3.5/5 stars! - The Make-Up Test is an academic rivals to lovers romance, with a little bit of enemies to lovers thrown in. Allison has wanted to be an academic her entire life. She has finally made it to grad school, only to discover her ex is in the same grad school program, studying the same field as her. They are now competing for the advisor that Allison has always admired, while trying to work out what happened in the past.

A lot of times I find enemies to lovers has a dual perspective, and this book didn't. I found that a good match for this story, as I was able to go through the same feelings and emotions as Allison in her move from hate, to love for Colin. We went through a whole gambit of emotions, and with what Colin had done to Allison, I actually found myself not rooting for their happily ever after. That was until the redemption arc. Because we didn't get the dual perspective, we had no clue what actually happened with one character, except Allison's interpretation, which I feel added to the story.

The struggle I had with this book was it felt a bit to academic for my tastes. This book is about two English grad students and there was way to much literature discussions and references to me. When I am reading a book about academics, I like to know what the characters are researching or working on, but not in-depth specifics. I find that this type of stuff takes me out of the story and pulls me into academia.

This book has some excellent plus-sized rep, Allison is fat, and she is comfortable with herself. Even after familial trauma, she has accepted herself for who she is, while recognizing the problems of living in a fatphobic society. This isn't a story about being fat, or plus-sized, it is a story about a woman falling in love, and that woman happens to be fat. I am a sucker for confident plus-sized characters and I really liked Allison (and her bff) in this book.

This was a quick, debut read by Jenny L. Howe. I enjoyed the book and think it would be perfect for lovers of the academic rivals to lovers trope, or enemies/ex's to lovers. I will check out the authors future books to see what she writes! Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for a copy of this book. All opinions are 100% mine.

I struggled a lot with this book. On one hand, I loved seeing Allison go through graduate school and befriend her cohort. Additionally, I loved the banter between her and Colin. However I honestly found her so angry as a protagonist. She seemed to take everything personally and react so stubbornly. We also never got to see her work on her teaching style, rather just lie about it to Colin and then feel bitter about it. But I thought the medieval lit angle redeemed it somewhat and it was nice to have a Fat protagonist where the story wasn't about weight loss or self-hatred.

*Thank you to St Martin's Griffin and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.*

2.5 Thank you NetGalley for the ARC of this book but unfortunately again, this book wasn’t for me.
I can appreciate a few things in this book, but overall my rating is due to the fact that I could not connect to a single character in this book.

pros:
1. extremely PC so if you’re into that than this will be great for you. Touches on topics such as navigating tough family dynamics, fat representation…
2. Fat women representation (the only reason I’m writing that is because the authors note in the beginning pls don’t cancel me)
3. If you like tropes that are books about books, second chance romance you might enjoy this.

cons:
1. Extremely predictable story, I just feel like I’ve read this premise before and it didn’t bring anything fresh to the table.
2. I didn’t like how the past was presented in this book, the amount the past was talked about it almost would have been better as dual timeline. I think maybe then I would’ve made more of a connection with the characters, especially the FMC since she came off as stuck up and uppity.
3. Every character had a very immature personality

The Make-Up Test follows Allison and Colin who are exes. This book has one of my favorite tropes: close proximity!!! I absolutely loved this.

This was pitched as One to Watch meets Beach Read and it could not have been described more perfectly. Enemies to Lovers in an academic setting is my new favorite trope (thanks to Love Hypothesis and now this). The characters were so lovable and you were rooting for them from the beginning. There were some touchy subjects throughout the book that I feel the author handled amazingly. It was nice to see a romcom without the typical beautiful blond bombshell as the main character. We need more of these types of love stories!

Cute and sweet! An endearing story with academic rivals to lovers. It is sweet, quirky, and heartfelt. Also second chance romance!! It has a lot of wonderful pieces and parts to it.

Overall I would say this book about 2 grad students and exes competing for a mentorship and falling for each other again decent. It had its moments where it was fun to read but some where I struggled because I was expecting more romance, but that is my fault for being used to it and not authors.

Allison Avery is pursuing a Ph D at Claymore University in medieval literature with a professor she has admired for years. When she finds out her ex-boyfriend and arch nemesis, Colin Benjamin is also in the program all bets are off when the two begin to compete for the same TA position.

I'm struggling with how I feel about this one. On one hand I really enjoyed the plus size representation. It's refreshing to see this representation in a main character. Unfortunately, I really struggled to connect to the characters and at times found them to be a little immature. I also don't know anything about medieval literature so certain parts of the story were hard for me to understand. I think this is the perfect story for those who love second chance romance.

eh.

this book didn't really impress me. i finished it in a few hours but it wasn't the most enjoyable few hours. i liked the main character and her drive. i liked the academia setting. but i felt like the romance was REALLY lacking. colin was a boring love interest and i really didn't get their feelings for each other. they had no chemistry at all, which... is not ideal given its a romance novel. wouldn't recommend this at all, unless you're really into that academia setting i guess.

DNF for now at 35%.

I really liked how this was basically the adult version of What's Not to Love by Emily Wibberely and Austin Siegemund-Broka. The academia and teaching aspects were extremely interesting to me. I also liked how this book touched on a broken family and a basically dead-beat father and how that effects the MC. However, there were a lot of areas that fell flat for me. I felt like the love interests had basically no chemistry and that Colin had little to no personality. I wish that at almost the halfway point, we would gotten a little bit more history of their relationship.

I'm curious to see how this goes so for now this is an *on pause* DNF. I'll update my review once I finish. Thank you for the opportunity.

A rom-com about two grad students competing for the same mentorship. They are Exes so you have relationship drama. It was okay. Didn't wow me but didn't struggle through it either.

Thank you to Netgalley for the ARC

Thank you NetGalley and St Martins Press for the advanced readers copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

From lovers, to enemies, to rivals to lovers. Allison and Colin’s love story was neatly wound into the grad school life of studying, TAs and cohort hangouts. I thoroughly enjoyed that Howe wrote this as Allison is a plus size woman BUT she does not have an epiphany at the end of the book and gain a ton of confidence etc etc. Allison is already steadfast and confident in her body and Howe does a great job at displaying Allison’s firm boundaries and complex feelings of things we all go through in life. I loved the cross stitch mentions in the book. I respect Howe for also portraying Allison’s relationship with her father and how she and Allison’s mom navigate that. Healthy boundaries are important and I don’t feel it is written about more

So 3 stars because I wish there was more spiciness and hotter sex scenes between Colin and Allison. I also am not a huge fan of medieval literature so it was a little hard to follow. Overall I will read another book from Howe again and more than anything really appreciate her paving a path for plus size bodies.

3.5 stars

at times this book was so fun, but at others it was really frustrating. overall it was a solid read. i would still recommend it.

a few notes while reading:

the whole scene of her in the hospital and the constant naming of her fathers heart rate…. didn’t do what i think it was meant to. it didn’t touch my heart or make me sad or even that mad at him. it was annoying to watch her revel in his heart failure even if he is a bad character (also your heart rate changing isn’t the only sign of heart failure and the detail just felt… lacking).

at times the main character is incredibly petty and while no one wants a perfect main character, it wasn’t in a fun way to read, especially in this hospital scene and in the scenes where she was being jealous of colin.
and
she focused on the pain he caused her but never acknowledged that for half the book she went looking for it despite what she already knew about jed.

she’s so worried about being “better” than people, even than people she allegedly loves. it seems very toxic, and i wanted her to maybe acknowledge and clearly grow from that more.

her and sophie call colin self-centered but allison is literally so self-centered and proud.

“he’s put her feelings before winning” - yeah he’s done this for a while, allison seems to be the one who refuses to.

we’re told that colin used to undermine allison but we’re shown that she does it to him now, because of that, the latter sticks with us more.

inconsistencies with WCS or WSC list in naming.

I just had to read this when I saw Ali Hazelwood read it. I loved the academia setting. The tropes were good! Enemies to lovers and second chance romance. I typically do prefer a new romance versus a second chance but I enjoyed this.

This book was okay. It read a bit like a young adult book. The characters were pretty immature and didn't communicate well and I found that a bit frustrating. Despite having a doctorate myself, I didn't find the academic piece too relatable and have a hard time imagining students beginning a rigorous PhD program without already having an adviser committed to working with them.

I enjoyed Jenny L. Howe’s writing and the fat rep in this book. I also thought the academic setting was well done — you can tell she has a lot of experience with it and medieval literature. You can really feel how these characters (in particular Allison, since the book is from her POV) were affected by their previous relationship and past hurts. It made sense why they were so competitive in the present, but also why they were drawn to give each other another chance.

I’d recommend this if you enjoy second chance romances, rivals to lovers, or are looking for books with good fat rep.

I received a copy of this book from Net Galley.

I read this one quickly because I had to find out what happened next! This was a fun one to add to my summer list. I enjoyed it and am looking forward to reading other books this author writes.

This book just wasn’t a favorite for me. There were parts I really enjoyed. I found the discussion of the literature enjoyable and the dialogue between characters witty. The group get-to-know-you scenes were funny and I liked reading the interactions between all the grad school members! However, I just really couldn’t connect with Allison. I found her immature and her opinion of herself quite inflated at times. I am a really character driven reader, so if I don’t connect to the FMC it’s hard for me to fully enjoy a story. Colin had plenty of flaws and the way he acted towards the end of the book was out of line, but at the beginning it just felt repetitive to read Allison’s feelings about him. The final resolution also happened quickly after the conflict and I felt like it could have been fleshed out more. I definitely think this is a book others will love, but it just wasn’t for me personally!

I really enjoyed this book. I thought that it was interesting to see how Allison handled the situation with her father. It was not the typical approach and I commend her for being so brave.

I enjoyed the dynamic between Colin and Allison when it came to their studies. Being competitive with each other is a huge part of their relationship and they were able to make it work.

Second chance romance always gets me! I think it shows that people can change with time and life experience!

I really enjoyed this exes/enemies to lovers romance, set in academia, it tells us the story of Allison and Colin, who are exes and now compete for a spot in their program.
I liked all the pull and push between them, their banter, the arguing. I love the way the author narrated the evolution of their relationship from enemies to friends to romance.
This is a sweet and funny story that made me laugh and sigh. Definitely recommended for RomCom and enemies to lovers fans!