Fake It Till You Bake It is a cute read that includes the fake dating trope and likable characters. I’d like to thank NetGalley, St. Martin’s Griffin, and Jamie Wesley for a copy of it in exchange for an honest review!

I had high expectations for this book because of the GORGEOUS cover and I did enjoy it. The main characters are Jada, who just finished up starring on a reality TV show, and Donovan, a professional NFL player and owner of Sugar Blitz - a cupcake shop. I really enjoyed learning about the shop and what it takes to successfully run it. I was also a fan of Jada’s past on the reality show because I found it really interesting, especially seeing the power of social media.

I was a little disappointed by the first half of this book because it seemed to drag a bit and there wasn’t a lot of chemistry. However, I feel like the second half was much better and I enjoyed the characters and their journeys throughout. The representation was great as well and the premise was unique.

I recommend this book, especially if you’re looking for a light-hearted read involving a cute cupcake shop, great characters, and important themes. It wasn’t perfect, but it was good and I’m thankful I was given the chance to read it early.

Donovan a professional football player is a owner of a cupcake shop with a few of his teammates. After the first few weeks, his business is not doing as well as he expected. He turns to Ms. T the owner of the football franchise for advice. During their meeting she asks if he is willing to hire her granddaughter Jada whom can’t figure out what she wants to do with her life. He agrees to hire her although he has never met her, or so he thought.

I flew through this book, it was a very enjoyable, light read. The romance between the characters was cute, yet predictable. I recommend if you are looking for a easy romance read.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the ARC of Fake it Til You Bake It.

Jada and Donovan meet under tense circumstances and tossed into a fake relationship after a misunderstanding and realizing it can benefit them both.

This book is super charming and the characters are multifaceted and lovable. I found the plot to be solid but getting to it was slow for me. I felt like there was a lot of detail added that I didn’t need to enjoy or understand the book. I also found some dialogue in the beginning to be choppy.

This was a sweet read! I enjoyed the progression of Jada and Donovan’s relationship. Their friends and most of their family members were endearing, and the book had a great balance of lighthearted quirkiness, drama, and spice.
I loved Jada’s character development. Donovan’s possessiveness (and growling?) could have been toned down a bit, but overall I loved their chemistry and the fact that they didn’t spend a major chunk of the book fighting it.

Jada is a spoiled trust fund girl who recently committed the cardinal sin of public opinion by turning down the proposal she received on a reality dating show. At her grandmother's urging, she begrudgingly takes a job at a cupcake shop owned by a star NFL player, Donovan, but a rumor soon spreads that she's dating Donovan - and it's easier for her to pretend it's true than face the music, so she convinces Donovan to go along with the fake relationship. This reminded me a lot of "Donut Fall in Love", a romance novel about a cupcake shop owner and a movie star, and while I enjoyed this, "Donut Fall in Love" was much better. Jada came across as rather young and immature, and I found her hard to like or empathize with. However, it was a fun and sweet easy read, in spite of the somewhat shallow characters, and I enjoyed it overall.

First of all, thank you for NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review. Second… football, cupcakes and romance all in the same book? Put me in, coach! I ate this book right up! Okay… enough with the puns.

This book features Jada who is recovering from social media humiliation after turning down a proposal on a reality tv show and Donovan, a football star also turned cupcake businessman. I loved the snarky relationship these two had from the beginning. They each knew how to get on each other’s nerves and didn’t hesitate to do so.

After a run in with a paparazzo, they end up having to fake date to save both a reputation and a business. This is one of my favorite tropes and it was well done. There was a moderately slow burn while they figured out their feelings towards one another. Both characters went through so much growth and made each other better people.

Must read if you like: witty banter, playful characters, cupcakes, great character arcs, or fake dating.

Also, I’m very much looking forward to August’s story! Can’t wait to see how that one goes!

Review posted on Goodreads (March 31st, 2022)
Review linked.

3.5/5 stars!

A huge thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press, for sending me an E-ARC of this book for an honest review.

CW (that I caught): social media harassment, mention of gambling addiction, undiscussed/non-consensual kiss, ableism.

WE LOVE A GOOD ROMANCE WITH DISABILITY REP! WOOHOO!

Okay, now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, let me tell you how enjoyable this book was. I didn’t know much about this book before going into it and I am so glad that I picked it up. This book was a breath of fresh air full of a sexy romance, strong female leads, a cute cupcake shop, and so much more.

As someone who is not dyslexic (I am apart of the disabled community because I am autistic and have chronic pain), I cannot speak on the rep, but it did feel well researched and well written. I loved how Jada was still dealing with internalized ableism—the scenes that discuss these feelings and discuss the ableism she faces from her parents were done respectfully and made me cry.

This book is unfortunately 3.5 stars rounded up to 4 for a few reasons. One is the pacing. I felt like the romance moved too quickly for me and that this book needed about 100 more pages. I was also very much pulled out of the story by the time jump at the end of the book. Though, for third act breakups, this one weirdly didn’t bother me because I understood Jada’s desperate need to feel like she can make it on her own before she is ready to be with Donovan.

Second, the non-consensual kiss. I HATE THIS TROPE in romance books and it is so annoying to me that this seems to be a very popular trope/action in romance books. For people who are confused by what I am talking about, I mean when one character kisses the other because of some need to either hide and/or distract. This kiss usually happens without any conversation to the other person involved—which… guess what… makes it non-consensual. I think that in many books, and in this book specifically, there could have been a moment that acknowledges the other partner’s consent for the kiss and it would have fixed this moment. But unfortunantly, there wasn’t, and this book fell into this trope that is one of my biggest pet peeves.

The only other thing I wanted to talk about in this book was something I found interesting in this book, which is Donovan’s character. He is extremely Autism coded and it does make me wonder if the author is, themselves, on the spectrum. Where sometimes, especially with the grumpy/sunshine trope, the autism coded character is “needing to be changed” by the sunny, outgoing love interest and then the autism coding can become harmful, this book did not seem harmful to me. Because Jada never tries to change Donovan. Jada, his family, his friends, and everyone around him celebrates his differences and quirks and therefore, some of the jokes surrounding his intensity, logicalness, or the like, do not seem cruel. I really loved this. As an autistic reader, autism coding can be very harmful a lot of the time, so I feel it is important to point out that this wasn’t harmful (at least from my perspective). I would love to say that this book has autism rep, because I 100% think that Donovan is on the spectrum, but because it was never discussed, I can’t. I just thought that this was a very interesting aspect of the book that I ended up enjoying.

Thanks for reading!
Caden

AHHHHHHH ATHLETES ~AND~ CUPCAKES 🥵🥵🥵🥵 FAKE RELATIONSHIP ~AND~ ENEMIES-TO-LOVERS 🤩🤩🤩🤩 COMMUNICATION ~AND~ HOT SEX 😫😫😫 you literally could not ask for a better recipe for a book, and Jamie Wesley does not fail to deliver.

When Jada Townsend-Matthew rejects a proposal on national TV, she can’t confess that something was missing from her relationship— so she makes up the idea that there’s ‘someone at home’. The last thing Donovan Dell needs is a beautiful, snarky woman demeaning his cupcakes when his dream bakery begins struggling. Imagine his surprise when the granddaughter his football boss asks him to hire is none other than Jada, the very woman who scorned his cupcakes *gasp. Through a series of events, they end up engaging in a fake relationship to save Jada’s reputation as well as drum up business at Sugar Blitz. However as time goes on, the two realize they might not be faking things anymore—can they overcome the challenges and get what they really want?

Being a romance, we obviously know the answer to that hehe 😃. But the journey Jamie Wesley brings us through is just SO beautiful 😫😫.

Starting off as slightly enemies-to-lovers, before going into forced proximity (via our fav idgaf Grams), Jada and Donovan are constantly thrown together, creating so many sparks. When the fake relationship starts, I got a little wary because I really dislike miscommunication as a trope and I was worried that their story would just be built on snowballing lies, but the way that Wesley addressed it really alleviated a lot of my fears. Even though, yes Jada did tell a massive lie and Donovan and her decide to continue the ruse, how they treat each other and what they tell their close friends is completely genuine. Perhaps because the fake relationship was placed outside the wall of social media/nameless fans/media, it made the story feel a lot less sus.

Both characters are so well-developed and you can't help but fall in love with them and root for them. Jada starts off as a very arrogant and slightly flighty rich girl, but through her work at Sugar Blitz and her interactions with the down-to-earth footballers, she's able to ground herself without losing her forthrightness and bougie-ness (that Donovan comes to love hehe). On the other hand, when we first meet Donovan he comes off as brash and lacking sophistication, but we get really drawn in to the reason he is why he is, and along with Jada, begin to appreciate his honesty and bluntness. Just as Donovan brings out the best in Jada, Jada helps Donovan find his fun side, bringing out his inner-effervescence.

With some really well-written and beautifully-developed moments, Fake It Till You Bake It is definitely one of my favorite swoon-worthy romances this year, not to mention the copious mentions of cupcakes!! 😍😍😍
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Check out my blog at https://textualenergy1.wixsite.com/home for the full review to be published when this book comes out here https://textualenergy1.wixsite.com/home/post/fake-it-till-you-bake-it-by-jamie-wesley!!

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the free eARC in exchange for the honest review!

This was a really cute, refreshing book! The characters were super fun and the story flowed naturally.

Our main character, Jada, has just returned from a Bachelor-style show that did not end very well for her. She had been proposed to by the nationally beloved Dr. John, but she had turned him down because it had felt wrong, and was hated by the media because of it. Her love interest is Donovan, a football player who also owns a cute little cupcake store with two of his teammates-slash-friends. Jada’s grandmother is the manager (I think? I don’t know sports.) of Donovan’s team, and convinces Donovan to hire Jada, even though Jada is not particularly interested in the job. Customers flock to the store, reporters start swarming, and of course, hilarity ensues, culminating in a fake relationship between Jada and Donovan.

This book was just, in a word, sweet. The relationship between Jada and Donovan was adorable, from their initial chemistry to their fake relationship to everything that happens next. I am a sucker for a teddy bear football player love interest, and Donovan was exactly that. They really seemed to support each other but push each other in a healthy way, which was really good to read.

And of course, how could I write a review without talking about the amazing secondary characters? Donovan’s friends and teammates made me laugh out loud and reminded me of how grateful I am to have supportive friends like them. And Grams. Oh, Mrs. T, what a wonderful woman. She was every bit the loving badass grandmother that I hoped she would be from the beginning of the book, and every scene with her in it was all the more vibrant for her appearance. Every character was fully fleshed out and had a large personality and it made the book just that much better.

Overall, this book really was just like a good cupcake - sweet, enjoyable, and definitely worth it. I can see the potential for a sequel, and if one is released, I would absolutely read it.

Huge thanks to NetGalley and to St. Martin’s Press for sending me an advance copy of this book for review!

I voluntarily read and reviewed this ARC copy from NetGalley and the publisher. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Cupcakes, football and fake dating: what could go wrong?! Some of my absolute favorite things all together in one book by Jamie Wesley. Jamie Wesley is a new author for me and therefore I was excited to read this novel!

Jada Townsend-Matthews would rather hide her face from the world right now instead of being the bubbly person that she usually is. After declining Dr. John’s proposal on “My One and Only”(think “The Bachelor”), the world isn’t so kind to someone that used to be America’s Sweetheart and 1/2 of a major power couple. Trying to return to normal after that fiasco is a lot harder than she imagined it would be. Her parents have cut off her credit cards and only allowing her to stay in her apartment because they own it. Her Grandma had given her an ultimatum; either hold down a job for 4 months and flourish in it, or she will not be able to access her trust fund.

Donovan Dell is very Type A person. He prefers charts, graphs, numbers and statistics to feelings, fun, and carefree joy. He has his entire life mapped out but sadly, the one risk he has ever taken, “Sugar Blitz”, his cupcake store he owns with two of his fellow NFL players, is not turning the profit that he needs. Donovan and the boys are handling the store just fine in the off season but opening day is coming quick and they need a store manager to step in and take over. But at this rate, he won’t be hiring anyone with the profits he is making. That’s when a Miss Jada walks into his shop and turns everything on it’s head.

Overall, I did enjoy the book. Donovan was honestly probably my favorite characters. He didn’t feel as one dimensional and I could really relate to him and how hard he was working to provide a future so that he didn’t have to struggle like his mother did. I wish the side characters were more flushed out. It seemed Wesley tried to do that at the end with the epilogue and August, ending with a cliffhanger, but it just fell flat in my opinion. It was intriguing, that little bit of epilogue about August but I wish there was more throughout the book.

One of the things I did not enjoy about the book was some of the grammar used. Yes I understand that both Donovan and Jada are higher class individuals as Jada was born into money and Donovan earned his but sometimes the choice of words was too much. I don’t want to say pretentious but at times some of the word choices were pretentious. But on the other hand, I learned a lot of new words through this book so I guess it wasn’t all bad.

The book did start out very slow. The story did flow very organically but it did start out slow. There wasn’t a whole lot of suspense or in other words, conflict in the book. While that was the case, I still enjoyed it. I would get so frustrated with Jada when she hid behind her mask or when Donovan let his Type A personality control what his heart was telling him to do. Good little quick read. I definitely would be willing to check out more of Wesley’s work and I am kind of intrigued about what happened with August in that epilogue!

I love a good fake dating story as much as the next person but something about this book just didn’t work for me. I really struggled to get through it and didn’t really feel the connection between the main characters.

I had high expectations going into this one but found that overall the lead characters were not believable and I had trouble keeping my attention on the story.

I'm not a fan of the instalove trope and found that this instance didn't do it very well to begin with. Female lead was supposed to be likeable but was boring and it seemed like she had no friends. Trust fund girl used to having everything handed to her but also has a poor life. Male lead was a football character but we didn't see him working out or practicing.

I found there were weird conflicts that popped up throughout the book that supposed to be huge issues, but then resolved in one chapter.

Overall, this was about a cupcake shop - sounded delicious. Mains were good at baking, bad at business. This could have been a great story but I had difficulty keeping my attention hard to keep my attention.

This book was cute but I wasn't very into the fake dating trope, unfortunately. It fell flat for me. Overall this was an enjoyable read but not super memorable.

Thank you to Netgalley for this eARC in exchange for an honest review!

What I liked:

▫️Donovan! Ugh his austere principle, do as I say vibes, are 🔥🥵!

▫️Love this no-nonsense grumpy attitude versus Jadas sunshine one.

▫️The banter between Jada and Donovan is pure bliss and the epitome of #couplegoals

▫️ I loved the “bachelor” tv show vibes.

What didn’t work for me:

▫️ Honestly there wasn’t much to critique for me. But I do wish we had a little more open door action to the romance scenes. 😉

Overall I really enjoyed this and I’m looking forward to possibly more from this series and this author.

Thank you so much to NetGalley & St. Martin Press for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Overall, this was very cute. I loved the enemies-to-lovers/fake dating tropes that were featured in this. Jada & Donovan were adorable and I absolutely loved their banter together. If you are looking for a light read or feel good romance, this for you.

After being in multiple reading slumps so far this year, this book was so welcome and exactly what I needed to read.

This was fine! I honestly didn't love the dialogue, it didn't feel naturally flowing to me, but the idea was really cute!

Fake it til you bake it is a cute, light-hearted read. This book centers around a fake dating couple featuring Jada, who is fresh off of a reality dating show, and Donovan, a professional NFL player and cupcake shop owner. I could feel the chemistry between them and the book got steamy at times which I enjoyed. It is a quick read and it’s rather predictable of course, but that’s what makes for an easy, fluffy read. I would guess based on the ending, this is going to be a series and we’re going to see a book on August next! 3.5 stars rounded up to 4!

Thank you St. Martins Press and Net Galley for an ARC in return for my honest review.

Ok first thing is first…. This cover is one of the cutest covers I’ve ever seen so I absolutely had to pick this one to read! It has everything you could want in a RomCom PLUS diversity. Loved it!

Cupcakes, professional football players, and a strong female protagonist who is able to be vulnerable and open to love even after being hurt before? We love to see it! This book was as sweet as the cupcakes the characters sold in their bake shop and had excellent character development and a hilarious and supportive (and only slightly meddle-some) grandma. Highly recommend!

This story is sweet, sexy and definitely a feel good read. Jada Townsend-Matthews endeared herself to the public, becoming the frontrunner on a poplar dating show. Unfortunately fame is fickle as she soon found out, becoming a target to a vitriolic public. Popular professional football player Donovan Dell. owns Sugar Blitz with his fellow teammate. From the moment Jada entered his shop, there is a tangible reaction,. Jada has the audacity to offer her opinions regarding his bakery. In an unexpected turn of events Jada ends up working at the bakery. This is where the story takes off. The story is told from a dual perspective which I think adds nuance to the story. I enjoyed the support that Donovan continually offered Jada support throughout their burgeoning romance.. Rounding out the story are loving, loyal characters August, Nicholas and Mrs. T
I would enjoy seeing other characters in this book get their own stories (especially August).