I'm a bit torn on how I feel about this novel. I don't know if I've ever read a non-second chance romance where the main characters (leads) get together so early (and often!) and keep getting together throughout the novel. I was a bit worried it would be a bit dry after the initial heat but no - it was the book that just kept giving. That said, every sexual encounter was at a different stage of the relationship so that gave it a bit more depth than just "yet another" sexy moment.

So in some ways I'm pleasantly surprised that the quick start romance kept burning for the duration of the novel.

I really thought the age gap between Erin and Cassie was going to be a bigger deal than it was made to be - but perhaps the author really wanted to focus in on a few key moments/struggles/issues rather than ram home the age gap message at every possible moment.

It just seems like the main characters didn't have to work very hard - and maybe some would argue they shouldn't have to work hard to "prove" or justify their relationship or love to others - but it just didn't seem like the most believable pre-epilogue ending ever...

This was a super sweet and delightfully smutty Sapphic romance. I'll definitely be checking out Meryl Wilsner's first novel after loving this one!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the free e-copy.

Trigger Warnings: Alcohol, bar, sex, cursing, past cheating/violence, masturbation, absent parent, parental abandonment, drunk, house party, underage drinking, sexting, divorce, lying, sex in public, marijuana, misogyny

Representation: Bisexual, Genderqueer, Pansexual

Mistakes Were Made is the MILF book, or a rom com about college senior Cassie who accidentally sleeps with her best friend’s mom after picking her up at a bar one night. Unaware who Erin is, Cassie has some fun with the stranger. The next morning when Parker drags her to breakfast with her mom, she ends up sitting across the table from her night before hook-up. This dual POV lays out the next years worth of encounters during which the two swear to never do it again. Can they put the past in the past or are they drawn back to each other repeatedly? And what happens if Parker were to ever find out?

You know what I hate about books that you fall in love with while reading? You get through all of this good stuff then you know there’s going to be a bad turn. Once that happens, you’re just wishing for a resolution sooner rather than later. The thing is that those resolutions happen at the end of the book, meaning once the problem is resolved, this book you now love will come to an end. This is the basic formula for romance novels. Mistakes Were Made loosely follows this formula but it doesn’t even matter! This has easily become one of my top 5 favorite books of all time! This book is amazing and totally worth every page! There is no fillers or fluff and everything is just perfect!

This book is definitely sex positive! Just In case you didn’t know, the premise is mistakenly sleeping with your best friend’s mom. That being said, if you don’t like sex on the page, this isn’t the book for you. If you’re okay with it, man is this book good!! I loved all of the sex scenes and I have such a soft place for people who have sex and then end up falling in love! The scenes were written so well and I loved the focus on woman loving woman/pleasuring the woman!

I honestly can’t say enough about this book! It was so great! I loved our messy leading ladies and the entire ensemble! Messy gays, messy adults, messy gay adults- we need so many more books with these! I absolutely loved seeing a full adult make mistakes and just exist in this world! She was so relatable! I thought Cassie was also relatable as the “adult” who doesn’t feel like an adult. Both characters portrayed parts of growing up that I think we don’t get to see enough!

Mistakes Were Made is a sapphic one night stand / friend with benefits kind of romance with lots of life lessons mixed in. My favorite being “ f should, do what you feel”. This was my first sapphic romance and I really enjoyed it. Cassie, a college senior, goes to an off campus bar to grab a drink at the beginning of Family Weekend. Erin is a woman who Cassie spies across the bar and buys a drink for. What they think will be a one night stand turns into a not so meet cute the next morning when Erin finds Cassie across the table from her at breakfast because Cassie is her daughter’s best friend. Hook ups and relationships abound from there. I found this story to be well written and I kept reading past my bed time to see what would happen next. There is a bit of spice factor to this one, and I will definitely be recommending to anyone looking for a beginner spice level rom com!
Thank you to Netgalley and SMP Romance / St. Martin’s Press for the opportunity to read this in exchange for my honest opinion.

Age Gap; Best Friends Parent; Care Taking; College; FF; Forbidden Love; Forced Proximity; Holiday; Long Distance Relationship; One night Stand;

This was a good romance, the first one I've read with the best friends parent trope and it worked out well. Beyond physical attraction I was totally sold on the chemestry between the characters but I had a good time reading.

Thank you NetGalley for an ARC of this book!

Man, can you imagine having the hottest hookup of your life, only to find out the next morning that it was your new besties MOTHER?!

We were SO excited to start this book. In the middle we struggled to continue...the characters fell a little flat and we found Cassie to be a bit unlikeable. She was selfish and never gave any real consideration to how Erin might be trying to process things. Also, how are you gonna call Parker your friend and then sneak around behind her back like that?

We enjoyed the way things worked out in the end, and Parker was MUCH more understanding of the whole relationship than anyone else would have been!

Spoilers!

I'd been waiting for this book ever since Something to Talk About, and in terms of its storytelling and pacing, it is miles better than STTA, a book I still really enjoyed. I love the concept of this book and how light it felt to read. The chemistry is absolutely there and that is what makes a book like this, regardless of the whole host of rather spicy scenes. The sexual and romantic scenes were well done and felt real, which was a part of what compelled me to read in the first place.

For the most part, the characters were likable and kept me interested, but some aspects of the characterization and backstory felt underdeveloped and forced. The amount of time Cassie's mother figure, Mama Cass, was mentioned without a single appearance till the end was jarring since Cassie as a character seems to value her so much. I am also not the biggest fan of the miscommunication trope, or rather the trope where everything would be solved with a single conversation that does not take place until after shit hits the fan. This is utilized a bit too much for my taste, to the point of being repetitive and at one point, it felt like the same conflict happening again with the exact same outcome each time. It's a tiring trope that definitely diminished my enjoyment of this otherwise fun and light read.

I have been incredibly excited for the so-called MILF romance ever since I first heard about it and let me tell you that this book lived up to the hype and more. It is sweet and steamy and funny and just a joy to read. There weren’t any pieces of the storyline that felt unnecessary or like they ruined another part of the story, instead all the pieces came together to create something amazing. Cassie and Erin have toe-curling chemistry and some incredible character growth throughout. I can’t recommend it enough.

MISTAKES WERE MADE has all of the hallmarks of my favourite romances, with that classic will-they-won’t-they tension with newer and more unique circumstances. There is some pretty instant chemistry but it doesn’t just stop there, morphing into some serious compatibility. Cassie and Erin don’t just automatically fit, but they grow to one another and work to make a relationship that the reader can believe will truly last.

Another great aspect of this book was the side characters, from Acacia to Parker to all the groups of friends in between. They aren’t just there because it’s generally accepted that a realistic contemporary romance needs more than two characters, they’re a part of the growth and conflict and function as real people. Now I’m emotionally attached to them just a little bit!

This book is delightfully queer, even outside of the main characters. We love bisexual parents with bisexual children! It made me kick my feet with joy, it made me swoon, and at the very end it made me cry. I enjoyed MISTAKES WERE MADE so much, all the angst and romance with just the right amount of tropiness for my taste. There are plenty of mistakes in this book, but reading it was the opposite of one.

4.5⭐️

thank you to the publisher and netgalley for sending me an earc!!

TOP TIER WTF. i am an absolute sucker for dad's best friend / best friend's dad trope but BEST FRIEND'S MOM TROPE >>>>>>>> this was so hot, so fun, and was so hard to put down. if you've read wilsner's other book STTAB, then you already know it wasn't super spicy - like slow burn to the max with one scene at the end. this book?!?!? HOT HOT HOT with like 5+ smex scenes y'all (there is even a face s!tting one ;) and it's vvvvvvery good)

i loved the chemistry between erin and cassie. i loved all of their interactions. i could 100% read a book filled with them doing absolute mundane sh!t. this is a new favorite sapphic ff romance of mine FOR SURE, and i am so excited for my physical copy to come in because i already want to reread this one!

⚠️tw/cw: infidelity (not mcs), abandonment, biphobia, fatphobia, homophobia, toxic relationship

This one was so interesting!! As a bisexual woman, this was a trope I dont see often, but was done extremely well by Wilsner. I am looking forward to more work by Wilsner and am fascinated to see how this book will be recieved by everyone as I loved it!

I loved this story! Erin and Cassie’s chemistry was off the charts. I did struggle a bit during the third aft conflict because they are both adults and could’ve just opened their mouths. All that aside, I felt their internal conflicts were realistic and loved the chapters that included a therapist as well. 10/10 recommend!

the bi milf romance I didn’t know (but should’ve known) I needed. This was SO fun!!!! Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC!

3.5 stars

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley and am voluntarily posting a review. All opinions are my own.

While I wasn’t blown away by Meryl Wilsner’s debut, I was still optimistic they were author that I might like. And Mistakes Were Made sounded like just the right amount of chaos and mess, flipping some common tropes on their head, like “best friend’s parent” with the simple, exciting adage “but make it queer.”

And I really liked the setup, as well as certain facets of the execution. Finding out that Cassie and Parker (Erin’s daughter) are also linked through a prior seedy history of having dated the same guy adds further spice and drama, while managing to make the friendship feel solid enough that there really are stakes and forbid-ness to Cassie and Erin being together. And Erin’s own divorce from Parker’s father as a plot element is also an issue that adds to the conflict, and I appreciated seeing it addressed.

But I wasn’t super-sold on the romance in the long-term. Cassie and Erin’s first interaction culminates in a one-night stand, which pretty much sets the tone for their relationship going forward. While I like a super-steamy romance when there’s substance alongside it, I didn’t feel like I got much of a sense of their development as a couple beyond that. And at the end, we have Cassie seeking Parker’s approval to marry Erin, and while some time has clearly passed, it still didn’t feel earned, as I didn’t have a sense that the connection went beyond the physical.

I haven’t given up on Meryl Wilsner as an author for me, especially reflecting on the fact that I had the opposite problem with their prior book. Depending on the trope(s), I may consider their books in the future. And if you’re on the lookout for steamy sapphic romance with a sort-of forbidden/taboo dynamic, I recommend checking this out!

Incredibly grateful as always to St. Martin's for an early gifted copy of Mistakes Were Made by Meryl Wilsner. I can 100% say that this is not the author for me as I have now read both of their books and did not care for either of them. I almost didn't finish Mistakes Were Made multiple times and ranted to a friend about the issues I was having with it. I don't care that it's an age gap romance. I do care that the characters were often mean to each other, especially Erin and Parker to Cassie regarding "mommy issues." There was also a scene with Adam (Erin's ex) that made absolutely no sense in the context of the story other than to just prove he was a dick. I don't know. I also didn't buy that Parker was ever okay with her mom and Cassie and I think Cassie needed to go to therapy very very badly. There were many things unresolved and overall, I just wasn't charmed. The book is steamy and that's awesome but overall, not for me at all.

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the free e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Mistakes Were Made by Meryl Wilsner follows Cassie, a college senior, and Erin, the mother of Cassie's friend, Parker. They have a one-night stand but then find out how they're connected through Parker. It's an age-gap romance, called The MILF Book on twitter, which is an apt name!

I liked this book, and there was definitely chemistry between Cassie and Erin. I liked their individual characters, but some of the conflict was a bit a contrived. But I felt like there wasn't a ton of tension and the third-act breakup was super rushed. I'm a Third-Act Breakup Hater, so it annoys me in a lot of romances.

i was in it for the drama the whole time, and it didn't disappoint! i loved the forbidden romance, and the happy ending for the characters, as well as the character development.

It's my first book by the author and I really liked it and deeply enjoyed to follow Cassie and Erin's love story. I love age gap romances and if you add the forbidden element, argh, so good.
Loved the strong characters, friendships, the chemistry between the MC and the found family aspect.
Don't let the cute cover fool you, this book is hotter than it looks.
It kind of reminded me of the HBO series Mrs. Fletcher (but sapphic)😅

Erin and Cassie!! Swooooon. Contrary to popular belief, age gap romances don't bother me and this was the perfect steamy sapphic romance. I looooved the banter, no one writes it like Meryl Wilsner and I really adored the characters as well (if you couldn't tell). I think the character development was great and the plot moved at the perfect pace. This is a romance I will be thinking about for a long time and definitely recommending to others. I can't wait to see what Meryl comes up with next!

This was super sweet & fun! There was a lot of sneaking around, and secrets, but it didn’t give me as much anxiety as I thought that it would. I loved both Erin & Cassie, and it was such a joy watching these two fall in love without meaning to, or realizing it.

I also really enjoyed the women in STEM as well with Cassie going into engineering and Erin as a doctor.

I thoroughly enjoyed this one, and think I may need a copy for my shelves!

Mistakes Were Made by Meryl Wisner is a good time! We meet Cassie and Erin - two women who meet at a bar and go home together. What they didn't expect is to see each other out at breakfast the following morning when Erin is taking her college age daughter out during parents weekend and her best friend Cassie joins. What follows is the two doing their best to stay away from each other but inevitably being drawn together.

Overall, this was really fun and I breezed through it. I liked the representation of female relationships and it was fun to stay guessing about what would happen. What I missed was depth. I found the characters to be surface level, with very little connection beyond the physical level and the tension in the book was barely explored and very quickly resolved. It left me wanting more! I would still recommend this though - it was an enjoyable read and it was the perfect book to breeze through on my TBR when I was feeling stuck.

Mistakes Were Made is out 10/11/22. Pick this one up! Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martins Press for the ARC.