This cute little romantic fake-dating novel caught my eye immediately and I had to give it a read.
It starts out from Solange Pereira’s perspective. She is helping her cousin (a wedding planner) the morning of the wedding and overhears the bride talking to *gasp* another man. She then crashes into the groom, Dean Chapman (and also our hero), and can’t help but stop the wedding in a big and traumatic opening scene.
Dean is looking for someone to fill out his “wife” spot so that he can attain his dreams of becoming partner at his law firm. And because his semi-arranged marriage just went up in flames at the altar, he needs a fake girlfriend to convince his boss that he’s currently stable. He meets up with Solange (after already dropping her name – no way out now!) and she agrees to help, mainly because she feels guilty about ruining his wedding, but also because she thinks he’s one of the most attractive people she’s ever seen. The two then embark on a whole bunch of shenanigans (like seriously, some crazy things happen) and slowly start to catch feelings for each other.
I LOVED Solange’s family. They’re so warm and accepting of Dean towards the end and they literally jumped off the page. I also really liked Solange’s best friend, Brandon. He was a little mysterious (and put Dean on his heels) but was ultimately quite loyal to her.
The pining was also there. This got me through about 3/4 of the novel before the over-the-top antics caught up. However, Dean really starts to catch the feels and WOW is that man attractive both inside and out. I wanted it to work out so badly for him. It was also great to watch Dean go from someone who doesn’t even believe in love to someone who just wants it with Solange no matter what. And luckily, we get a very happy ending.
The premise is super cute. Unfortunately, the plot just didn’t do a lot for me because this book was over the top ridiculous. I kept thinking that nothing stranger could happen to these characters and then bam: a weirder scene. For example, they end up at a sex club and watch orgies together. Dean does a Magic Mike strip-tease type dance. He’s also forced to wear a contraption that shares a pregnant woman’s pain (Solange’s family calls!) the moment he meets her. To me, some of these things were just over the top cringy. And the characters were so great that I felt they could have fallen in love without these wild plot twists. I wanted to see more of them!
Plus, how many different times do you need to fake-marry/date? How many fake relationships can actually occur in real life? And TBH, I could have totally overlooked that since I love a fake-dating storyline as much as the next reader. But the rest of the craziness kind of made me think over the whole plot. I wish it had been toned down just a bit, or maybe I just needed more development between the characters and less outside influence.
Overall, it’s a cute read if you’re willing to suspend disbelief and exist in the land of the romance novel. Both of the main characters are lovely people and are really a joy to read about!
The Wedding Crasher will be available on April 5th, 2022. Stay tuned!
*I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review*
