The Charm Offensive - Alison Cochrun
Published: 7th September 2021
Source: Purchased
Genre: Contemporary Romance, LGBTQ+
My Rating:
In this witty and heartwarming romantic comedy—reminiscent of Red, White & Royal Blue and One to Watch—an awkward tech wunderkind on a reality dating show goes off-script when sparks fly with his producer.
Dev Deshpande has always believed in fairy tales. So it’s no wonder then that he’s spent his career crafting them on the long-running reality dating show Ever After. As the most successful producer in the franchise’s history, Dev always scripts the perfect love story for his contestants, even as his own love life crashes and burns. But then the show casts disgraced tech wunderkind Charlie Winshaw as its star.
Charlie is far from the romantic Prince Charming Ever After expects. He doesn’t believe in true love, and only agreed to the show as a last-ditch effort to rehabilitate his image. In front of the cameras, he’s a stiff, anxious mess with no idea how to date twenty women on national television. Behind the scenes, he’s cold, awkward, and emotionally closed-off.
As Dev fights to get Charlie to open up to the contestants on a whirlwind, worldwide tour, they begin to open up to each other, and Charlie realizes he has better chemistry with Dev than with any of his female co-stars. But even reality TV has a script, and in order to find to happily ever after, they’ll have to reconsider whose love story gets told.
I had been excited about reading The Charm Offensive ever since I saw the first blog review about it. It sounded right up my street as an interesting LGBTQ+ contemporary romance read. I was so excited I actually found myself putting off reading because that is what I do every time I get excited about a new book. Put off reading until I forget why I wanted to read.
Unfortunately, I ended up reading it when I wasn’t in the mood for it. I was hoping once I started I would find myself growing into the right mood for it as that does happen sometimes. That didn’t end up being the case and I dragged myself through reading it. As such, my rating doesn’t truly reflect the book but instead reflects my mood when reading it as I couldn’t enjoy it as much as I hoped. I want to acknowledge that although I didn’t enjoy this one as much as I hoped I adored it for so many of the important conversations it had and the complexities of these characters and the journey they went through. Part of my rating reflects that, because even though I wasn’t in the right mood for this book I can recognise it was good and it might have been an amazing book on another day.
The star of this book, for me, was Charlie. He was an adorable guy who hadn’t had the right people around him in the past to help him realise he was not the problem. He decided to go on a dating show for all of the wrong reasons, he had hoped it would help show he wasn’t crazy or difficult to be around. It was a chance to boost his profile and show himself as real person. He wasn’t looking for love but he ended up finding it anyway, just not with any of the women he was meant to be dating for the show. It was great to see the struggle he faced with his OCD and anxiety and how that he could be perceived as difficult but only because people didn’t understand. He was sweet and honestly never expected to find love as he had never felt sexual attraction before. Until Dev. In some ways it seemed like the mental and emotional struggles of this book would centre on him but Charlie had been through therapy and recognised the importance of his mental health and was trying to build healthy coping strategies into his life. He had good people in his corner so you worried for him but not too excessively. Charlie’s book was about him discovering his sexuality and being brave enough to accept and tell people about it. He had backed himself into a corner signing the contract to star in the show which meant he had to date these women despite the fact he had no interest in any of them, and most of them had no interest in him either. Dev was the one who went through an emotional journey and discovered his faults and acknowledged the mental health journey he needed to go on.
Dev was a sweetheart who believed in love and had rose coloured glasses about the show he worked on. He never meant to develop feelings for Charlie but he did. But really this book was about him accepting his mental health struggles and acknowledging he had depression and then learning how best to live with this. He very much ignored it and tried to push those who cared for him away when he was in a depressive episode as he didn’t seem to want them to associate that side of himself with who he was. That was obviously a terribly unhealthy coping strategy but Dev seemed unwilling to accept help from others and was a touch too independent and isolated despite viewing himself as a romantic and a man who was looking for love and a relationship. It was great seeing him at the end getting help and developing healthier strategies in his life to cope. And most importantly allowing others close to him and help him when he needed it. It was about him acknowledging fairy tales aren’t true and that love is not easy. It doesn’t follow a set narrative and you cannot control it.
Honestly, this book did so much well and I wish I’d DNFed and tried to read it again another day as I would have loved it if I’d been in the right mood for it. Instead, I struggled through and acknowledge the potential there without truly connecting with it which was sad.
Have you read The Charm Offensive, if so what did you think? And if you're a mood reader what was the last book you read and you knew you should like but just weren't in the right mood for it?
In the Middle of Somewhere (Middle of Somewhere #1) - Roan Parrish
Published: 10th July 2015Source: Purchased
Genre: Contemporary Romance, LGBTQ+
My Rating:
Daniel Mulligan is tough, snarky, and tattooed, hiding his self-consciousness behind sarcasm. Daniel has never fit in—not at home in Philadelphia with his auto mechanic father and brothers, and not at school where his Ivy League classmates looked down on him. Now, Daniel’s relieved to have a job at a small college in Holiday, Northern Michigan, but he’s a city boy through and through, and it’s clear that this small town is one more place he won’t fit in.
Rex Vale clings to routine to keep loneliness at bay: honing his muscular body, perfecting his recipes, and making custom furniture. Rex has lived in Holiday for years, but his shyness and imposing size have kept him from connecting with people.
When the two men meet, their chemistry is explosive, but Rex fears Daniel will be another in a long line of people to leave him, and Daniel has learned that letting anyone in can be a fatal weakness. Just as they begin to break down the walls keeping them apart, Daniel is called home to Philadelphia, where he discovers a secret that changes the way he understands everything.
In the Middle of Somewhere was a book I think I added to my TBR because it appeared on a romance recommendation list or something. It has been on my Kindle for so long so when I rolled the Romanceopoly prompt to read a romance with an M/M romance I chose it to give it a shot. I actually kind of thought I might DNF at first because it had been unread for so long, there surely had to be a reason for that right?
I found the start a little slow as we began with Daniel leaving a job interview in Michigan driving through the woods and getting into an accident where he subsequently met Rex for the first time. It then seemed to hop in time to him being back home in Philadelphia. It hopped again to him starting the job he interviewed for in Michigan. He meets Rex again and their instantly getting it on by a tree. The start just seemed to hop from place to place with little context for the change in time. I found it confusing and it really took my our of the book as I had to flick back and see if I missed something when i was reading. I liked the characters of Daniel and Rex though. Daniel was this intense guy who was an English professor and he's had it rough. He wass on edge a lot ready to fight and very untrusting of people and what they said and did. He was like that stray cat ready to scratch you at any sudden movements (can you tell I've recently got a cat and need to now reference cats in every day conversation?). And the most we really learnt about Rex at first was that he was this really large, strong guy who had quite an intimidating presence. He was a sweet cinnamon roll really but that comes later. He was quiet and reserved but he disn't play games, he was very open with most things. In a lot of ways they were opposites but you could instantly tell there was a spark between them and that interested me to see how Daniel would let his guard down and how Rex would speak a little more and help Daniel and himself move forward.
I think I got to the 50% mark and it was going to go either way in terms of me DNFing but at that point I'd gotten so far and I was interested but it seemed like it was going nowhere. They were having sex and occasionally discussing their relationship, I'm all for a low angst romance that doesn't put the characters through the ringer but I needed some kind of plot direction. Thankfully, the last half of the book had Daniel and Rex exploring their relationship more and they were discussing their feelings and revealing their vulnerabiilities. It became less about their physical connection and more the emotional side, which I was much more interested in. Rex revealed his dyslexia which had led to certain misunderstandings at the start of the relationship and Daniel fully recognised his own emotional constipation and inability to ask for help or demonstrate his feelings articulately which is funny considering he was an English professor.
I think Rex revealing his past and his dyslexia was the start of this book getting interesting as the characters became more human and real. Daniel then received shocking news from his family which led to him returning home for a few days with Rex and that exploration of his past and the environment he had grown up in helped again move their relationship forward. The great part was what I expected to be the third act break up for them, Daniel potentially moving away when he was told about a job back in Philadelphia, instead this brought the two of them together and led to them discussing what they wanted in the future as a couple and it was lovely.
I think I've read too many angsty romances as I expected far more conflict in this book and that just wasn't the case here. Instead, whilst there were stumbling blocks to get past their relationship itself was always solid. In fact, I finished the book contemplating reading the next book which centres around Daniel's brother, Colin, which is a big change from potentially DNFing. I just worry there will be higher angst in the next one as Colin has a lot of internalised homophobia to overcome.
The Spanish Love Deception - Elena Armas
Published: 23rd February 2021
Source: Purchased
Genre: Contemporary Romance
My Rating:
The first book I read in 2023 is to be my first review of the year and also my first review in who knows how long. Thank god my first read was such a winner because I’d hate to be posting with negativity when I’ve only just come back.
I admit I did start The Spanish Love Deception expecting to DNF so I suppose I started my year with a bit of a negative mindset but I was wrong. I’m always happy when that happens. I’d bought it a while back after it had appeared in my Twitter timeline and I’m sure I saw Nick raving about it. I mean, it’s fake dating so it was obviously an insta-buy for me in that way but the first time I attempted to read it last year I’d put it down as that first chapter did nothing for me. I figured it was a mood reading thing as I did buy it during the slump season of 2022. But, again, when I started it this year those first few chapters were rough and I had my doubts. Once things got going though I soon got what the hype was about. So I guess you could say there were a few pacing issues but honestly once you get invested in Lina and Aaron’s romance you won’t notice it.
As a romance novel told from a single POV, I did find I struggled a little with the character of Aaron. I loved him and it was obvious from the start he had feelings for Lina, she was one oblivious woman when it came to men, but I did feel he could have been developed slightly more from the beginning as he only became a fully fleshed human within the second part of the book. Until then he was a cardboard cutout of a romance hero. Maybe this was deliberate to show Lina also began to see him as a real person and not some fictional antagonist in her life but it meant I struggled to feel fully invested in this book until later on. That could have been a me issue, it just made me feel a little less invested in their romance and is probably why I struggled to get into the book. I did really enjoy the slow burn of this romance. Lina was always going to take a while to realise Aaron’s feelings for her were anything but pretend so it was fun seeing the ways she twisted things in her head to fit the narrative until she finally realised she was an idiot.
One thing which made me want to keep reading, despite the rough couple of chapters, was the casual sexism Lina had to suffer through at work. I’ve worked in an office for a while now and seen situations like this play out, not to the level seen in the book but those casual moments of sexism which make your blood boil. Like female members of staff being asked to make coffee for a group of managers when there were men in the room too and the manager's office was nearer to the kitchen and they could have done it then damn selves. It was infuriating seeing Alina go through that at the start and it definitely helped endear her to me because I wanted to see her do well. I admit I did want to see a bit more of her work situation than we got but since a lot of the book takes place in Spain I could see why that wouldn’t exactly fit well with the rest of the story.
This was a new to me, but this certainly won’t be the last book I read from her. Luckily for me, it took me so long to get to reading this release she has another book out already so that’s going on the shopping list. First, I need to try and get through a few more books but I can’t wait to read The American Roommate Experiment, fingers crossed it works just as well for me.
Have you read The Spanish Love Deception? I'm sure I'm the last one to get to it, what did you think? And what are your favourite fake relationship romances?
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