I think? the author was going for "Four Weddings and a Funeral" vibes but honestly this was boring. Too many ~hijinks~ that ultimately had no effect on the overall plot, and I also wasn't really sold on Luc and Oliver actually liking each other/being a solid couple, despite having been together for 2.5 years. Overall not a win for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and SourceBooks for an e-ARC!

A perfect follow up to a perfect fake dating romance! Luc and Oliver once again bring readers to tears of laughter while breaking your heart. These two idiots love each other dearly and this book is the perfect mix of shenanigans, heartbreak, messy friendships and complicated family relationships. This series is a must read for rom com lovers!

Finishing a book is bittersweet. On one hand there is usually significant resolution because you’ve come to the end, but on the other hand you’ve spent a great deal of time watching these characters develop and grow through their journey, only to come to a hard and fast stop. Having a sequel allows for that window that was firmly shut to open once again and allow you to visit with people you’ve come to care about in some small measure.

Alexis Hall brings readers back to London with his new novel “Husband Material”, which checks back in with Luc and Oliver, who are two years into their relationship and seemingly in domestic bliss. After growing attached to Luc’s hits-too-close-to-home self deprecating humor and Oliver’s steadfast demeanor, being able to linger in their world again felt like a treat.

‘Oh, this is nice,‘ I told him. ‘It reminds me of when we were first going out and I didn’t like you.’ And it was a testament to how far we’d come that I could say something like that and he’d laugh. And Oliver laughing in a special-occasion suit was a very good Oliver indeed.

“Husband Material” is very much character driven. Most of the novel circles around Luc and Oliver and how they engage socially with others while navigating taking their own ‘next steps’. Hopefully you can manage expectations well enough to enjoy the characters’ return to the page without needing a huge overarching plotline, because there isn’t much of one.


I really enjoyed reading the first half of this book because I was able to see Luc and Oliver, who I fell head over heels for in “Boyfriend Material”. Two years later they are still together, in a good place, and are settling down with each other, acknowledging each other’s warts and all. I realized halfway through, though, that there wasn’t as much character development off the page as I’d initially hoped for, and they didn’t grow during “Husband Material” either.

See, this was the problem with trying to be a better human being to impress your boyfriend. You ended up having to be a better human to everybody.

Luc is still self-deprecating, but it’s not as funny this time around. He’s insecure and self-sabotaging. Oliver is exceptionally anxious, even though he hides it better than Luc, and he hasn’t really worked out much of his family issues or reconciled being gay with being part of the gay community. To summarize, the same issues that plagued these characters in book 1 are still lingering in book 2, except they’re really together not just fake-dating together.

Final Thoughts
To be frank, “Husband Material” isn’t the novel that I was hoping it would be. I’m rating it 2.5 stars, bee-cause while it wasn’t everything that I hoped it would be, I still enjoyed experiencing Luc and Oliver’s banter again on the page. These two really do get into some fun shenanigans, and they have some interesting conversations. Luc’s internal monologue and commentary specifically reminds me of hearing my best friends tell a story over drinks. I hope that there will be more of them in Hall’s future London Calling novels, even as secondary characters, because they deserve more love.

It was absolutely delightful to be back in this world with Oliver and Luc. Boyfriend Material was one of my favorite reads the year it released and I was so excited when it was announced that we were getting a sequel (and a third book coming soon!). Being back with these characters was so heartwarming and wonderful and fun and I can't wait to see what happens for them next!

After quite enjoying the first book in the series, I was excited to read the second.

Unfortunately, while overall still enjoyable, this one fell flat. The characters seemed to not develop, but become almost caricatures of themselves and their attributes. To me, the plot never seemed to gain traction the way it did for the first.

Hall‘s style is easy to read and digest, there’s strong humour, which makes reading her works enjoyable. However, there’s a glaring error that could have been avoided with five minutes on google either on part of the author or editor. Oliver apparently off screen claiming a connection between the word “Kitsch” and “volkitsch” is baffling. First off, volkitsch is not a word in the German language, and the correctly spelled völkisch bears no connection with Kitsch. Granted, one has to know German to notice, but it made the character look so stupid that I almost didn’t finish the book.

A great follow up to Boyfriend Material

Thanks to NetGalley / Edelweiss and the publisher for providing me with an eARC of this book in exchange for a review.

This book was okay. I think this should not have turned into a duo. It felt like an entire book of insecurities and idiocy with no real plot.
Did have some lol moments and as with boyfriend material, I loved Oliver but Luc was just meh.

This was the sequel to Boyfriend Material which I definitely recommend reading first. I absolutely loved the movie Four Weddings and a Funeral. Which I totally recommend. Huge Grant was especially great in that film. And who doesn’t like Huge Grant?! This book definitely used that framework. Each wedding was special in their own way and were filled with a lot of humor.
We see Luc and Oliver tackle each event with grace and humor. Oliver was great as always and Luc was a bit annoying as usual. I liked some of the wedding stories. Lucy’s friends were hilarious, sweet, and loyal as they ever have been. His mom was amazing as her son’s advocate and cheerleader along the way.
My only complaint was I didn’t like the ending. I felt that it didn't quite work out like it did in my head. It felt anticlimactic in a lot of ways. Unfortunately , I lowered my rating score due to that.
Overall, a good and sweet story, just wish for a better ending.
I also found out after reading this that there will be another book. I'm definitely looking forward to it. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for my ARC in exchange for my review.

I have always been a huge Alexis Hall fan and of course Boyfriend Material is one of my top favorites. So with the release of Husband Material I was highly anticipating diving back in to Luc and Olivers world and romance.

This book reads almost like a diary of events for these characters. What I mean by that is that we are along for the ride for the events of their life as they play out instead of working towards the rise and fall of a predictable plot.

I think a lot of the issues other readers may have with this title is that they went in to with with what THEY wanted from it but Alexis wrote what works best with the characters overall. There is a 3rd book coming out with Luc and Oliver so this isnt the last we will see of them (hooray!), and I cant wait to read that one as well!

Thank you NetGalley and Casablanca books for this copy of Husband Material by Alexis Hall! I loved the relationship that Luc and Oliver built together in the previous book, even though they started as a fake couple. I was happy to see that they were happy after a couple years together. But this book took so many turns that I didn’t expect! I appreciated hearing about the difficulties couples go through leading up to their wedding, the stress of just that one day is outrageous and can be very hard on the couple and their families. It felt real, not just a happily ever after story. With that being said, I hope we hear more of Luc and Oliver’s story in the future!

I love this sequel, it keeps with theme of the original novel but somehow finds a way to grow. So rarely in romance novels do we get to see behind the "how they got together" phase of the relationship, it is delightful to see a relationship change and grow over time.

Although I did end up enjoying this story it took me a lot longer to become invested as I thought I would. I loved the first book in this series but this one at times felt unnecessary to me. I do however enjoy this authors writing style.

This book! It was super enjoyable to revisit Luc, Oliver, and their cast of friends. Luc always annoys me a little bit and the end of this was a premium example of why, but I loved the message around marriage and queerness, societal expectations about love and commitment and recreating the meaning of all that for yourself. It resonated a lot for me as a queer millenial who was coming of age during the fight for marriage equality. Hall is great at making me laugh out loud and I enjoyed this sequel thoroughly.

I wanted to love this as much as I did Boyfriend Material, but just couldn't. TBH more of my rating is probably for Luc-and-Oliver nostalgia and cuteness together (when I don't want to throttle them, at least) than for the story itself, because reading this was just very...frustrating. They have the same argument over and over and over and OVER again without ever really resolving it, and then with how close they let things get at the end I was about ready to scream. Luc is becoming a bit too much like Bex in the Shopaholic books, making the same (type of, at least) mistakes over and over again and not showing much, if any growth in the end.

I'm looking forward to the next book with equal parts dread and hope...

Rating: 3 1/2 stars / C+

Eu lembro bem de quando esse livro foi anunciado e meus olhos simplesmente brilharam de tanta alegria por poder encontrar mais uma vez personagens que eu adorei conhecer e que me entregaram uma das melhores leituras da vida, lógico que assim que tive oportunidade eu não perdi tempo e me agarrei a leitura.

A escrita de Alexis nesse livro se mostrou tão gostosa e fluida quanto eu esperava, me vi mais uma vez completamente envolvido na leitura, cada capítulo era um surto diferente se saber como as coisas iriam se desenrolar, eu dei boas risadas de algumas situações, que dar uns bons tapas em Luc e Oliver em outros. Eu adoro livros que me causam vários tipos de emoções e sensações e o autor acerta demais nesse quesito neste livro.

Foi muito bom reencontrar Luc e Oliver mais uma vez, é visível o crescimento dos dois como casal, principalmente depois de dois anos juntos. Luc para mim foi o que teve a maior evolução, se mostrou mais seguro, menos auto depreciativo, mas, claro, as recaídas estão lá porque nenhum personagem é perfeito né? Eu adorei o que vi de Oliver nesse livro, vi muito mais nuances dele nesse livro do que no primeiro, então ele parece um homão perfeito no primeiro livro nesse é possível ver de forma mais tangível as rachaduras na armadura dele e isso me fez gostar ainda mais dele, ainda que eu tenha tido vontade de dar uns dois tapas nele.

Adorei também rever os amigos de Luc e a mudança que esse dois anos trouxe para cada um deles, gosto bastante do plote dos amigos de Luc, porque eles não estão ali apenas para dar apoio ao protagonista, pelo menos não todos rsrs, também conheci um pouco sobre um personagem que foi muito falado no primeiro livro mas não havia aparecido.

Eu adorei a leitura desse livro, ele era tudo que eu estava precisando e esperando que fosse ser e isso me deixou muito feliz, o único ponto que não foi totalmente ok para mim foi o final do livro, eu entendi totalmente a mensagem que o autor quis passar, mas, nem por isso eu sou obrigado a gostar né? E pessoalmente eu não gostei rs, mas, isso não quer dizer que a leitura não valeu a pena, valeu muito e com certeza eu pretendo reencontrar Luc e Oliver mais uma vez numa releitura.

Ugh, this was not what the book wanted it to be. I loved Book 1, but this was just... not it. Luk was so insecure and had not really grown into the character that we left within the first. I was hoping for more growth, but it felt like we went backward.

Thank you to #NetGalley and publishers for the ARC of #HusbandMaterial.

DNF. Boyfriend Material did not need a sequel. Luc is too annoying and insecure and I just did not care enough to try to finish it. And honestly, Oliver can do better.

I loved Alexis Hall's earlier works and I had high expectations for this one, but unfortunately it just left me disappointed.

When you reach the age Luc and Oliver are in the book I appreciate that you are often caught up in the kind of situations they experience. Having got married at 21 I really don't get the focus on weddings, but I appreciate that it can force you to feel certain responses.
Luc hasn't moved on much - he would be exhausting to live with, and yet he brings a certain charm to his reactions. This time round we get to see them go through a number of weddings, some of which are more entertaining than others, and how it impacts their relationship.
Luc and Oliver continue to feel they have to behave a certain way, and I was pleased that they were given the opportunity to really have the chance to think about who they were/what was important to them. The scene following Oliver's speech really did hurt - sometimes fanily are the ones who find it easiest to hurt you.
Thanks to NetGalley for giving me the chance to read this before publication.

After trying to read this more than once I just can't bring myself to get further in after hearing so many bad things. I don't want to ruin book 1 for myself.