Lovers to enemies to lovers.

Annika and Hudson met at a tech conference the previous summer where they hit it off and had a weeklong fling. Now Hudson and Annika are developing similar but opposite apps and Annika thinks Hudson stole her idea.

I really wanted to love this book! I love enemies to lovers and I was excited for the techie storyline. It’s exciting that we’re starting to see more books with female leads involved with tech and science.

I thought Annika was very immature and unlikeable and I wish we got to get to know Hudson better.

I've been wanting to read Sandhya Menon/Lily Menon for a while now, and I was stoked to see this book pop up on NG. I didn't dislike this story, but...I'm not sure it was strong enough for me to seek out more from this author. There are a few too many ideas/plots - female empowerment; father/daughter dynamics; rival app developers; finding your own destiny; and the romance - and a heroine (the only PoV) whose constant whiplash effect of her mood changes between uber-confident /self defeated/ zen-calm grows increasingly tedious as the novel progresses. I think the heart of the story - lovers to rivals to lovers - is good. Unfortunately, everything else - and there's so much of it - isn't.

Annika Dev grew up believing in fairy tale love (like her parents had) and second chances. So much so that she's invented an app (alongside her best friend/solo-employee June - a programmer) to help couples communicate more effectively. She believes in Make Up and knows it can work AND CHANGE THE WORLD (eye roll)...except the app is still in development, she's still very single, and her landlord is threatening to kick her out unless she starts paying rent. With bankruptcy on the horizon, Annika has her heart set on winning the EPIC investment pitch contest which could MAKE or BREAK her company; unfortunately, Make Up isn't the only app the investors are interested in.

Break Up, the "Uber for break-ups," is a massive success. Users love it, investors love it, magazines love to write about it, and Annika Dev hates it. She also hates its handsome creator, Hudson Craft, who she's convinced stole her idea - after she made the mistake of telling him all about it during a hot, weeklong summer fling - and subverted it into the exact opposite of Make Up.

With Break Up, users provide information about themselves and the person they want to break up with; the app then sends a stranger/Break Up employee to deliver the break-up message in person and provide a link to a personal, pre-recorded message from the user/dumper. Simple, clean and effective, Break Up is the hottest app in town.

Annika knows she has to win EPIC, and she's certain that if she can focus on the pitch and beat Break up , the money will eventually lead to app success. But her landlord becomes the least of her worries when Break Up moves into the adjacent office space, and Hudson Craft is suddenly everywhere all the time. And he keeps giving her hot stares like he thinks she’s beautiful. And complimenting her big brain. And her commitment to her so far non-existent app. And he keeps being super cool and fun and hip. And showing up on her blind dates because he’s obviously into her. And basically being awesome and nice and chill in the face of her constant insults and one-upmanship games. Which he usually wins. Because he's a total dick.

Wait. Hold up. What just happened there?

Oh, sorry about that. I forgot to mention that even though Annika is constantly trying to tell us that Hudson is the last one at the jerk store, he always seems like a pretty great guy. And since his reason for starting his company is also GLARINGLY obvious nearly the moment we meet him on page - and it's sort of sad sack romantic, it’s impossible to dislike him.

Friends, Annika is such a frustrating/polarizing character. You want to root for her - but the author can't stop stuffing this book full of all the reasons she's such a badass that you almost can’t help but find her a bit annoying. I loved her commitment to her company, her loyal and intense friendship with June, her grit, and her vulnerability around Hudson, but she still remained this “character,” I just never seemed to know very well. And it didn’t help that I thought her app idea sounded super lame (IF YOU NEED A COMPUTER APP TO TELL YOU WHAT TO SAY TO THE PERSON YOU ARE FAIRY TALE IN LOVE WITH, FFS I DON’T THINK YOU ARE FAIRY TALE IN LOVE WITH THEM. There, I said it. Anywho.

Like I mentioned earlier in the story, there are a whole bunch of other things happening in this story, and the most distracting of them all is the daddy/daughter plotline. Annika and her dad are super close, but his dreams for her and her dreams for herself are different. He’s mostly superfluous for much of the story, and when his ‘big moment,’ arrives, it’s supremely underwhelming.

Hmmm. Underwhelming is the biggest takeaway I had from this book. The characters, the romance, the plot. It’s good? Okay? Kinda dull? Messy? I’m still not sure. When Menon is laser focused on her principal pair and their excellent chemistry, the novel shines. When Annika is constantly refining her pitch and/or telling Hudson how to make his life right (since she totally has her own shit together. Ahem.), it’s a slog.

I’m on the fence folks.

If you like this author, maybe you forgive this overstuffed feel of this one.
If you’re new to Menon, maybe you wait to read reviews of her next release before you give it a try.

You do you.

The chemistry in this book is unmatched! Their witty banter slays me. I love the modern take with the app world and love connections through that. This book give The Hating Game a run for its money.

Imagine the having the handsome guy who stole your app idea moving into the office right next to yours. Annika is so relatable and her relationship with Hudson is so fresh and fast paced.

I highly recommend for fans of Sally Throne and Christina Lauren!

Thank you Net.Galley and St. Martin’s Griffin for the eARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

#makeupbreakup #lilymenon #netgalley #netgalleyreviewer #netgalleybooks #stmartinspress #stmartinsgriffin cute story of romance. Boy meets girl. Girl meets boy. Insecurities. Thinking that you know things but you don’t. Both starting up #techcompany #dating #breakingup fighting not to be together. But. What if??? Definitely a cute #valentinesday❤️ read #happilyeverafter #bookstagram #readersofinstagram #bookstagrammer #readersofig

Make Up Break Up features some of my favorite tropes: Friends to Lovers and Forced Proximity. The competition between Annika and Hudson is smoking hot; Hudson's Break Up app and Annika's Make Up app put them at opposite ends of the relationship app spectrum. Lily's writing was enjoyable and engaging; the banter she wrote was amusing and the excitement she was able to portray of owning your own company made me wish I could come up with an app idea and take the tech world by storm!

Overall, I enjoyed the story but did feel that a few things kept me from loving it as much as I could have. I felt like the characters felt older than-24, in the way they behaved and the responsibility they shouldered, but then in other ways, like that ways they were okay sabotaging each other on really important stages, felt too immature for me. I honestly just didn't like Annika that much. I often prefer dual perspective stories, and in this case, I really wish we would have gotten some insight into what Hudson was thinking; I think seeing Annika through his eyes may have helped with that? In some ways, I also felt that Annika was really way too hard on Hudson; I respect that she felt they had fundamental differences, but really ultimately felt like she was putting a lot of her own issues and issues between her and her dad onto her relationship with Hudson, and that was just really hard to read and continue to feel sympathy towards her for. I also felt like the crisis moment towards the end felt a little unnecessary; issues between those two characters were already working their way towards being resolved, and it felt a bit forced and over the top to have the final push be what it was.

Overall, I give this one 3 stars. If you love enemies to lovers and forced proximity, you'll probably still enjoy this one, and what bothered me may not be a big deal for you; so you may even enjoy it way more than I did! That said, I will absolutely be looking for more things from Lily Menon in the future.

I was really excited about this book the moment I read the blurb, and it was a cute & fun story. I loved the idea of a romance between rival app owners - one whose mission to is to bring couples together, the other to break them up. I really loved the enemies to lovers & rom-com mash-up, although the "enemies" part wasn't exactly what I was expecting.

While I enjoyed the storyline I have a love-hate relationship with Annika. I loved her passion & determination and the fact that she was fighting to make her business a success. What I didn't love was how she perceived her relationship with Hudson and seemed to create conflicts in her head. Her character was a bit indecisive, and I think having the entire story told from her point of view made it a little hard for me to invest in their happiness. I think getting Hudson's POV, even for only a few chapters if not the whole thing, would have developed the story a lot more and made this a complete hit for me. That being said I think it's a fantastic debut novel, and I can't wait to read more from Lily Menon in the future!

Make Up Break Up by Lily Menon is the story of Annika Dev and Hudson Craft, two rival app developers who had a fling in Vegas and now find themselves in neighboring offices.

Annika’s app, Make Up, is designed to bring people together, while Hudson’s app is all about being able to effortlessly break up with someone. Despite having feelings for each other that they haven’t quite come to terms with, they find themselves trying to sabotage each other until certain events change everything.

What worked for me: Annika and June’s friendship, the woman owned company, Annika’s relationship with her dad

What didn’t work for me: Annika’s at times over-the-top coldness, how she too easily won the EPIC pitch, and how quickly and simply the book ended.

Overall I liked the book, but this one just didn’t click with me.

3.5 stars.

I love how passionate Annika is about Make Up, and her pettiness (sometimes) and anger that she tries to cover up with anxiety techniques and yoga felt really authentic.

I thought it was a little crazy how often Hudson and Annika butted heads, despite knowing there’s history between them and that we don’t have the full story. Annika consistently makes comments about Hudson having two sides to him, one deep and intense and one super flippant and arrogant and cold, and she struggled with that, as did I. But I also found myself frustrated with her, because Hudson dropped hints all along that things weren’t quite as she seemed to remember them from their past.

The payoff though is worth it, and while I thought it was a little too easy, at the same time Annika didn’t tell or want Hudson to do anything that he wasn’t already marinating on himself. She called him on BS, but I’m glad he called her on hers, too. I wish we had seen them as a couple more.

I loved that there was a focus on Annika and her dad’s relationship as well, and that was super sweet to watch (and painful at times but again, worth it). I love how Menon doesn’t shy away from family topics.

Read to 40%, then skipped around

I had such high hopes for this one and was so very disappointed.

I couldn’t connect to either of these characters. Annika is smart, Hudson is charming, together they have so much potential and yet, it’s all pettiness and ridiculous behavior. There are a few secondary characters, but it didn’t seem like we got to know them.

Plot wise, it’s a lot of back and forth and about a million percent more inner monologue than I would have liked. The story moved slowly and I couldn’t get invested in any part of it. It breaks my heart to say that I could have set this down and never finished.

Overall, the idiots to lovers is my favorite trope, but this one didn’t work for me.

**Huge thanks to St. Martin’s Griffin for providing the arc free of charge**

Annika Dev wants to get her company Make Up off the ground and make it a success. A hunky guy moves into her office building with his new company Break Up. She realizes they had met over the summer in Las Vegas. Her ideas are totally opposite of his and they go round and round. This was a good book and I enjoyed reading it.

Cute enemies-to-lovers contemporary romance. It seemed to start kind of slow, but the ending was sweet.

I received an advanced copy of Make Up Break Up from NetGalley so I could share my review with you!

Annika Dev is passionate about helping reconnect the world with itself. That’s why she created her start-up company, Make Up, an app designed to help struggling relationships survive what could otherwise be devastating conflicts. Annika believes that Make Up has the potential to revolutionize the way couples deal with quarrels if she can keep the company’s financial woes under control for long enough to get the app out into the world. Though things are far from perfect, Annika knows that she’s got what it takes to help couples remember why their relationship is worth fighting for. But when Hudson Craft, Annika’s irritatingly handsome arch-nemesis and founder of Break Up (an app that goes against everything Annika stands for) moves in next door, Annika realizes that her fight for success in the world of tech entrepreneurs has just begun.

You can get your copy of Make Up Break Up on February 2nd from St. Martin’s Griffin!

As you might recall from my earlier reviews, Sandhya Menon is one of my favorite contemporary authors of all time! Every book she releases is an instant must-read for me, and Make Up Break Up was no exception. Make Up Break Up is a bit different from Menon’s previous releases, as it is written for adult romance readers, rather than her usual young adult audience. With this being said, I was blown away by how well Menon’s writing style translated to this new genre! Annika Dev is such a strong and confident lead, who works her hardest to try and make the world a better place. I just want to be her friend! My favorite part of this book was the elements of the world of entrepreneurship integrated throughout that made the whole story feel so real!

My Recommendation-
If you’ve been looking for a steamy romance to push away the winter chill, you need to pick up a copy of Make Up Break Up! This book would be perfect for fans of The Boyfriend Project and Get a Life, Chloe Brown! I would especially recommend Make Up Break Up for folks who enjoy reading books with fierce female protagonists!

2.5 stars

I’ve seen Make Up Break Up by Lily Menon on a bunch of “books we can’t wait to read in 2021!” lists, so I was eager to dig in as soon as I received a review copy in NetGalley! Unfortunately, almost as soon as I started the book my eagerness began to diminish and I just didn’t connect with the characters or their story at all.

I might be too old for it? (I’m 38.) Annika and Hudson both struck me as so immature, yet the amount of life experience and professional standing both are supposed to have would be more appropriate if they were at least five years older. And not that I demand absolute realism from my romance reads, but the whole app development/tech plot felt both dated and superficial. All I kept thinking is, “sure, they might hit it big for a year, but the whole thing will be a bust before they hit thirty.”

Because the book is written in third-person and only follows Annika’s point of view, I never really got to know Hudson. That was a shame, because what we do learn of his story is more compelling than Annika’s. I think this book shows potential and many other readers might like it, but it just wasn’t for me.

Annika's devoted to her idea for a new relationship app, dedicated to helping people resolve conflicts in their relationship. This is why she is so angry when she finds out that after their brief summer fling, Hudson has come up with his own app that helps people end relationships. His entire outlook on life seems to be the opposite of hers, and yet she can't deny the attraction between them.

As much chemistry as there is between the two protagonists, I actually found them fairly interesting characters individually. Their work sounded fascinating, and honestly, I could have read a whole novel about the apps' development and success. The conflicts between them seemed a little more obvious and it was a little hard to believe these two intelligent people couldn't resolve it more quickly, but it was satisfying when they eventually did. I came to appreciate the message Menon was sending with this story, to believe in optimism and second chances.

I loved Annika as a MC. She was a multi cultural, headstrong badass who thought quickly on her feet! I thought her relationship with her father was truly unique, as she lost her mother from cancer early on and he raised her alone. His Incessant pushing her to try to become a doctor because he wants what is best for her (or really what is secure and safe) is something I understand coming from an immigrant background. Passion doesn’t pay the bills, a job does. 🙃 We’ll show them, right? 😂 i was not expecting to shed a tear, but when Dr. Dev visited Make Up, whew, someone must have cut onions at the exact same time!

June. June girl. If my best friend in the ENTIRE world was ever in a book, her name was June. My god. The hype woman, the girl always in your corner, the baddest of the bad. I love her. These female empowering friendships, along with empowering the future females in tech was AMAZING. I loved that spotlight.

This book is very sensual. There was a lot of pearl clutching happening, but it was all very sensual. There’s definitely the steam in this book, so skip this if you need a clean and closed door romance. The sexual tension between the two is very palpable and when it comes to a head, oh it goes.

Overall, I really enjoyed this. It’s a very catty enemies to lovers, but also has a second chance (which is my new kick) trope in a sense. I found myself enjoying Annika’s peeling back of Hudson’s layers to figure out what really happened in Vegas.

Thank you a million times St. Martin’s Press & Net Galley for the gifted copy. Make Up, Break Up is out Feb 2nd!

Make Up Break Up is Lily Menon’s first adult novel but you can tell instantly that it will not be her last. Not only is the cast diverse but the main character is a strong women who has thrown her hat into the technology world where women are normally outnumbered. Annika Dev is a character that doesn’t cower but instead stands up for herself and is not afraid of a little competition.

The book begins with us being introduced to not only Annika but her best friend and colleague June Stewart. We learn that the two are working on creating and launching an app called Make Up with the purpose of giving couples a second chance. We also quickly learn about Hudson Craft whose app Break Up allows users to hire them to break up with their significant other without doing it face to face. Annika assumes that Hudson stole her idea and twisted it into his own project. It isn’t long before the two of them battle head to head with mind games to try to outwit each other to become the better company but in the process will these two find a connection with each other?

Only time will tell!

💕Passionate competition between opposing relationship apps📱: what a couple of CEOs!

4-4.5🌟stars
I really found this romance based in the start-up tech world a compelling read. No, the subject of rival techies who fight mutual attraction is not new. But the idea that their companies were so diametrically opposed and the owners knew each other in an earlier time was intriguing. And, strung in bits and pieces throughout the story, we learn just how they connected and lost touch.

Hudson, the male lead, seemed to keep both Annika, the female lead, and me constantly confused about his true character. He first appears as a bragging, pretty insensitive jerk and then we are left to speculate if that's the real Hudson, especially when Annika remembers a guy with such a different attitude and ambition when they first met. Annika, on the other hand, could not be more vocal about her goals and her strong views about the Break Up app Hudson created.

I loved the realistic, conflicted relationship between Annika and her dad: mutual love, yes, but major disconnects on how Annika should be molding her future. I was glad that a key plot thread focused on Dr. Dev. I am also a fan of stories like this that highlight successful women in STEM professions, especially ones ready to mentor other girls and young women. Author Lily Menon also supplied a healthy dose of realism by showing the difficulties, financial most obvious, that come with building a new business.

Thanks to publishers St. Martin's Griffin and NetGalley for providing a complimentary advance copy of the book; this is my voluntary and honest review.

Make Up Break Up follows in the footsteps of many other recent rom coms where a main character has created an app and is looking for funding. Unfortunately, it didn't provide me with much of a new story and fell short of my expectations.

I had trouble liking Annika because I didn't feel she made good business decisions and her partner seemed to just go along with whatever Annika wanted to do. Hudson, the love interest, didn't have much substance to him. I never rooted for their relationship.

In addition to not liking the characters much, I didn't find the timeline all that plausible and I didn't feel the chemistry.

I did enjoy that Annika had sweet father that raised her.

This book just didn't do it for me. I appreciate the opportunity to read and give my honest opinion.

Thanks to St. Martin's Griffin for an advanced copy of Make Up Break Up.

Make Up Break Up was cute and while I usually love enemies to lovers, this unfortunately didn't hit the mark for me.

I wanted to love this one I really, really did but I started it and it just has not grabbed my attention yet. Which is disappointing because I love Sandhya's other books and I was so excited for her first contemporary romance.

I will definitely give this a try at a later date, but for now it's going back on the to read pile!

Thank you for the opportunity to give it a try!