into Liz… So, in an attempt to convince Michael that Liz isn’t into Wes, they start… fake dating? But only so they can fake break up later on and Michael can be assured Liz is completely available. But as said break up date comes closer and closer, Liz feels unsettled. She’s liked this new friendship that’s grown between herself and Wes—who’s making it a whole lot harder to hate him.

In this fake-dating, enemies-to-lovers tribute to all young adult rom-com movies, you will ultimately fall in love with some of the most infuriating characters ever. Liz, with her blinding stubbornness; Wes, with his trust issues; Michael, with his insecurities—and misguided decisions. I could not get enough of this book.

I think it’ll be amongst my favorite reads this 2022. Where is Netflix when you need it most? This book needs to be made into a movie. Like now.

In this mostly-clean read, you’ll get all the teenager lessons you’ll need: how all lies are discovered in the end, how your family can support you—even if you’re not related by blood, how it’s okay to mess up and forgive and be forgiven, but mostly how high school and first loves and first crushes aren’t the end of the world.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone who’s looking for a cute, rom-com-movie-inspired read. If you enjoy fake-dating and enemies-to-lovers this book is also for you. But specifically, if you’re looking for a book to gift to a teenager in their junior or senior years, THIS IS IT. Don’t look any further. This book has the perfect mix of romance and deception and friendship and family and high school and prom and love.

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“Enemies-to-lovers—it’s our trope, Buxbaum.”

ARC — The Make-Up Test — Jenny L. Howe

“You don’t have to take care of me.”
“Yeah, I do. We have a mild truce now, remember?”

Genre: Romance
Actual Rating: 4 stars
Spicy Meter: 3 fire emojis
Content Warnings: As given by the author—Fatphobia both in flashback and in present day, fatshaming from a family member, and deals with death and loss.

“The Make-Up Test” follows Allison Avery and Colin Benjamin, two grad students with the same advisor. Sounds simple enough, right? Except it isn’t. Allison and Colin dated while they were in undergrad and it did not end well, to say the least. Now, years later, and in a more competitive program, they’re left to work together to the best of their abilities. That is, until their advisor tells them she’ll only be able to keep one grad student moving forward. Now, with higher stakes, they end up in the exact same situation they were years ago. Will history rewrite itself? Or will old habits prevail?

You see that endorsement on the cover? Well, I agree wholeheartedly with Ali Hazelwood: I’ll read anything Jenny Howe writes. Her narrative is clever and her (most of her) characters complex and layered. This book had a second-chance romance and lovers-to-enemies-to-friends-to-lovers trope. It’s told partially through flashbacks, which were nice and helped us understand why the main characters act the way they do.

I loved Allison and how she was protrayed as more than just a student. I, myself, am currently in grad school and something I feel like my whole life revolves around that—but Allison’s doesn’t. We get to see her shifting relationships with old friends and how her family dynamics, all but ideal, affect her, but she pushes on.

And then there is Colin. Bland, one-dimentional Colin. Now, I really did feel like he was only there to fill up that romantic void in Allison’s life. Like he had no other purpose than that. We do get a sob story about his family background, but it doesn’t really seem to phase him or define him in any way. He’s just an insecure, white man hoping to thrive in academics. That’s it.

But the story was entretaining and relatively fast-paced. I think it was definitely worth the read. My only complaint is that it wasn’t as spicy as I thought it would be. The sexual tension was there, but the scenes didn’t deliver. I felt like it was missing something. I wasn’t ready to let go of these characters.

I would highly recommend this book, I can’t believe it’s a debut novel. If you like second-chance romance and enemies-to-lovers, “The Make-Up Test” is for you.

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ARC provided by NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.

Publication Date: September 13, 2022

“You don’t like happy endings?”
(…) “I think the problem is more that I like them too much. No one gets that in real life.”

A Pho Love Story — Loan Le

“There’s so much in your life that you can’t control.… So maybe you can use this chance to do something for yourself.”

Genre: Young Adult, Romance
Actual Rating: 3.5 stars
Spicy Meter: N/A, it’s clean
Content Warnings: Discusses racial discrimination and xenophobia. Mentions war and death.

“A Pho Love Story” follows Linh Mai and Bao Nguyen, the children of two immigrant Vietnamese families who own rivaling pho restaurants. They’re on their last years of high school and are just trying to find themselves—Linh loves art and Bao loves writing, but those don’t sound like acceptable careers in their culture. Will they follow their dreams, and perhaps forget their family’s rivalry for a moment? Might they even become friends? Or more?

“A Pho Love Story” is a multicultural, sweet, high school romance story that lives up to all of its potential. Just reading the premise I knew I would be moved, and oh was my heart warmed. But here’s the thing: I knew exactly how it was going to pan out. Hence the low-ish rating.

Ignoring its predictability, this was an very entertaining read. Loan Le is an amazing writer and I can’t believe this is her debut novel. Well, she’s also an editor at Atria Books, so perhaps her love and devotion to books made her an amazing rookie.

I would recommend “A Pho Love Story” to readers who enjoy multicultural books and clean love stories. Also, if you’re just looking for a somewhat predictable, feel-good read, this book is for you.

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“But in anything you love, isn’t there always some bit of sadness, some essence of suffering? That, to me, is what makes art worth it.”

Tweet Cute — Emma Lord

“It’s weird, how you have no idea how far you’ve come until suddenly you can’t find the way back.”

Genre: Young Adult, Romance
Actual Rating: 4.5 stars
Spicy Meter: N/A, it’s clean
Content Warnings: Deals with teenagers under a lot of pressure, grandparent sickness, and high school bullying.

“Tweet Cute” follows Pepper and Jack, two high school seniors that are under waaay too much pressure. Pepper is the captain of the swim team and the social media manager for her family’s massive food chain business. Jack lives under his twin’s shadow, who’s the captain of the dive team, but the one thing he has that his brother doesn’t is the authority to manage his family’s small restaurant’s Twitter account. When the two Twitter accounts go into full-on feud mode over a grilled cheese sandwich recipe, Jack and Pepper aren’t aware that they’re actually fighting against themselves. Until they are. And things get messy.

This book felt exactly how it felt like to be a teenager: everything was the end of the world and people-pleasing tendencies were at their all-time high. But I loved it. It’s clean, so no spicy content there, but it’s sweet, with its own happy ending and all.

The amount of plot twists we get is almost troublesome, but since the book is written in two points of view—Pepper’s and Jack’s—we also know things that the other doesn’t, making it all a bit more exciting. It’s like you’re in on a secret that you know will come out, you’re just not sure when.

And can we talk about how this was Emma Lord’s debut novel? That’s crazy. It’s so so good, I can’t wait to get my hands on the 2 other books she’s published since (and the 4th book that’ll be published by early 2023).

I would highly recommend “Tweet Cute” as a gift for a young reader. It’s fast-paced but will keep you on your toes. It’s a love story but it also touches deep and relevant subjects for their age, like finding yourself and what you love, standing up to your parents—in a respectful way—to let them know maybe the path they’ve chosen for you isn’t the one you’d like to chose for yourself. I would highly recommend this YA read.

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“A stolen day. The kind of day that ends too fast but stays with you much longer.”

Meet Cute Club — Jack Harbon

“People think of this lonely cat lady substituting affection in real life for fake people kissing, but there are so many people of any gender writing this stuff.”

Genre: Romance, LGBTQIA+
Actual Rating: 3 stars
Spicy Meter: 1.5 fire emojis (Very descriptive, but it just wasn’t for me)
Content Warnings: Veeery sexual, and mentions child and emotional abuse.

“Meet Cute Club” follows, well, the Meet Cute Club, a book club centered on romance books (hell yeah!). Jordan Collins is a recently-unemployed romance book aficionado who founded (and funds) the Meet Cute Club. As the club slowly loses member, Jordan is afraid his efforts and dreams have all been for nothing. Then in comes Rex Bailey, a new (and temporary) employee at Jordan’s favorite book store. In what I would personally call the least-cute meet cute, Rex makes fun of Jordan’s choice of books—until he decides to give romance a try himself, and ends up not hating it and deciding to help Jordan bring the book club back. Will they find their own romance in the process? Or will Rex’s impulses and Jordan’s nature get in the way?

This is a short, fast-paced romance. I feel like it’d be a great airport book. It really sucks you into the story, I read it in less than 24 hours, even though I had some busy days then. But I also felt like it was missing something.

I’m usually all for a queer romance, but this really wasn’t it. I’m not giving up on Jack Harbon quite yet tho, I’ll be looking forward to reading more of what they have to offer.

I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a gay romance. It is very explicit, I’ll give it that. And it’s truly face-paced, so if you’re not into slow-burn romances, then “Meet Cute Club” is for you.

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The Cheat Sheet — Sarah Adams

“Do you see now? You’re always giving me things that remind you of me, but I’m over here stealing things that remind me of you.”

Genre: Romance, Comedy
Actual Rating: 3 stars
Spicy Meter: 1 fire emoji
Content Warnings: Describes panic attacks, discusses a career-ending car accident, and describes someone very drunk.

“The Cheat Sheet” follows Bree Camden and Nathan Donelson, two (almost) inseparable childhood best friends. Bree aspired to be a professional ballet dancer but, when an accident ruina her chances, she pulls away from everyone and everything. Now, years later, she’s back to being friends with her best friend and forever crush, Nathan, who is now a star quarterback in the NFL. It’s just platonic for them tho. Bree would never even come close to Nathan, she can’t lose her friendship again. Little does she know, Nathan may have those same feelings. Perhaps, he’s had them all along too…

This book had all the things I like in a romance: friends-to-lover and football themed. Yet, I didn’t like it that much. Bree was annoying, the double pinning was exhausting, Nathan was clearly a man dreamed by a woman… I could go on and on about the things I didn’t like about this book. But it was a fun read nonetheless.

The panic attacks seemed like they were written by someone who’s never had a panic attack (or perhaps just didn’t know how to describe them), but they were very off putting, seemed oversimplified.

Personally, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend this book, but Booktok does, so read it at your own risk. It’s not particularly a bad read, it just wasn’t particularly a good read either. If you’re looking to read books by Sarah Adams, I would highly recommend going for “The Off Limits Rule” instead.

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ARC — Mr. Perfect on Paper — Jean Meltzer

“But love—”
“Doesn’t conquer all. (…) It doesn’t, Chris. Look at the divorce rates in America. (…) Do you know what every single one of those couples had when they got married? Love. They all stood in front of an altar and gazed into each other’s eyes, and that’s the problem with these modern notions of love. There’s too much staring into each other’s eyes, and not enough looking in the same direction.”

Genre: Romance, Comedy
Actual Rating: 5 stars
Spicy Meter: 1 fire emoji
Content Warning: Discusses antisemitism, generalized anxiety disorder, and mixed religion discrimination, and mentions car crashes, parent death, aneurysms, and head tumors.

“Mr. Perfect on Paper” is just about what the title suggests. Dara Rabinowitz is a modern Jewish matchmaker, having created a dating app called J-Mate, when she just still hasn’t found her Mr. Perfect. In comes, Chris Steadfast, a news anchor who moved to New York recently after losing his wife. Dara’s “Perfect Jewish Husband” list is broadcasted by her grandmother in live television, pushing in a series of events that lead to Dara and Chris working on a reality TV style segment where they try to find this Mr. Perfect on Paper. But what does it say of Dara when they actually find Mr. Perfect, but all she can think about is Chris (who fits basically none of her requirements)? Will she follow tradition or will she follow love? And why can’t she follow both?

I am not Jewish myself, but I enjoy so much reading and learning about different religions and beliefs, and I must say this is truly a blast for that. This books takes place during the High Holidays, and even though I had read about them before, Jean Meltzer really did deliver at subtly explaining and showing how these holidays are lived—and why.

I loved Dana’s mannerisms and Chris’s insecurities and empathy. They both felt really human to me. Did I like the outcome? I’m not sure, but I still gave it 5 stars because in the end I just wanted Dara to be happy, and that’s the best testament of how this book moved me. But, if what you’re looking for is spice, this book isn’t for you. You’ll get a few kisses and that’s it.

I would recommend this book to readers with exposure to the Jewish religion and traditions, or anyone whose willing to Google a ton of terms you might not understand (that’s what I did, and I loved it). If you’re looking for a light-hearted, clean romance, “Mr. Perfect on Paper” is perfect for you.

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ARC provided by NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing in exchange for an honest review.

Publication Date: August 9, 2022

“But what I learned from this journey, from finding my real-life Mr. Perfect on Paper, is that love isn’t something that can be quantified on a list. Love is messy. And terrifying. It shows up when you least expect it, and complicates your life in every way. But it’s also…safe. And comforting. It allows you to be yourself completely, without judgment or fear, and it feels right.”

Romancing Mr. Bridgerton — Julia Quinn — Bridgertons #4

“I love you with my past, and I love you for my future.”

Genre: Historical Romance
Actual Rating: 4 stars
Spicy Meter: 3.5 fire emojis
Content Warnings: Discusses parent death, fat shaming, and bullying.

“Romancing Mr. Bridgerton” is the fourth book in the Bridgerton series, but will actually be the third season for the Netflix series. It follows Colin Bridgerton, the third of eight Bridgerton siblings, and Penelope Featherington, the third and youngest daughter of a family that continuously diminishes her. Penelope has had a crush on Colin ever since they met, but after 12 years of their acquaintance, she believed he was meant to be with someone else, most definitely not her… right?

In this book we finally get a glimpse at who Lady Whistledown is (although if you’ve seen the Netflix series, you already know). It was a somewhat dull book in the beginning but then it became more and more interesting and engaging as it went.

Although perhaps I’ll blame it on the high expectations I had for the book. I loved Penelope in the Netflix series, but she was even more lovely in the books. I feel like the series portrays her as a villain, when she’s really not.

I really thought this would be my favorite book, but it wasn’t. I would still thoroughly recommend this series to readers who like Regency Era dramas and this one in particular if you like the friends-to-lovers trope.

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ARC — For Butter or Worse — Erin La Rosa

“You have excellent taste in wine and terrible taste in men, are you happy?”

Genre: Romance
Actual Rating: 5 stars
Spicy meter: 4.5 fire emojis
Content Warnings: Discusses panic attacks, relationships with a narcissist, and parent death.

“For Butter or Worse” follows Nina Lyon, a renowned, award-winning chef, and Leo O’Donnell, a restauranteur who’s made his family restaurant into a famous franchise. They have been cohosts (and nemesis) on a cooking reality TV show for 3 years, but things quickly go south when management decides to have their final episode for season 3 filmed live, and Nina ends up quitting mid-episode. To make matters worse, when Leo goes to Nina’s restaurant to apologize, they’re photographed in a compromising position, sparking up dating rumors…which actually end up helping both their restaurants? Seeing the effect their “relationship” has on their respective businesses, their publicist decides it’d be best if the fake date, at least for a while—they’ll just have to not kill each other while doing so.

Um, can I just say I can’t believe this is Erin La Rosa’s debut romance novel? The story she’s told is well written and complex without being pretentious. Both main and side characters were lovely but imperfect. I loved Nina, I loved Leo, I loved their family and friends, I loved and lived vicariously through their story. I found out I apparently love cooking themed romance novels? I can’t get enough of it. I just finished reading it and want to grab it all over again.

And on the spicy side… I’ll just say it didn’t disappoint. The last few novels I had read were sort of lacking on that front, but “For Butter or Worse” definitely delivered. Also, I found it hilarious how in the acknowledgements, Erin La Rosa thanks (and apologizes to) her cousin, Mela Lee, who’s an audiobook narrator and who narrated the audiobook version of this book—with sex scenes and all.

I’ll be recommending this book for the rest of the year. It’s that good and entertaining, there is not a single dull moment. It’s relatively fast-paced and the different points of view really built on the pressure between Nina and Leo.

If you enjoy fake dating romances, close proximity tropes, books with “famous” characters, or books that involve the culinary world, then “For Butter or Worse” is definitely for you. Also, just in general, if you’re looking for a steamy, generous read… then grab this novel as soon as you can.

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ARC provided by NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing in exchange for an honest review.

Publication Date: July 26, 2022

“Believe it or not, I’ve dealt with bigger assholes than you.”
“Give me a chance. I’ll try harder.”