Wylie becomes homeless overnight as her roommate gets a better offer. Fortunately she doesn't have to sleep in her car for long as Nolan who owns a food truck offers her a room in his swanky commune. She agrees to be his fake girlfriend to impress some neighbours with whom he wants to make a business deal. These are supposedly his honorary grandparents but somehow he thinks that having a brand new girlfriend he's known for a day or two is what is going to swing their opinion. It is also very real sex that they're having., so this fake relationship aspect made no sense to me. He's all in and says he's ready to marry her when they've known each other for a week or so. But she freaks out when she learns that Nolan is from a rich family, because it feels like a power inequality to her, although she knew all along that he has a custom-made vehicle and lives in a house with a pool, so, yeah, he was never ever going to be indigent. She's got Nolan donating free food to the homeless but still has trouble trusting that it will last with him and worries that the relationship undermines her independence. As if she'd been doing so great before. She's also struggling to get her yoga teacher certification because the yoga studio had their lease canceled.

I had a hard time connecting with these characters and some of their motivation wasn't clear. Sometimes the dialogue is a bit stilted, like they're speechifying to make a point rather than having an organically developing conversation. Apart from the instalove, there is a lot of political talking, about homelessness and associated issues, social justice, wealth inequity, gentrification, racist dress codes, healthy nutrition options, and so on. There's a shooting, a medical emergency, a mugging... There are references to suicide, sexual harassment, prostitution, memory loss... I thought there were enough serious issues for at least three books. . It is written in third person narrative, and there are a lot of italicized sections hanging out in Wylie's headspace.

Continuity: There's a character who is usually named Price but sometimes Pierce or Piece.

I read a netgalley copy and this is a voluntary review.

TL;DR An aspiring yoga teacher goes from freshly evicted to drinking champagne in a chauffeured limo while busy saving mugging victims and feeding the homeless. And I just didn't care because there was too much going on.

I received a complimentary copy of Lost in LA in exchange for an honest review. This was not what I expected. The beginning had the potential for a great read, and Wylie becoming homeless was a unique spin. After that, this entire novel unraveled.

It went from Nolan meeting Wylie and inviting her to live with him in some community commune on a beach front house with at least four other roommates (this was just weird). Then Wylie is physically duking it out with a former yoga instructor on the beach but they become besties later, and then there is a whole club scene with an ex boyfriend and drama, and then Wylie talks Nolan into serving food at no cost to the homeless people that deserve jobs which results in them getting involved in a shooting, which involved one of Wylie's homeless friend's friends, all causing Wylie to end up in the emergency room with an asthma attack. I won't even talk about Wylie's original roommate Dottie and how that came back into play at the end of the novel. Did I mention Nolan is filthy rich, and the beach front commune is his home?

My head is spinning trying to even describe what all happened, and how there was absolutely no story in this novel. Unfortunately this was not a good fit for my reading preferences.

Lost in LA is a very well written romance. Great plot, characters and setting. I received an advance ebook from the publisher and Netgalley and this is my unbiased review.

Thank you NetGalley, Backlit PR and Amy Craig for gifting me an advance copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!
Wylie’s life is a mess. After being evicted from her california apartment and forced to live in her car, she’s found herself at a dead end. Does she stay and keep pursuing her dreams of a beachside yoga retreat or does so go home with her tail between her legs and admit defeat? When she meets food truck vendor, Nolan, she doesn’t expect her luck to change, but a kiss proves things are starting to look up for her. And then her car gets towed. Desperate and out of options, Nolan offers her a room for rent. One thing leads to another and soon they find themselves posing as a couple to help Nolan secure a new commercial kitchen. Their about to find out the heat in their kitchen is turned up to high.
This was a fun read with a unique plot. I don’t think I’ve read a romance book that dealt with homelessness, much less where the main lead was homeless. Sure there have been a few “oh no where will I go” plots, but this felt different than the rest! I didn’t feel super connected to either main character, unfortunately. THe pace of the plot felt a little wonky at times and there was just too much dialogue for me to really get lost in the writing.

The first couple of pages pulled me in then it couldn't hold my interest. DNF.


*****************************I received an ARC for my honest opinion from Net Galley.***************************

This was a sweet and cute read for me. Didn't blown my mind, but it was okay 3 star read for me.
Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC.

I feel like this has a lot of "telling," to the point of being distracting. There are so many details that feel unnecessary, and philosophy on a number of social issues that is really getting center stage. It's as though it's intent is more to fight for social justice, rather than tell a fictional story.

I find the homelessness aspect to be interesting, especially as it is an issue of particular interest, but then it flops to the strangeness at the club (What even WAS that?), or being healthy... It just had a strange vibe. Maybe it's trying too hard to "be L.A."? I say that as someone who has lived within 15-30 miles from downtown my whole life, and enjoys a pretty healthy lifestyle... I am very familiar with the area, and perhaps that's the trouble?

I think this just wasn't written with a clear idea of what the author wanted it to be. Nothing specifically feels like it actually has a spotlight shining on it, and, while the characters are described well, there isn't much to make you care about them on a deeper level. They seem more like pawns to explain some cause than people.

On the romance side of things, I am not typically an instalust fan, and this has that. The relationship takes a back seat to a lot of other things, but also moves at a strange pace. Starts, stops, dragging, then skipping ahead...

I think that perhaps a big part of the problem for me was the verbosity. So much time spent inside Wylie's head, which is especially odd with it being written in third person. We get to read her overanalyzing everything ad nauseum, but in a very detached way.

There is certainly SOMETHING here, but I feel that it needs to be fine-tuned more to really be a great read. Cut back on the explanation of everything, and at least some of Wylie's neurosis, and add some more emotion to it, and this would be a lot of fun!

This book was an interesting read! The storyline flowed nicely and it was hot! Lol no major events happen its just a nice story ! Wasn't my top favorite but definitely wasn't the worst book I've read lol I do recommend reading it its worth reading! Thank you Netgalley and the publishers for sharing this book with me!

Wylie is a yoga teacher in LA, struggling to make ends meet when she is kicked out by her roommate. She is rescued by Nolan who offers her a place to stay and a job in his food truck. Will she give him a chance to be more than her friend. I liked that although Nolan had money, he wanted to do something worthwhile with it.

Really struggled with this book, not what I expected, tried really hard but a third of the way in and I’m lost. Sorry can’t finish it.