I admit that I tend to drop the random influencers because it all seems so fake. Well, first I get judgy and then I get annoyed and drop them. Instamom gives a little glimpse behind the influencer world in all its glory. It is the story of Kit, a single woman, who has created a little empire for women who choose not to have kids and still live fulfilled lives. Until she meets Will, a single dad, and everything turns upside down. I found the influencer lifestyle and obligations to be so fascinating and entertainingto read about. I have a hard enough time posting a random book review when work is super crazy for me that I can’t imagine the schedule the influencers have to keep. The jokes and jabs about the Instagram world were spot on and definitely drew the laughs. I also really loved seeing Kit grow as a person, embrace change, open herself up and learn to love again. There were some definite frustrating moments seeing what she was put through and I could dissect Will’s behavior for hours (and hours) but there were such sweet and inspirational moments. This is definitely a fun summer rom com read with so much more depth!

I received this novel as an advanced reader copy from net galley in exchange for an honest review. This is the light read that examines what happens to an Instagram influencer when faced with the ultimate task of motherhood.

This was a really interesting story to read, especially as a relatively new mom. Kit has built her life around her desire to be child-free. She’s a social media influencer, has written a book and has No Kidding meetings for other women who choose to be child-free. Her world turns upside down when she meets and starts falling for a sexy chef who also happens to be a single dad. Kit is so determined to keep her child-free lifestyle despite her developing feelings for Will. I found Kit a little selfish at the beginning of this book. I think it should completely be up to the individual whether or not they choose to have kids, but it seemed like she looked down on so much of Will’s life because of it. I really enjoyed her progression as a character throughout the course of Instamom.

I wasn't able to get into this book, mostly because I liked the characters TOO much. I wanted it to lambast influencer culture a little bit more - almost like satire. I'm sure this will be a great beach read for some who don't mind wanting an influencer to succeed.

Instamom is a difficult book to rate for many different reasons. The premise of the book is that Kit is an Instagram influencer and businesswoman who promotes kid-free lives. Soon enough she meets Will and they kick off a fragile relationship with the tension point being he has a daughter. While this book was enjoyable for the most part, I didn’t really care for Kit’s character development. At the beginning she is firmly against having any kids. Then, overtime all the reasons she had for not wanting kids started to crumble apart and she changed her mind in the end. While it’s not bad for a woman to want kids, this book once again affirms that every woman falls in love, gets married, and has kids (step or biologic). Obviously as the reader, I wanted her to end up with Will. I just think that the author took an interesting concept (of a woman not wanting kids), and ended the book in a non original way. Another aspect of the book that rubbed me wrong was how Will hardly ever took responsibility for his actions. At one point, Kit called him out for putting her in a position of parenting that she was in no way prepared for. Instead of trying to figure out a way he could ease her into the relationship more, Will instantly turned it back around and used her complaint to attack her. Kit got enough backlash from other women (especially Will’s friends!), and it was disappointing that he didn’t even try to understand where she was coming from for a single second. The have a conversation at the end that helps clear the air a bit, but in my mind, the damage was already done.

It's so hard for me to write a review of this book. When I started reading it, I thought it was a lighter kind of love/family story.
Kit Kidding gets paid to promote brands and share expertly curated posts about her fun, fabulous, child-free life on Instagram. Kit likes kids just fine, but she passionately believes that women who choose not to become mothers shouldn’t have to face guilt. Or judgement.
Will MacGregor is a hot chef that she meets in a party and enjoys a great night of sex with, and who turn out to be a single a dad who is averse to social media. As soon as Kit learns his parenting status, she vows to put their scorching one-night stand behind her and move on. But Will and Kit are thrown together on an Instagram campaign, and the more time she spends with him—and his whip-smart, eight-year-old daughter, Addie—the more difficult it is to stay away. Kit’s picture-perfect career path is suddenly clashing with the possibility of a different future—messy, complicated, and real. Which life does she truly want? Will she have to re-invent herself? And will love still be waiting by the time she figures it out?
It was hard for me at the beginning of the book to empathize with Kit. Her life felt so shallow and empty. But as the pages keep turning, I started to fell in tune with her. I´d been a stepmom for a long time who had to step as a mom because the biological mom decided not to be in the picture. So yeah, I thought about leaving this book behind and start a new one. But I´m a believer that books find you, not the other way around, so I gave it a second chance. And I’m so happy I did it. I´m never going to understand Kit because I´ve being trying to get pregnant for almost three years now, but this book is an invitation to open your mind, respect the choices others make even though you don’t think that way, and be able to change your mind about who you are and who do you want to be.
This is not an ease journey, but I absolutely think that it worth it. At least for me.
I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Full disclosure: I've known Chantel Guertin for a number of years. I've been reading her books since 2011 (um, I did NOT expect it to have been a decade...) and I've seen her at countless book events in the years since. So, it's no surprise that I was THRILLED when I heard she was writing a new adult novel that was going to fall into the rom com sphere. Instamom is out tomorrow and it's a contemporary story that is smart and fun but also really deep as it addresses a lot of heavy and important topics.

Here's the book's description:
In this #funny, #wise, #emotionally compelling look at modern love and finding your true path, a proudly kid-free influencer meets the ultimate #dealbreaker . . .
It’s the influencer’s golden rule: know your niche. Kit Kidding has found hers on Instagram, where she gets paid to promote brands and share expertly curated posts about her fun, fabulous, child-free life. Kit likes kids just fine, but she passionately believes that women who choose not to become mothers shouldn’t have to face guilt. Or judgement. Or really hot chefs who turn out to be single dads.
Will MacGregor is aggravating, sexy, persistent, averse to social media, and definitely a bad idea. As soon as Kit learns his parenting status, she vows to put their scorching one-night stand behind her and move on. But Will and Kit are thrown together on an Instagram campaign, and the more time she spends with him—and his whip-smart, eight-year-old daughter, Addie—the more difficult it is to stay away, much less sustain what Will so cleverly calls her “Resting Beach Face.” Kit’s picture-perfect career path is suddenly clashing with the possibility of a different future—messy, complicated, and real. Which life does she truly want? Will she have to re-invent herself? And will love still be waiting by the time she figures it out?

Let's get the heavy stuff out of the way first. I, like Kit at the beginning of this novel, am childfree. I do not want kids and have felt this way for probably over ten years but have been super firm in my decision for I'd say about eight. I've had so many people tell me that I'll change my mind (pro tip: never tell a woman that. Ever.) My boyfriend (of sixteen years) also doesn't want kids and people in his world often say "but doesn't your girlfriend want kids?" There are countless other frustrating and nosy questions and comments I've gotten and it all comes down to this: society finds it really weird and hard to understand when a woman does not want to have children. So it was great to hear that some of Guertin's characters were also feeling those frustrations - it was so incredibly true to life and I appreciated it so much. But. This is where it gets tricky. (And slightly spoilery. But this does have a romance at it's core and if you can't figure out that there's a Happily Ever After at the end of this one, well, I can't help you.) I really, really didn't want Kit to change her mind. And I kind of felt like an asshole about that. One of the main points of this story is that women are allowed to change their mind about having children (or not). I truly do believe that. One of my very best friends did and I'm thrilled to bits for her and her little munchkin. BUT. I don't get to see myself and my views on not having kids reflected in fiction very often and the fact that this one was so close and then wasn't? I think I felt hurt. It's been a very complicated time for me to sort out these feelings, let me tell you. At the end of the day, Guertin's novel nails the judgment women receive because of their decisions on motherhood and how they're questioned because of those decisions. I may have felt way too close to the storyline but that doesn't take away from how important it is for stories like this to be out there, that challenge the status quo and explore what it's like to be a woman - with or without children.

I love that contemporary novels are finding a great balance between fun and light and serious and heavy. Should we be calling them all rom coms? Hmm, maybe not. Romantic comedies are going to have more real life topics to deal with than straight romance novels but they should still be super heavy on the romance and the comedy. Once you add in struggles with, in the case of Instamom, deciding whether you want to completely change your values when it comes to having children? Can it really be a rom com? This one wasn't laugh out loud funny like I expect from those kinds of books but it was still smart and witty - which I love. I don't have an answer for "what should we call these kinds of books?" and I'm still not sure if we really need one. I struggle with it, too, because a book by a man with these kinds of themes would just be fiction. No need to throw a subgenre on there. Anyone else feel like that?

The other part of the storyline, apart from the childfree business, explored Kit's job as an influencer. I am so small time but I'm still in the influencer world a little wee bit so I understood some of what she was feeling. Authenticity seems to be what people want to see but it also appears they still enjoy the carefully curated photos and captions more than every day views. Influencers feel they have to have a niche so followers know what to expect. And it all gets to be a bit...exhausting. Guertin doesn't hold back in describing how conflicted Kit was and the issues she was facing as an influencer and it was great to read - really real and impactful. I don't know what's going to happen with our influencer heavy world but I think something has to change.

Kit was a really interesting character to read. She's about my age, which I always appreciate, and smart and a book lover. I was pretty sure we would be friends if we ever met in person. I was really emotionally connected to her and her story and I felt all the feelings right alongside with her. I did feel a little differently about Will than she did. Quite honestly...er...well...I didn't like him. I felt he never listened to Kit and brushed off her concerns as if they were silly or hysterical. I do think he truly cared for her but I couldn't help but think he had some shit to figure out before he'd be good enough for Kit. And Addie? She was an absolute delight. I've read three books in the last two months where there's a daughter who's about seven or eight and they've all been so smart (sometimes too smart) and fun to read about.

I also absolutely loved that this book was set in Toronto. We're seeing that more and more in contemporary reads from Canadian authors and I'm SO HAPPY. Next we need to have more cities and towns represented from across the country. Publishers may have some backwards notion that readers in other countries (cough, the USA, cough) don't want to read books set in Canada but I think that assumption is slowly changing.

Instamom had me feeling all of the feels and I think Chantel Guertin's latest novel is going to stick with me for a long while. It's a perfect book to throw in your beach bag or dive into while sitting in your backyard. It'll make you think and smile the entire way through.

*Am egalley was provided by both the Canadian (Doubleday Canada/PRHC) and American (Kensington Books) publishers and a print copy was provided by Doubleday Canada in exchange for review consideration. All opinions and honest and my own.*

Instamom was such a refreshing and fun novel. Kit Kidding is an influencer for the child-free woman. She likes kids, but doesn’t want to have her own. It’s a choice many women make, but she doesn’t want to face judgment or shame for her decision.

She has a project with Will MacGregor and she’s very interested from the beginning. They get hot and heavy quick and only after does she find out… he has a full time daughter. She starts to spend time with them both and realizes it isn’t so bad. But this doesn’t fit her brand at all and her brand is her career. Will she have to start all over to be with the man she loves?

It’s definitely eye opening topic. I have always wanted children and I hope to have my own in the short future. But I know so many who choose not to have kids and they know that it’s the right decision for them. I really liked this book for bringing light to a sensitive topic.

I also loved the humor and the behind the scenes of an influencer. I loved all the lingo and metrics, and how she makes money on her posts. This was loosely based on the author’s own life and it clearly worked out!

Absolutely enjoyed this book! Once I started, I could NOT put it down! As someone with insight to the world of influencers and social media personas, it was so telling as well! One thing, I would point out, is I did not care for the relationship between Kit and Will. I just don't see it being a lasting thing, especially with their lack of communication. I will say though, Addie was my absolute favorite part of this entire book and the scenes where Addie and Kit grow closer warmed my heart to pieces!

Kit Kidding is a social media influencer that builds her brand on being childless by choice. Carefully curating content that speaks to her brand, Kit is happy empowering women to embrace their unconventional lifestyles, instead of giving into society's demands that all women should be a mom. At an event, Kit meets charming and sexy chef, Will MacGregor, and the two hit it off immediately. That is until she finds out that he's a single dad. She tries to ignore the chemistry, but when the two keep getting thrown together on work assignments, Kit is forced to analyze what she's ever thought she's wanted in life versus where she feels her life could go today.

⚠️ CW: death of a parent at an early age

I loved the premise of this book and Kit's character made me think about being a mom vs. choosing not to have children. While I am a mother of two, I have several friends that are child-free by choice. I cannot speak to their experience in life, but the book raises a lot of good questions about expectations people have for women when they grow up and the questions that society pushes on women who choose not to have children.

Kit was an interesting heroine and I liked that she had an arc of feeling satisfied by her influencer life early in her career, but then this shifted to feeling unfulfilled. As she grew and changed, her priorities did the same and I liked how the author explored what this means to change in your personal life, but also feel the need to stick to being "on brand" to continue with contracts and obligations.

Will was a swoony hero and I enjoyed how he challenged Kit. Their initial meeting was adorable and I loved how they fell easily into teasing each other and pushing buttons to get a rise from the other. The pair had instant chemistry and I liked how they were continually forced together in a close proximity trope.

While this was a fun read, I felt like the book never really dug deep, especially with Kit and Will's relationship. They continually skirted around tough issues and defaulted to lack of communication and running away from a situation, rather than hitting it head on. Kit kept hinting at this large emotional void she has due to her mother's untimely death, but it's not really explored until very late in the book, and when it was talked about, it seemed rushed. I did not see a deep emotional connection between the two, especially after Kit admits that she's falling for Will and the physical connection is sparse at best. There is more telling rather than showing and most of the book is spent in miscommunication and jealous spats. Kit is very immature for someone in her early 30's.

Thank you Kensington and NetGalley for my gifted copy.

** REVIEW WITH SPOILERS**

Kit is a successful influencer, and in her instagram she promotes a kid-free life, in which she believes. That is, until she meets Will and his eight-year-old daughter...

I liked the premise of the book as I believe that women don't have to be mothers just because it's the social rule; however, I didn't like the execution of the book. The biggest problem for me is the TOTAL lack of communication between the characters:
- between Kit and Will: Kit doesn't want kids, Will has a daughter and he wants more children, but they never talk about it, Will just asumes that she has to put up with it.
- between Kit and her daughter Addie: when Kit goes to live with them, he didn't even tell his daughter.
- between Kit and her sister: they appear to be super close; however, at some point her sister tells her that she had been trying for a child for a long time and she couldn't get pregnant, but she didn't even tell Kit at the time. Also, she knew for months that her father had a new woman for months but she also didn't tell Kit.
- between Kit and her friends: they are supposed to be her best friends but she doesn't tell them anything about she and Will.
- between Kit and her agent: when Kit realizes that this is all too much, she just disconnects her phone for a couple of weeks without even telling her agent or thinking how this will impact her. After those weeks, she just tell her agent she is fired.

I also didn't like how the mothers were portrayed in this book, I get that Kit has a personal rivalry with Gillian, but when she goes to the school fair with Addie and something goes wrong, all of the mothers attack her, even the ones that don't know her (telling her "she's not even a mother").

** Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher/author for an ARC in exchange for an honest review. **

Thank you so much NetGalley, Kensington and author for this amazing ebook copy!

This novel is full of great characters and settings, and it's easy to visualize everything. I loved Kit's chemistry with Will, complete fire!
This was such a great story the entire way through. It really grabbed me right away and I had a hard time putting it down.
The plot and characters are really believable and so relatable.
This was just a great book! And how a romcom should be done!
Its a light-hearted, swoon worthy rom-com with relevant issues and re-visiting our choices in life.

Instamom touches upon some of the issues, rather aspects that present day women face. Chantel Guertin has described the shallowness of the modern day social media well. The novel reflects an intensity on the subject of the choice of a woman for opting a child free living but the same intensity is not reflected in the the romance of the relationship for which the main character 'Kit Kidding' changes her opinion on the subject.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an electronic copy to read and review.

Okay, this one hit harder than I thought it would. I was expecting a fun little romance, easy to read, but not to be really invested in it. I will be honest. I cried. Ultimately this is a story of love and chance and change. Yes, there is romance and yes, sometimes it feels like an easy read. However there is so much more to unpack as we watch our characters learn and grow. I really appreciate how Guertin writes about some of the realities of being an influencer and how she has made Kit into a successful and confident career woman. I definitely recommend this one!

This book was just okay for me.

The main characters were hard for me to like. Kit is childless by choice and advocates for that position for the whole of the book and then completely changes her stance because she meets the right man who has a child. This plot twist reinforces the stereotype that women claim they don't want children and then suddenly change their mind later.

And an adult man who flexes his muscles while making a "tickets to the gun show" comment is hard for me to take seriously. He seemed immature and also uncompromising for the entirety of the book.

There were some funny moments and a fairly redeemable ending, but in the end that wasn't enough to save this book for me.

📱🄸🄽🅂🅃🄰🄼🄾🄼 🅁🄴🅅🄸🄴🅆📱 ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4/5 stars

Instamom
by Chantel Guertin

Released TODAY! 🎉 HAPPY PUB DAY!! 🎉 6/29/2021
Published by: Kensington books

Genre: contemporary romance/rom-com

I received this #freebook #eARC through @kensingtonpublishing via @netgalley for an honest review.

➡️SWIPE for the synopsis
⬇️READ below for my thoughts

⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4/5 stars

This book is completely relevant to the here and now... especially if you are reading this review on instagram! I love that we get a fun and realistic look into the life and behind the scenes of an instagram influencer... and the struggles to keep up appearances or stay "on brand" while falling in love with a guy who doesnt match your aesthetic and branding! I also love that books and bookstagram are a big part of the storyline.

Some things that bugged me while reading this one were the fact that the main characters were 33 and 38 but at times it felt they had the maturity level of early to mid 20s. I didnt really love either character too much but they did have their moments throughout the book... and who doesnt love their own personal chef?! Super sexy!! Lol!

The last 25% of the book is what brought this from a 3 star read up to a 4 star read for me!

It is a cute, relevent, touching story and the perfect light romance summer read!

It does deal with some real life issues such as the loss of a parent and becoming a step parent, making the choice to be kid free and normalizing and making that socially ok for women etc...but overall keeps it light and is a quick read!

#BookQuote -
"I always thought the perfect relationship meant long stretches of romance , but now I see that sure, there are dates, and nights alone, but it’s the everyday stuff, the stolen kiss while doing a mundane chore, that feels almost more romantic."

(⬆️ 💯🙌 especially relateable if you saw my 10 year anniversary post a few days ago! 😂)

#bookrec - 👍 Yes! Read this book!

💅💅💅

I think the idea of this book was great, but it just didn’t click for me. I think it will still end up a pretty popular book, but for me, I just wanted more. I couldn’t connect with the characters or the story.

I loved this book! I thought Kit was hilarious, and I instantly fell in love with Will. These two very different personalities were perfect together throughout this book. It was well written, light, and a great summer read. If you are looking for a light-hearted romance, I would definitely recommend Instamom.

I was all-in on the premise of Instamom—thirtysomething woman falls for a single dad—but the book itself was a slog. This is because the heroine, Kit Kidder, is so unlikeable. Kit has built her career as a social media influencer who’s leading the fight for women to enjoy the freedom to choose whether or not to have children. Okay, sure. (Though I am incredibly tired of books in which the heroine is a social media influencer and the conflict leads her to realize how shallow and fake her brand identity is, resulting in her revealing her True Self to her audience, to great acclaim.) When she meets Will and realizes that he has an eight-year-old daughter, Kit is torn between her desire to build a relationship and her commitment to her career. What I found so unlikeable is how Kit mostly presents this conflict to Will as “my followers won’t like it.” I wanted the two of them to really discuss what it means to be a stepparent to a child whose mother has died, not argue over whether or not it’s on brand for her to date a guy with a kid. Kit is shallow, immature, and selfish for so much of the book that I couldn’t get on board with her redemption at the end.

When I saw Instamom , I knew I had to read it, rom-com and social media, what’s not to love? Unfortunately, for me, I found the first half of the book to be slow, and I had difficulty getting into the story. I also found it difficult to relate to the main character. I did however, enjoy the ending. I believe this book has its audience, as based on other reviews, it just isn’t for me.

Thank you Netgalley and Kensington Publishing for the e-ARC, which I voluntarily reviewed.