A quirky, heartwarming story of self discovery and love. Family dynamics affect everyone's outlook on life and dealing with it is a challenge but one can learn if you take the time.

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

Thank you @netgalley and @entangled_publishing for this eARC I’m exchange of my honest review.

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How to Survive a Modern-Day Fairy Tale by Elle Cruz
Published by @entangled_publishing

Claire is a people pleasing book lover who works at her neighborhood bookstore. Her real dream is to focus full-time on her cookie decorating business. But between her family not taking her dreams seriously and taking care of her grandmother with Alzheimer’s, she can’t seem to make the leap. Then she meets tech guru Nate and everything changes. He sweeps her off her feet and even flies her to Paris on thei
This book was way too unrealistic to me. There were also inconsistencies within the story that were very noticeable. One example being Nate supporting Claire starting her own business one minute, then telling her to consider working for her aunt for a while, then going back to telling her to take a chance. The concept is cute, but the execution just wasn’t for me.

I had such high hopes for How to Survive a Modern Day Fairy Tale. I'm Filipino and I'm always looking for more Filipino own voices romance. This synopsis for this one sounded so cute, but unfortunately the writing and plot simply did not work for me. DNF at 33%

This started out as a really cute fairytale. I loved the setup and had really high hopes! Unfortunately I found it to really drag. Her family drama around her sisters seemed really immature and the romance seemed kind of forced under such a short timeline.

If you need a break from reality, this may be the book for you. It's cute, fairytale-esque with plenty of sexy times. But the insta-love was a bit much for me. Plus there were times when I wanted to shake Claire and tell her to get a grip

Thank you to NetGalley, Elle Cruz and Entangled Publishing for the free e-book in exchange for an honest review.

This was so fun! I really enjoyed the atmosphere of this novel and how quickly the how novel goes! It made it really hard to put down and I really wanted to curl up and just live in this novel for a few more hours. I really enjoyed all the characters and their unique characteristics that made them seem so real. I loved the atmospheric writing and was really able to picture the different places that they traveled. I really wanted to be in those places, Overall, I would definitely recommend for a lighthearted and fun novel and I can't wait for the next Cruz novel.

Utterly disappointed by this book. It was nothing like what the blurb or Preface suggested and the writing was cringeworthy. I actually sent a quote from the preface to friend, because we could both relate to being stuck in between two worlds (in this case America and the Philippines) but the story went into a completely different direction.
The grandmother and family pressure was only a small storyline on the side and in the end it was about a woman falling for the novel version of Mark Zuckerberg who is also amazing in bed.
There is no getting to know each other, they just have a lot of sex (did I mention the cringe factor in those scenes?) and to me it has nothing of a fairy tale, rather it's a what-not-to-do and the lines of the stunning lover, which are meant to sound like he drops everything for her, just made me recoil because it sounds like she should thank him for every sacrifice he makes.
Surely that isn't what we should be teaching women?

Unfortunately this book was not for me. Claire and Nate’s insta love wasn’t as believable as I would have liked it to be. I would have also liked to see more subplots in this to bring the story together. The romance was rushed and I would have liked to get to know them as individuals a bit more before throwing them together.

I am so furious at this book. The writing was stilted, Claire was a doormat who at the end…remained a doormat?, Nate was a manipulative jerk, and the obstacles the couple faced fell over flat in 10 pages or less every time. The sex scenes would be fine, but when coupled with the two MCs refusing to discuss even a single thing about their compatibility or future plans? Paired with the fact that Claire’s final decision is to tank THE ONLY THING SHE WANTED THE ENTIRE BOOK for a nasty billionaire? Hard pass.

2.5 stars. Uff this was a bit painful to read and enjoy. Claire has a meet cute scenario with Nate but her doormat personality with her family create obstacles along the way. Her backbone shows up when it’s too late and all is lost, and I couldn’t be on her side through most of it. The writing style felt juvenile or more like someone was repeating a story rather than telling me a story. There was promise in this book but it didn’t deliver, and I appreciated the main characters having a different background but it seemed to only be used for references to food and family names.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the arc.

Imagine bumping into a billionaire and then getting swept up into his world as you fell madly in love with each other while everything else got a little hazy in the background. Claire is a simple girl trying to build up the courage to take her small business to the next step and quit her day job. She is self described as plain and she likes it that way. Nate is a tech mogul who can sweep you into a private jet to Paris for a first date. Things move super quickly with these two but once they build up a relationship it felt so lovely.

I love that the main character was a Filippina and that there were lots of intense family & cultural dynamics on display here. I had a hard time with some of the end where I normally expect there to be a grand gesture, the story felt like it petered out a bit. There ultimately was a moment but I wanted it to be bigger and more worthy of this amazing couple.

Sadly this was a not for me. I did skim read it to know what happens. Claire and Nate had no chemistry and their whole insta love thingy was not very believable. There were things that I liked about the book like the cultural rep but it was not enough for me to keep on reading.
Thanks for Netgalley, the author and the publisher for the e-ARC in exchange for my review.

The title is what caught my eye at first and I'm so glad that I asked to read this! What a unique take on the moderns happily ever after. I can't wait to read more from this author!

Giving this story a 4 hearts rating would be too high for me, while a 3 would be too low. This is why I settled for a 3.5 hearts rating. I was happy to see a book in net galley which had a Filipina heroine. I had high expectations but was not expecting it to be an instant love story. Claire had a more modern-day Filipina which I like. I enjoyed the read as much as I can but Claire was doubting a lot, which irritated me at some point. It is a character-driven story with Claire overthinking and Nate being her rock. However, I knew that Claire would buckle and leave which was very selfish. Somehow, Nate could not be real. He is the overpowered male lead since he was patient, loving, and always makes time for Claire. I would think that if there is someone like that, the person he or she ends with is very blessed.

Unfortunately, I am DNFing this one at 56%. I think it's a bit obvious that the book is written by a debut author. The style is a bit juvenile and hard to connect with. I feel like I'm being read a play by play of events from a script rather than a fleshed-out novel. If I were to continue on with this read, I could see myself giving it a 1 or 2 star, so I am just going to cut my losses here!

This story hits close to home. Just like the protagonist, I also have a grandma/Lola who has Alzheimer’s and is currently in a home. And I’m also Filipino. Some of the family dynamics ring true and some I can’t relate to. Claire’s family operates on an hierarchy whereas my family does not. The karaoke thing was something we used to do but honestly, it doesn’t happen anymore. I wish it did because I miss it.

While we really got to know and understand Claire, there isn’t really much to be said about Nate. We know that he’s a workaholic, loves video games and was abandoned by his father when he was younger but other than that, he’s a mystery. This is where having two POVs would have really worked.

Back to Claire’s family. We’re told she has a big one but other than her siblings, her Lola and occasionally her Tita Chriss, she didn’t really interact with any of them. Her parents weren’t even really mentioned until the end.

The writing felt too stiff at times but the story is sweet enough to ignore those parts. I don’t want it to seem like I didn’t enjoy the book because I did. I loved that Claire overcame her anxiety and finally let go. I’m not a huge fan of insta-love, which is what this book is, but if you come in knowing that it’s a light-hearted read and everything HEA, I think you’ll enjoy it.

How to Survive a Modern-Day Fairy is a contemporary fairy tale, loosely based on Cinderella. Elle Cruz manages to breathe fresh life into the old tale. I kept an open mind going into reading this, since insta-love and billionaire hero isn't my usual trope, but this one may have converted me!

Our heroine Claire is an introverted, romance book-loving people pleaser that comes from a large Filipino-American family. She prefers to bake, read, and visit her beloved Lola rather than date. So when she has an unconventional meet-cute with tech billionaire Nate after nearly running him over with her car, her first instinct is to run and hide. Instead, their instant chemistry and attraction overrides her instinct to keep her heart under lock and key. He's determined to win her heart and sweep her off her feet, but their whirlwind romance brings out some of Claire's greatest insecurities, risking their happily ever after. When Claire needs to make a decision between protecting herself and her dreams or follow her heart in what she believes is the love of a lifetime, she finds she has no fairy godmother to guide her - she must rely on herself to write her own fairy tale.

The only thing that I felt was a little lacking was Nate's character development - he felt a little superficial, almost one-dimensional, which I think contributed to a lack of understanding for their intense chemistry and connection - I couldn't quite figure out their dynamic since I wasn't very emotionally connected to him. If you can look past this admittedly small issue, this is a very solid contemporary romance.

Thanks to Elle Cruz, Entangled, and NetGalley for the advance copy of this book - this review and all thoughts and opinions are my own.

3.5 I liked the characters. I wanted to learn more about them. Instead we get a lot of love scenes. It seemed to be the majority of what we know about their time together. The scenes were very graphic. If that bothers you then you would not like this book. I would've enjoyed reading more conversations between them. Thanks to the publisher for allowing me to read an e-arc copy in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own

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

This book was not for me. It requires you to accept some truly questionable plot points. I can read a book with insta-love, I think I've read at least 3 of them this month but this one was like beyond warp speed insta-love. If that had been the only issue, I probably would have finished this book. Unfortunately, I only made it 60%. Something about the writing didn't work for me; it felt stunted at times and some parts read like the author wanted this to be a first-person narrative but didn't follow through.

I don't think I'm going to analyse any of the characters because I didn't finish this book; I have no clue if they got better or worse but not a single one did it for me.

This book surprised me in so many ways. For this love story, it was a love-at-first-sight type scenario. That trope is not my favorite, and I didn’t particularly like it in this book. This book moved extremely fast too. There were always moving parts, and things moved too fast for my liking. The end was especially rushed. I felt that the main character, Claire, needed some time to adjust to her situation. She didn’t get a chance to really absorb what had happened to her. The love interest, Nate, wasn’t my favorite either. He said he would put Claire over his work, but that never happened. I wished Claire would realize she didn’t need a man to be happy! Overall, this book was a good, fast read, but it just wasn’t my favorite. Thank you so much to Netgalley and Entangled publishing for allowing me to read and review this book!