Lyric and Kian are best friends and roommates working on completing their dissertations. Lyric’s topic is related to intimacy and compatibility -her Sizzle Paradox - but feels like a fraud because she’s never been in love. Her and Kian are both the king and queen of random hookups, and Kian agrees to “tutor” her on flirting and relationships.

The miscommunication trope is strong in this book, and they both seemed a little immature. Lyric was also really into crystals, which just isn’t my thing. It was cute altogether, with a few spicy scenes.

Hey book lovers! I'm here with a book review for a Netgalley arc of The Sizzle Paradox by Lily Menon (a pen name for Sandhya Menon). I requested this arc after liking Sandhya's book From Twinkle, With Love and LOVING 10 Things I Hate About Pinky. On her website blog, she said she's using Sandhya for her YA books and Lily for her adult books so that parents and librarians can easily tell which books are appropriate for younger readers. The Sizzle Paradox will be published soon and is an easy and fun read for the beach or summer vacation.


About The Book 📚
Title: The Sizzle Paradox

Author: Lily Menon

Publication Date: June 28, 2022

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Suggested Reader Age: Adult

Genre: Contemporary Romance
› Lyric and Kian are best friends and roommates. Kian is a big guy with curly dark brown hair, half-Indian heritage and is an environmental chemistry grad student. Lyric is a short, blonde hair blue eyed psychology doctoral student. The Sizzle Paradox is a scale she developed for her psychology thesis. She is studying romantic partners in successful relationships to figure out how they keep the romantic and sexual chemistry alive. Biotech students helped her develop software that can analyze romantic and sexual activity in the brain. She plans to interview couples with high scores to determine what they are doing "right" in their relationship and once she's gathered enough data she will know what makes a successful relationship.

You might think Lyric has first-hand knowledge about long-term relationships, but no. She has struggled to have both a romantic and sexual chemistry with anyone. When she meets a guy who seems like good fit, she somehow messes it up. Kian suggests they can go on "fake" dates so he can try and help her figure out where she's going wrong because he knows she's amazing and doesn't understand why she's not in a relationship. Kian just broke up with his girlfriend due to his fear of commitment. Hmmm...I wonder what will happen?

› I use the CAWPILE method to rate books.
0-3 Really bad
4-6 Mediocre
7-9 Really good
10 Outstanding

› Characters: 4
› Atmosphere: 4
› Writing Style: 5
› Plot: 5
› Intrigue: 5
› Logic: 8
› Enjoyment: 6

Average 5.3

1.1-2.2 = ★
2.3-4.5 = ★★
4.6-6.9 = ★★★
7-8.9 = ★★★★
9-10 = ★★★★★

My Rating ★★★

› Final Thoughts
• The Sizzle Paradox isn't one of my favourite rom-com reads, but I did have a good time reading it. I'll definitely be checking out more from Lily Menon!



Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the complimentary copy in exchange for my honest review.

Not my cup of tea. It just didn’t interest me that much and as someone who gets major secondhand embarrassment, let me tell you, there’s a lot of it. But it was well written, so if you like friends to lovers and don’t get secondhand embarrassment then by all means get this book 😂

I really enjoyed this author's previous book but this story didn't draw me in the same way. Best friends, to one-time lovers, to HEA trope. It's kind of hard to cross the line with your best friend when you also live together. I think that was what made the story difficult in that they really couldn't escape each other and so all the awkwardness was kept in play until someone moves out. I'm not sure why the parents had to be Wiccan, it's like the author was trying to throw in so many diversities with the characters. It was an ok read - 3 1/2 stars.

You're the shizzle to my nizzle! You make my shizzle dizzle!

This was hot! That's what my slang implies. It starts hot; it ends way hotter to the point I kept saying to myself — when would you both see that you should be together?

There are no words to type; if you are in a spicy need for the perfect friends-to-lovers, please my darlings, this is it.

Thank You, SMP Romance, for a wonderful reading journey!

What's your favorite romance troupe? Personally, I am a sucker for #bestfriendstolovers!

📝 Best friends and roommates, Kain and Lyric, are two doctoral students at Columbia University. They both struggle to make long-term relationships work. Kain can't seem to make a long term commitment. Lyric on the other hand, can't get her physical connections to match her emotional ones and vice versa. What worse....Lyric's thesis is all around the science in healthy long-term relationships. How is she supposed to graduate if she can't even understand what love feels like? The solution: to tutor each other. What could go wrong?

What I 🤍:
👩‍🏫 Academic Setting
💕 Best Friends to Lovers
💗 Interracial Relationship
✌️Duel Perspectives
👟 Fast Pace
🌳 Treehouse Date

I REALLY loved the idea of this book! I appreciate reading about women in this setting, because I feel that representation doesn't happen a lot. I also loved the warm connection these two had at the beginning of the book.

With that said, some things didn't work for me, and I was longing for more. This is a miscommunication troupe. So if that's your thing, you'll love this book! Personally, it seems weird miscommunication would happen when two people are best friends for a long period of time. Because of this, I am not quite convinced this relationship would work. 😢 I also wish there was more plot and character devlopment. If I was the editior, I would have cut ✂️ this story apart and rearranged some scenes around. 🧩 That way, readers would be more invested in the MCs.

Prince's Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Steaminess: 🔥🔥🔥
Read If ➡️: You Love Paris Geller from Gilmore Girls or Miscommunication Troupes.

Overall, this was a phenomenal story idea, but it fell a bit flat for me.

Huge thank you to @stmartinspress and @netgalley for a #gifted #arc of this book!

🌟 The Sizzle Paradox comes out June 28! 🌟

The Sizzle Paradox: Lyric's method towards finding love: her main research project. She is picky as can be and has set standards.

Kieran: Lyric's roommate who has sworn off daring. BUT he also has promised Lyric to fake date her to get her research results. What could go wrong?

In Lily Menon's book, it turns out a lot could go wrong. The characters were dry and seemed very stuck up in their standards. Standards are not a bad thing but acting like you're better than everyone less than five percent in? I wish there would be more fake dating scenarios and more depth into who these characters. The audio voice for Lyric was suitable but the male lacked emotion. Overall, this book wasn't for me but hopefully it will be for others.

Lyric and Kian are both students finishing up their doctoral studies and BFF’s who live together. Lyric is studying sexual chemistry in romantic partners and what makes for healthy happy long term relationships. She feels like a fraud as she has never been in one herself and acts like an immature goofball with men. Well, all of them except Kian. As she feels in need of some real life experience to help with her thesis she’s at a loss until Kian volunteers to tutor her on dating and all that goes along with it. Their tutoring sessions start off well until actual feelings get involved on both sides with neither of them willing to admit it to each other things go all FUBAR. Its a cute story, but considering they’re both adults they come off as children at times. For goodness sakes talk to each other. It all goes wrong until the tow of them figure it all out with a sweet HEA. It was a sweet story of friendship to romance, but at times found some of their dialogue and actions a little bit cringe worthy. It’s light and sweet listen.

As a doctoral student and woman in STEM, I love a story that features both. Lyric's research and family were interesting and kept me reading. I struggled a bit with rooting for Lyric and Kian, as it didn't feel like they had much development. It was a slow burn that ultimately fell a little flat for me.

The Sizzle Paradox is a friends-to-lover romance between Lyric, a PhD candidate studying sexual chemistry in romantic partners, and Kian, her best friend and fellow graduate student. Their journey is sloooowww but cute! This book is a great summer beach read when you want low-stakes, something a little predictable, and funny. Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the advanced copy. All opinions are my own.

Lyric is a Ph.D student studying what she calls the Sizzle Paradox - using emotional connection and sexual connection to see how they amount to a successful long-term relationship. Although she has the science to back up her theory, Lyric herself has never had a successful relationship that has both. When her best friend/roommate Kian offers to tutor her in dating, she takes him up on his offer. However as their “lessons” progress their feelings do too.

I love a good woman in academics/Science plot line and I thought Lyric’s research sounded super intriguing. This one was a slowww burn and although I loved Lyric and Kian as individuals, it took me a bit to really invest in their romantic relationship because it was such a slow burn. Ultimately I did end up rooting for them, it just took a while to get there for me.

Thanks to SMP Romance for the advance copy.

. . . ⭑ ⭑ ⭑ ⋆ ⭒
You ever finish a book and we’re so caught up in it that by the end you’re like: “Y A S, ALL STARS!”, but then a day later, you settle down and start to really reflect in the book, and then catch yourself going: “Waiiiiit a minute…”? That was me after finishing this one.

So initially, I had a hard time getting into this STEM-romance story - the beginning really didn’t have that spark for me - but the more I read on, the more I got caught up and into the characters, that by the ending I was all aflutter and completely on board with all that happened. But then, after thinking about this book for a few - and while a major kudos to the author for writing a book that kept me thinking about it for several days after finishing is in order - there were some issues that became more apparent.

I find it a little hard to believe that after 7 years of friendship, Lyric - who is literally pursuing a doctorate in sexual chemistry and emotional connection - was totally oblivious to any inkling or twinkling of sexual attraction to Kian ( &/or vice versa ). Especially because it’s essentially a flip-switch shift for two parties who are presented as being very “platonically” connected, who then suddenly want to rip the clothing off of one another.

Ultimately though, I did really like this one. I tend to favour the friends-to-lovers trope more than others, mostly because the emotional connection is well established. And while they did seem to jump on the fast track in this regard, I still enjoyed the journey.

~👩🏻‍🦰

I’m always amused when scientists try to analyze emotions, especially love. Lyric is trying to code what she calls the Sizzle Paradox. Until it applies,to,her best friend, Kian.
It’s an amusing read with some painful parts, but the ending is totally worthy of the story.
Take analysis and practicality out of romance and just emote those feelings. Not everything can be sliced, diced, and compartmentalized anyway.

This was a very predictable friends-to-lovers romance. I always like that trope since I think that is actually the best foundation for a relationship. And I really enjoyed the friendship between Lyric and Kian. The only thing that was how long it takes them to realize that they are actually a perfect couple and just what they have each been missing in a romantic relationship. I also liked Lyric’s family and friends and their interactions.

I voluntarily reviewed an advanced reader copy of this book that I received from Netgalley; however, the opinions are my own and I did not receive any compensation for my review.

For being compared to the Love Quotient and Love Potion No. 9, I felt like this book fell flat.

Lyric was quite immature for her age and it made the book hard to read. I didn't feel any sort of lasting connection between me and the characters in this book, as even Kian was mediocre.

Thank you Netgalley and St. Martin's Griffin for the advanced copy. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Thank you to St. Martins Press for an advanced digital copy via NetGalley in exchange for review.

Unfortunately, while the premise of The Sizzle Paradox intrigued me, it really fell flat for me. At no point did I feel invested in the characters or the story.

There were definitely some moments that made me laugh, but as a whole, I wasn’t interested in how the Lyric and Kian kept hiding their true feelings for each other.

Best friends and slow burn, sign me up! This was a really cute romance between Lyric and her best friend of many years, Kian (swoon). They are both doc graduate students who live together and share everything, including no luck in the romance department. Although the story was overall predictable, it was exactly what I needed. Cute, lighthearted and funny. I really enjoyed it. Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the ARC.

This book starts out with PhD candidate Lyric, who is writing her thesis on sexual chemistry, on how emotional and sexual connection correlate in a relationship with the nuero chemicals in the brain related to those feelings. She herself has not been able to experience both at the same time with anyone she has dated and feels in a rut with her thesis. So she enlists the help of her best friend Kian who is charismatic and has no problem with dating. They begin have "tutoring" date sessions to help Lyric get better at dating. It goes well up to the point that they give into the moment and it feels like their friendship is ruined forever.

The chemistry between the characters was excellent, as was the gradual build up of feelings and tension. I loved having both characters be in academia and doing well. The miscommunication in this book is really what let me down. It went on for far too long and got frustrating in a bad way.

I gave Lily Menon another chance, as I really like her “Sandhya” stuff in YA. But this second adult romance is even more unbearable than her first. It seems to be trying to capture the magic that similar academically driven romances have, but without the substance. Granted, I couldn’t stand more than a page or two of The Love Hypothesis, but there’s basic plot similarities to The Kiss Quotient without a real grasp of the nuances of what made them work in TKQ. And I just didn’t care for the characters.

lighthearted fast-paced
Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75

I received a copy of this book from the publisher and netgalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.
This book had a lot of potential but unfortunately it did fall flat. The characters were unbearable about 50% of the time and the other half they were just okay. It felt as if the author had never interacted with a ‘nerd’ or ‘dork’ and got most of her source material from watching bad 90s sitcoms. The jokes and attempts to make lyric seem as if she was an unsocialized hermit felt weird and forced. Not to mention while the cast of characters are diverse and plenty there were some moments where my brain went ‘misogyny’ and then moved on. I did enjoy the writing style for the most part and the idea of the book was honestly very interesting . It was just the actual execution fell flat.
If you want a short book where you can kind of shut off your brain for a moment you could honestly do so much worse. But if you are used to well developed contemporary romance where the character growth is a main focus and the plot is well researched and stuck to this might not be the one.