The True Love Experiment by Christina Lauren Book Review

May 8, 2023May 14, 2023 by zajikalimakes ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link. Read the Disclosure here.

Blurb

Sparks fly when a romance novelist and a documentary filmmaker join forces to craft the perfect Hollywood love story and take both of their careers to the next level—but only if they can keep the chemistry between them from taking the whole thing off script—from the New York Times bestselling authors of The Soulmate Equation and The Unhoneymooners.

Felicity “Fizzy” Chen is lost. Sure, she’s got an incredible career as a beloved romance novelist with a slew of bestsellers under her belt, but when she’s asked to give a commencement address, it hits her: she hasn’t been practicing what she’s preached.

Fizzy hasn’t ever really been in love. Lust? Definitely. But that swoon-worthy, can’t-stop-thinking-about-him, all-encompassing feeling? Nope. Nothing. What happens when the optimism she’s spent her career encouraging in readers starts to feel like a lie?

Connor Prince, documentary filmmaker and single father, loves his work in large part because it allows him to live near his daughter. But when his profit-minded boss orders him to create a reality TV show, putting his job on the line, Connor is out of his element. Desperate to find his romantic lead, a chance run-in with an exasperated Fizzy offers Connor the perfect solution. What if he could show the queen of romance herself falling head-over-heels for all the world to see? Fizzy gives him a hard pass—unless he agrees to her list of demands. When he says yes, and production on The True Love Experiment begins, Connor wonders if that perfect match will ever be in the cue cards for him, too.

The True Love Experiment is the book fans have been waiting for ever since Fizzy’s debut in the New York Times bestselling The Soulmate Equation. But when the lights come on and all eyes are on her, it turns out the happily ever after Fizzy had all but given up on might lie just behind the camera.

Triggers

Here is some of the sensitive content that I observed while reading this book:

Alcohol
Cheating (not between MCs)
Divorce (not MCs)
Pregnancy/Childbirth (Not MCs)
Profanity
Sexually Explicit Scenes

Ratings

Add me as a friend on Goodreads! Click here.

There are possible **SPOILERS** beyond this point!

Keep Reading!

Promise Me Always by A.L. Jackson Book Review

March 13, 2023May 23, 2023 by zajikalimakes ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link. Read the Disclosure here.

Blurb

I should know better than to let Tessa McDaniels pretend to be my fiancée.

I’m a dark, dangerous disaster who leaves destruction in his wake.

But when she offers to pretend to marry me to help me get my kids back, I can’t refuse. They are the one thing I have left to fight for.

Milo Hendricks found me at my lowest.

Battered and broken by my ex with no place to call home. When he insists I stay at his cabin with him, he sparks the feelings I’ve tried to suppress.

He’s only supposed to be my friend, but every time he comes in the room, he makes my knees weak.

This gorgeous, tatted, mountain-of-a-man who’s riddled with secrets.

Tessa is everything I crave but can’t have.

I shouldn’t touch her.

Shouldn’t make it real.

But she’s a red-headed flame I can’t resist, and I can’t help but take her to my bed.

Now we’re falling into an abyss of passion and need.

Loving her is easy.

Only we’re tied in ways we don’t know.

I’ll do anything to protect her, but it’s my past that might destroy her in the end…

Triggers

This is a dark romance as it is romantic suspense. Here is some of the potentially sensitive content:

Abusive relationship (not MCs)
Alcohol
Blood
Child custody battle
Death of a loved one
Financial Anxiety
Grief
Hostages
Kidnapping
Murder
Profanity
Sexually Explicit Scenes
Violence

Ratings

Add me as a friend on Goodreads! Click here.

There are possible **SPOILERS** beyond this point!

Keep Reading!

Love and Other Words by Christina Lauren Book Review

February 20, 2023April 13, 2023 by zajikalimakes ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link. Read the Disclosure here.

Blurb

The story of the heart can never be unwritten.

Macy Sorensen is settling into an ambitious if emotionally tepid routine: work hard as a new pediatrics resident, plan her wedding to an older, financially secure man, keep her head down and heart tucked away.

But when she runs into Elliot Petropoulos—the first and only love of her life—the careful bubble she’s constructed begins to dissolve. Once upon a time, Elliot was Macy’s entire world—growing from her gangly bookish friend into the man who coaxed her heart open again after the loss of her mother…only to break it on the very night he declared his love for her.

Told in alternating timelines between Then and Now, teenage Elliot and Macy grow from friends to much more—spending weekends and lazy summers together in a house outside of San Francisco devouring books, sharing favorite words, and talking through their growing pains and triumphs. As adults, they have become strangers to one another until their chance reunion. Although their memories are obscured by the agony of what happened that night so many years ago, Elliot will come to understand the truth behind Macy’s decade-long silence, and will have to overcome the past and himself to revive her faith in the possibility of an all-consuming love.

Triggers

There aren’t any trigger warnings for this book. Here is some of the potentially sensitive content that I observed while reading:

Alcohol
Anxiety
Car accident
Death of a parent
Grief
Profanity
Rape (mentions of)
Sexual content

Ratings

Add me as a friend on Goodreads! Click here.

There are possible **SPOILERS** beyond this point!

Keep Reading!

Fractured Freedom by Shain Rose Book Review

January 21, 2023March 7, 2023 by zajikalimakes ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link. Read the Disclosure here.

Blurb

Is it so bad that I tricked my older brother’s best friend into taking my v-card?

Maybe.

In my defense, it was Dante Reid—my crush, my first love, and the one I ended up pushing away.
Our paths split in opposite directions.
I went to college on one coast while he returned to work with the US Army on the other.
The end.
Or so I thought.

After graduating and attempting a bucket list of self-discovery, guess who I find standing outside the jail, bailing me out from a crime I didn’t commit?
Dante freaking Reid—this time with more muscles, more tattoos, and more demands.
One of which is to move in across the hall from him so he can keep me safe. Like I need protection after a little felony mix-up.

I don’t.
Unless it’s from him.
Because Dante has been my downfall before …

And living next to the guy I gave my innocence to a long time ago may actually end in my complete devastation.

Triggers

Shain Rose does include sensitive content warnings on her website so I have included those here plus any other potentially triggering content I observed while reading:

Alcohol
Blood
Depression
Hostages
Miscarriage
Murder
Profanity
Sexually Explicit Scenes
Stalking
Violence

Ratings

Add me as a friend on Goodreads! Click here.

There are possible **SPOILERS** beyond this point!

Keep Reading!

Lovelight Farms by B. K. Borison Book Review

January 2, 2023February 18, 2023 by zajikalimakes ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link. Read the Disclosure here.

Blurb

Where the lovelight gleams …

A pasture of dead trees. A hostile takeover of the Santa barn by a family of raccoons. And shipments that have mysteriously gone missing. Lovelight Farms is not the magical winter wonderland of Stella Bloom’s dreams.

In an effort to save the Christmas tree farm she’s loved since she was a kid, she enters a contest with instafamous influencer Evelyn St. James. With the added publicity and the $100,000 cash prize, she might just be able to save the farm from its financial woes. There’s just one problem. To make the farm seem like a romantic destination for the holidays, she lied on the application and said she owns Lovelight Farms with her boyfriend. Only … there is no boyfriend.

Enter best friend Luka Peters. He just came home for some hot chocolate, and somehow got a farm and a serious girlfriend in the process.

Lovelight Farms is a romantic comedy featuring a handsome, freckled data analyst, a messy, optimistic Christmas tree farm owner, and a small town with the best hazelnut lattes on the east coast. This sweet and steamy romance is a holiday happily ever after.

It is the first book in a series of interconnected standalones following the three Lovelight owners.

Triggers

These are the the potentially sensitive topics that are discussed in this book:

Alcohol
Anxiety
Cancer (not Main Characters)
Death of a parent (both Main Characters)
Profanity
Sexually Explicit Scenes

Ratings

Add me as a friend on Goodreads! Click here.

There are possible **SPOILERS** beyond this point!

Keep Reading!

Hook, Line, and Sinker by Tessa Bailey Book Review

January 1, 2023January 3, 2023 by zajikalimakes ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link. Read the Disclosure here.

Blurb

In the follow-up to It Happened One Summer, Tessa Bailey delivers another deliciously fun rom-com about a former player who accidentally falls for his best friend while trying to help her land a different man…

King crab fisherman Fox Thornton has a reputation as a sexy, carefree flirt. Everyone knows he’s a guaranteed good time—in bed and out—and that’s exactly how he prefers it. Until he meets Hannah Bellinger. She’s immune to his charm and looks, but she seems to enjoy his… personality? And wants to be friends? Bizarre. But he likes her too much to risk a fling, so platonic pals it is.

Now, Hannah’s in town for work, crashing in Fox’s spare bedroom. She knows he’s a notorious ladies’ man, but they’re definitely just friends. In fact, she’s nursing a hopeless crush on a colleague and Fox is just the person to help with her lackluster love life. Armed with a few tips from Westport’s resident Casanova, Hannah sets out to catch her coworker’s eye… yet the more time she spends with Fox, the more she wants him instead. As the line between friendship and flirtation begins to blur, Hannah can’t deny she loves everything about Fox, but she refuses to be another notch on his bedpost.

Living with his best friend should have been easy. Except now she’s walking around in a towel, sleeping right across the hall, and Fox is fantasizing about waking up next to her for the rest of his life and… and… man overboard! He’s fallen for her, hook, line, and sinker. Helping her flirt with another guy is pure torture, but maybe if Fox can tackle his inner demons and show Hannah he’s all in, she’ll choose him instead?

Triggers

This book is rather light but there are some subjects that may be considered sensitive to some.

Alcohol
Profanity
Sexually Explicit Scenes
Slut-shaming / Toxic Masculinity

Ratings

Add me as a friend on Goodreads! Click here.

There are possible **SPOILERS** beyond this point!

Keep Reading!

In The Event of Love by Courtney Kae Book Review

December 5, 2022December 10, 2022 by zajikalimakes ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

This post may contain affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase through a link. Read the Disclosure here.

Blurb

With her career as a Los Angeles event planner imploding after a tabloid blowup, Morgan Ross isn’t headed home for the holidays so much as in strategic retreat. Breathtaking mountain vistas, quirky townsfolk, and charming small businesses aside, her hometown of Fern Falls is built of one heartbreak on top of another . . .

Take her one-time best friend turned crush, Rachel Reed. The memory of their perfect, doomed first kiss is still fresh as new-fallen snow. Way fresher than the freezing mud Morgan ends up sprawled in on her very first day back, only to be hauled out via Rachel’s sexy new lumberjane muscles acquired from running her family tree farm.

When Morgan discovers that the Reeds’ struggling tree farm is the only thing standing between Fern Falls and corporate greed destroying the whole town’s livelihood, she decides she can put heartbreak aside to save the farm by planning her best fundraiser yet. She has all the inspiration for a spectacular event: delicious vanilla lattes, acoustic guitars under majestic pines, a cozy barn surrounded by brilliant stars. But she and Rachel will ABSOLUTELY NOT have a heartwarming holiday happy ending. That would be as unprofessional as it is unlikely. Right?