Jess is a single mom that has her priorities straight: her daughter, her grandparents, her work, and there's no time for much more, but when your best friend is a romance novelist I guess it's impossible to not get dragged down a promising new dating app that uses genetics to find your soul mate.

I loved this story, the premise was interesting and I loved the characters and the chemistry, and not just between the main ones! (but especially between the main ones). It's hilarious, it made me laugh out loud many times and giggle like an idiot. I couldn't put this book down and I wish there was so much more of Jess and River for me to experience with them, and I wish Jess was a little more curious at the end because I'll die not knowing!!!

The Soulmate Equation is a really sweet rom-com! Jess is a single mom to her 7 year old daughter Juno. Jess was raised by her grandparents and they help her with Juno. Fizzy is Jess's best friend and let me tell you, every girl needs her own Fizzy! Fizzy is a romance writer and while she and Jess are sitting at their favorite coffee shop working the girls meet River who works/and is the founder of a dna based matchmaking company. River invites Jess and Fizzy to come and check out his work. That's when the fun starts! Jess and River are matched and begin dating. Can your dna find determine your perfect match? I loved the characters in this book especially sweet Juno! I thought the ending was perfect! I would love another book with Fizzy as the main character!!! I received an advanced readers copy and all opinions are my own.

Big thanks to NetGalley, Gallery Books, and the authors for the opportunity to read an ARC of this book. An honest review was requested but not required.

Christina Lauren is (are?) mostly hits for me and relatively few misses. I loved their recent Holidaze but felt really lukewarm on Honey-Don't List. Nonetheless I had high hopes for the Soulmate Equation: I've been reading a lot of manhwa lately and "fake dating" can be such a fun trope. I also loved the premise of introducing verified science into the world of dating and dating apps. On the other hand, I was nervous about Juno (the main character Jess's daughter). I don't tend to love kids in romance novels (I know, I know) as I think they really sap the romance out of the story and hog the spotlight. Or maybe I'm just thinking of my own kids, ha, ha, haaaaaaa.

So I started out cautiously... but I didn't need to. This book was magic. I loved it from beginning to end. Jess is a super character, flawed but human, and River turned out to be awesome too. The chemistry between the two of them was 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥. It has seriously been a LONG time since I've felt so, uh, bothered by a book. Whew!!! *fans self*. The side cast was great all-around: Pops and Nana, Fizzy, Juno turned out to be super cute and realistic, the sisters, David (or was it Daniel?) the barista, and Jamie, who honestly provided a much needed foil. I even loved that Jess had a nerdy math job and that the authors more than once dove straight into the world of numbers for her. In short I enjoyed every minute and stayed up way too late reading this book. Going straight onto my keeper shelf and tbh I will probably buy a copy once it's published. ❤
5 stars and will definitely be recommending this at work and to friends.

The Soulmate Equation is another excellent book by Christina Lauren. I love that they’re consistent in pumping out great books that give me the feels and makes romance readers proud.

The book’s protagonist, Jess, was so relatable with her struggles in trying to balance all aspects of her life in the various relationships she has; especially with the different hats she has to wear. I appreciated the conflicted emotions between her and her estranged mother and I felt the chemistry between her and River was magnetic.

For me, the real star was Juno, Jess’ daughter with her too smart for her good ways and enthusiastic learning about different topics was just the cutest!

Overall, this was a sweet and enjoyable book with steamy and heartwarming moments.

I really love every Christina Lauren book I have read. I enjoy the characters, the banter, and the fun escape they provide. In this one single mom, Jess, isn't looking for love but when her best friend, Fizzy, convinces her to sign up for a DNA matchmaking service she finds out she may have found a perfect soulmate. Interestingly, he isn't someone she even likes. This is full of lots of tension between the love interests and has a lot of fun dialogue combined with an interesting premise. At times the science of it all got a little long but I understand it has to be believable. This would make a great beach or pool side read for the summer.

This book is available next week, May 18, 2021. Thanks NetGalley and Gallery Books for the advanced reader's copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I'm gonna say up front: if your complaint about Christina Lauren books lately is that they aren't steamy enough, you will continue to have the same issue with The Soulmate Equation. That said, I had a pretty good time with this one and thought they did a fantastic job depicting a single mom and what a 7 year old kid is really like. The premise is over the top, but still fun.

Jess is a single mom and freelance statistician, but between motherhood and financial struggles her dating life has been lackluster at best. But when she and her best friend find out about a new dating app that matches people based on genetic compatibility, her friend pushes her to give it a try, expecting very little. Surprisingly she matches at an unheard of rate with the founder of the company Dr. Pena, a grumpy man she's had less than glowing interactions with. So they offer to pay her to try dating him as a publicity move....

This is a light, fun semi-enemies to lovers story with a super nerdy Latinx hero and a just as nerdy heroine. (seriously, I was living for all the science and math puns). And for anyone concerned that this sounds like eugenics, they do try to address that issue early in the book, saying that a match doesn't mean being the same, differences are often compatible emotionally and sexually, and the algorithm can't take into account differences in experience or culture, which is why people have to make their own decisions of what to do. And you can set your profile to match with a variety of genders etc. according to preference. Whether this is adequate you'll have to decide but I can say it wasn't an issue I was bothered by, especially because it doesn't feel at all realistic to me in the first place. I received an advance copy of this book for review via netgalley, all opinions are my own.

I received a copy of this book for review from NetGalley. Christina Lauren is back! This book was super cute, and really fun to read. CLo's trademark humor was in full swing in this book, and it was an easy, fairly low angst read, and I enjoyed the heck out of it.
When single mom Jess was having a bad day, she impulsively submitted a sample to a DNA-based match making app, and then fairly promptly forgot all about it. She was pretty surprised to find out later that not only had she been matched, she'd received the highest match score to date and with the founder himself. Despite the fact that they could barely tolerate each other, they agreed to give it a try For Science.
If you've read enough romantic comedy, you know exactly how the plot unfolds, but this still manages to be fun and charming. Jess and River are cute, but to be honest, the very best relationships in the book are with their families. Jess has built herself a community of friends and family that are her bedrock foundation, and they are pretty fabulous. Her best friend is the kind of friend we all want to be, and I would love to read Fizzy's story some day. Overall, this book is fun, sexy, sweet, and the exact comfort read that I think we all need.

I’m going to keep this one short and sweet. I absolutely loved it. A DNA-based matchmaking company? So cool! Jess is a strong, fierce, brilliant force. Loved her and Fizzy’s friendship. Loved “Americano” and the development of he and Jess’s relationship. Juno is a love and the grandparents are absolute blessings. I couldn’t put it down, nor did I want to.

This was a really sweet story by Christina Lauren, whom I love. Single mother Jess reluctantly submits her DNA to this new dating company that has found a way to match people based on their genetic makeup. When she gets a 98% match with the owner of the company, she cannot believe it, especially when she had previously met this person and didn't think she liked him. Loved this book!!

Thanks to Gallery Books and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Rating: 3.5 stars

Christina Lauren books are always a hit-or-miss for me. I either LOVE them or feel like it’s nothing special. Unfortunately, this book was the latter for me this time. I feel like the premise and set-up was amazing. I love a good enemies-to-lovers trope. I love fake dating. I should love it, right?

I really loved the idea of this book that there could be markers in your DNA that indicate whether you’re compatible with someone or not. It brought in a science fiction element without it being too science-y (?). I really loved that our two love interests, Jess and River, already knew each other as regular patrons of a local coffee shop. I love it when characters already have a history before their love story starts. So, I was really expecting to love this thing, you know?

I don’t really know what fell flat for me, to be honest. It could be a number of things. I think the main things is that I feel like their connection, or at least what the book was mainly focusing on, was very physical over emotional. A book that is about compatibility and finding love, I would expect more focus on the emotional. Take for example, when River tells Jess all the things he loves about her in a truly sweet manner and then finishes with “And I want you in my bed,” Jess goes on to just focus on that last part. Just. Bypasses all the sweet things he said about her and what he likes about her. That made me feel a little… odd.

In the end, I just feel like it was nothing special. I feel like I kept being told that they were compatible and made for each other because of the numbers, but I couldn’t really feel it. I just feel like they liked each other in a physical way. Nothing wrong with that, but it isn’t really what I read a love story for; I want to SWOON. The sweet moments sprinkled in with River and her daughter, Juno, were adorable and it was what kept me reading. Otherwise, a quite predictable read. But, hey, we all need a comfort read like this once in a while.

This book was a delight. I loved the first two thirds of it but the ending conflict wasn't that great. I loved the build of their relationship and wish they had been together a bit longer before the third act conflict. But the cast of characters was great and all of them were woven into the story so well. There were a few laughs out loud moments. Overall I really enjoyed

Christina Lauren is an auto read for me at this point, and The Soulmate Equation did not disappoint. Jess is a single mom and unlucky in love. She hasn't even wanted to date while raising Juno, but when she learns of a new dating service connected to your own biology her best friend convinces her to give it a try. To her surprise, she ends up being a supremely high match with one of the project's founders, and a guy she finds absolutely unbearable. Enter some forced dating for press releases and Jess & River find themselves spending a lot of time together. But will they fall in love as genetically predicted?

This is a very interesting take on the online dating romances that have been published to date. It's also the forced dating trope, which is not one I read often personally but do really enjoy! The tension in the beginning is classic Christina Lauren as they get to know each other, and then the romance is sweet as they get together more. I appreciated the interesting take on the main conflict, it was not what I was expecting to have happen in a great way. I also loved that she was a single mom, which you don't see in romance novels as often.

I did have a lot of questions about Jess' willingness to go along with this, I just feel like there was some level of suspension of belief required in this book. It definitely walks the line of what people will normally see as acceptable behavior.

For Christina Lauren fans, definitely a worthy edition to their lengthy publication history. For the scientists out there, you can let me know if it is factually accurate or not!

**Thank you to Gallery Books and Netgalley for an early copy of this book in exchange for an honest review**

My geeky little scientific heart loved The Soulmate Equation!

Single mom Jess Davis uses the time at the local coffee shop to work on her freelance statistic jobs and visit with her best friend. Jess had a few random dates so when her friends found out that one of the customers ran a matchmaking company GeneticAlly that used gene compatibility to find the perfect person for them. All she had to do was send in some saliva and wait for the results. Little did she know that she would be an almost perfect match with customer and Subject # 1 Dr. River Peña.

I loved The Soulmate Equation because it showed that just maybe we can use science to help people find their match or at least help bring the couple together.

P.S. I would love Felicity to find her match!

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book from NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Thanks to Gallery Books for an advanced copy of The Soulmate Equation by Christina Lauren.

I LOVED THIS BOOK! It was such an interesting and fascinating premise. It has some of my favorite with enemies to lovers, some fake dating feelings at the beginning, absolutely wonderful main characters in Jess and River, the best secondary characters in Fizzy and Juno and the witty banter that you expect in a CLo book! The coat sharing scene at the photoshoot was the sweetest thing.

I honestly read this in a night and couldn't put it down.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC.

THE SOULMATE EQUATION is my favorite CLo novel to date. It's laugh-out-loud funny, poignant, and smart. I was rooting for Jess the whole way.

Single-mom Jess is just managing to keep her head above water. Her tiny "village" helps Jess raise her precocious seven-year-old daughter, while she tries to build a data analysis consulting business. Her routine is set, and as long as everything goes to plan, she can put food on the table, take care of her grandparents, and support her best friend. But the pieces of her life are precariously balanced, and when one part wobbles, the others do too. It makes absolutely no sense to enter the dating game with so much at stake. And yet....what is the point of a perfect plan if it ultimately gets you nowhere?

River is genuinely likeable as a love interest, but Jess really is the star of this book. She's wicked smart, fiercely devoted to her friends and family, and harbors just enough self-doubt to make her believable. It was a pleasure to read her thoughts, and I was (silently) cheering her on at the end.

N.B. to the universe: Please let us have a novel of Fizzy's path to eternal love.

I tend to run hot and cold with CLo novels, but SOULMATE is a solid 4.5 stars, rounded up. Read it. You won't be disappointed.

Jess is a single mom who is tired of the dating world. Then she and her friend, Fizzy, become interested in the guy they call “Americano,” who comes into the coffee shop they have turned into their workspace every morning at the same time. They discover that he has created a new way of dating by matching couples through their DNA. When Jess sends her DNA sample, it comes back with a huge surprise. She has an unheard of 98% match with none other than “Americano” aka River Pena. Did I mention that they did not get off on the right foot and now they have to “date” to help promote the company’s launch.

Christina Lauren has done it again. If you have liked their previous books, especially The Unhoneymooners or In a Holidaze, you’ll like this one. It had me hooked right away and I’ve really been liking books that come up with new apps and fun ideas like this. I liked all of the characters and that they had their own personalities. I loved Fizzy and that she is a romance writer. She was really fun. I don’t usually like a main character’s kids because they aren’t usually given personalities, but Jess’s daughter, Juno had a great personality and I loved all of her random facts (I did not know a roller coaster was built to deter people away from brothels.)

I really liked the romance. I liked that serious things were also included in the novel, such as Jess’s mom who pretty much abandoned her for drugs and alcohol. I thought this was handled well of how she feels about her mom. I also didn’t mind the obligatory “break-up” at the end, which I usually dread in other romance books.

I couldn’t wait to start this one, and it didn’t let me down. I think Christina Lauren is one of my new favorite authors. I liked the premise of the story, and how it made me think about how I’d react to dating software that could predict a soulmate based on DNA.

The characters were amazing. I loved the supporting characters — Jess’s grandparents, her best friend Fizzy, and especially her daughter, Juno. They were perfect companions and played such a great role in how the story developed. Jess was so relatable. She’s a single mom with a strong support group, a freelance job that allows her to be involved in her daughter’s life, and a tentative hold on everything else. Except she’s not really managing very well, and has completely put romance on the back burner. Until she meets her DNA-determined soulmate. Dr. River Peña is the most infuriating character at first. He wasn’t very likable, but he definitely grew on me as I kept reading, and I genuinely grew to love him. He had some truly redeeming characteristics, but also some incredibly frustrating flaws that helped him avoid the “too perfect” trap.

I enjoyed the way the romance unfolded as well. It wasn’t a fake dating story as much as a forced dating story, where they wound up having to give the relationship a genuine try, regardless of how they felt about it at first. I wasn’t sure how they’d get past the initial obstacles, since they were both pretty resistant to each other’s personalities, although there was a definite physical attraction. But when they started to give each other a chance, things started to heat up. There wasn’t any explicit sex in the story, but I did enjoy how the romance was portrayed.

Overall, this was a great story, and I’d definitely recommend giving it a shot. While it did get a little bit technical when it came to statistics and genes, it wasn’t overwhelmingly so and didn’t fall into too much jargon for a novice (read: non math person) like myself to be able to follow. So give this one a shot!

As usual, Christina Lauren had me gripped from the first chapter. This novel is fun and futuristic, taking today's obsession with dating apps/culture and adding a scientific twist. The characters are fun and sexy and as the reader, you can't help but continue to turn the pages to find out what happens next. The ending was satisfying and left me wanting more.

Christina Lauren's book, the Soulmate Equation, is based on genetics and compatibility. Or maybe just the thought that there is a possible link between the two. It is about Jessica, a woman who was in college, dating someone but not ready for marriage when she found herself pregnant. Her boyfriend wanted no part of a baby so he left. Jessica was raising her daughter with the help of her grandparents and best friend, Fizzy. Things were just as she wanted them.
Jessica was a self-employed statistician and spent her mornings at a nearby coffee shop where she and Fizzy, a romance author, worked at the tables and drank coffee. They would watch the people and became interested in a nice-looking man who came in every morning for an Americano coffee drink. One day, in the interest of research for a new romance book, they decided to talk to him. Fizzy was not afraid to talk to anyone, and he invited them to see his work. They found out that he worked at a place where you could find a partner, an app that was like a genetic version of Tinder. They decided to stop by and try it.
Fizzy bought the program for herself. She decided that Jess needed a little liveliness in her life and bought one for her, also. That is when things got a little crazy.
The story is based on modern problems like dating apps and IPOs (stock offerings). It reads quickly and is hard to put down. I recommend this book as a great diversion from the day.

I wanted to like this book! I have liked or loved almost every book by Christina Lauren that I've read. Unfortunately, Fizzy ruined it for me... The balance of her character at the beginning took too much attention away from the main characters. I wanted the nerds, the math, the technology, the potential for social awkwardness. I wanted that, but I didn't want Fizzy. So I stopped reading this about 1/3 of the way through.