This story is so cute. It really speaks to me about trying to date but also not trying to get into relationship. I really enjoyed the main MC and how she trying to navigate her business and maintaining independence but then HE came along. I understand his disappointment with dating apps. It’s either hit or miss. The plot was so cute and I laughed way too much than I should. I enjoyed the author’s writing and how it came together.

A Guide to Being Just Friends is Sophie Sullivan’s newest romantic comedy, a sequel to Ten Rules for Faking It and How to Love Your Neighbor.

Hailey Sharp is a 20-something chef who has left the Hollywood studio world to re-locate to a smaller California town. She has opened her By the Cup salad shop and is struggling to make it a success. She supported herself and her actor ex-boyfriend, so she feels burned by love and men, and just wants to focus on her business.

Wes Jansen isn’t interested in relationships because he witnessed the ugly end of his parents’ marriage and subsequent divorce. He’s had bad luck with dates and has decided to find someone who he likes but won’t love. Companionship, not passion, is the name of the game.

Hailey meets Wes at a neighboring coffee shop when he mistakes her for his absentee blind date, Hayden. When Wes’ sister-in-law finds out, she makes him find Hailey to apologize for his behavior. They become friends because that’s all they will allow themselves to be. Being surrounded by Wes’ younger brothers and their women encourages them to take their relationship further.

A Guide to Being Just Friends is an enjoyable friends-to-lovers slow-burn romantic comedy. The characters are very engaging and it was nice to continue the stories from Ten Rules for Faking It and How to Love Your Neighbor. Hailey and Wes each have personal baggage to deal with, and it’s fun to go along the ride with them!

I received an advance review copy (ARC) from NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

This was totally not my gig. This is like all the bad parts of When Harry Met Sally jammed into a book. Wes and Hailey spend the first half of this book being friends but also constantly bringing up to each other that they are only friends (you know.... as you do with all your friends) and then the second half of the book being insufferable and flip flop-y. I never really ended up rooting for this relationship or for any of these characters (except Leo!).

This book was... fine. I didn't realize it was the third book of a series, so I got quite lost when some of the side characters and their partners were introduced (especially since most of them don't play much of a role in the plot). The plot was straightforward and cute. I do love a female main character like Hailey who can do it all! I normally read spicier novels, so having this PG-rated novel was a refreshing change.

Strangely, one thing I found myself wishing for was... more commas. A few more commas would have made some of the longer sentences more readable.

Thank you so much to Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

A Guide to Just Being Friends by Sophie Sullivan

Published: January 17, 2023
St. Martin’s Griffin
Pages: 330
Genre: Romantic Comedy
KKECReads Rating: 4/5
I received a copy of this book for free, and I leave my review voluntarily.

Sophie Sullivan is a Canadian author as well as a cookie-eating, Diet Pepsi-drinking, Disney enthusiast who loves reading and writing romance in almost equal measure. She writes around her day job as a teacher and spends her spare time with her sweet family watching reruns of Friends. TEN RULES FOR FAKING IT is her rom-com debut novel, but she's had plenty of practice writing happily ever after as her alter ego, Jody Holford.

“It would look like whatever they made it, together.”

Hailey has just opened her salad shop and is fully invested in her fresh start. Her ex hurt her, so her focus is entirely on her business. And maybe making some friends, but mostly her business. When she has a random encounter with a handsome stranger, she doesn’t put too much into it. Until she meets him again, and they decide they are going to be just friends.

This was such a charming story. I loved the characters, and I will have to read the previous two books to get to know them better.

Hailey was charismatic, sweet, and utterly herself. Wes was determined to be successful and entirely in control. He was not expecting a Hailey-shaped whirlwind to blow into his life, but here she was.

I loved the brothers' dynamic and the bond between the women. I enjoyed the wit and the banter. I also love that this story leaned into the romcom tropes and embraced the classics.

This relationship felt authentic. This could be how a forever love happens, and I found that endearing. I enjoyed the plot, the pacing, and the self-awareness the characters had.

I liked how the main characters could look inside themselves and realize their flaws without being wrecked about them. The relationships throughout this novel are all so heartfelt and genuine.

This was my first rom-com by Sophie Sullivan, but it won’t be my last. I found her writing style easygoing and entertaining. I had a hard time putting this book down. A light, beautiful read for any romcom fan.

📖 ARC REVIEW 📖

Thank you @smpromance and @stmartinspress for an early copy of A Guide to Being Just Friends by Sophie Sullivan. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily. 🤍

A Guide to Being Just Friends is a slow-burn, enemies to friends to lovers romance about Hailey, who’s had enough of relationships after her last disastrous one and has decided to live her life the way she wants to by making her salad business flourish, and Wes, who doesn’t believe in love and romantic relationships after seeing his parents’ ugly divorce Their first meeting didn’t go so well, but after a heartfelt apology from Wes, who at that time was an ass, they became friends and insisted they don’t want to further their relationship, with Hailey refusing to have any distractions from her business, and Wes being reluctant to falling in love.

🛑 Read on with caution; may contain spoilers 🛑

Contrary to the title, the story isn’t really about a “guide” to being just friends. To summarize, it just tells the story of two friends who keep insisting they’re just friends and nothing more, until they finally admit to themselves that they’re attracted to each other and want to further their relationship, albeit all their excuses and reasons for not ruining their friendship. They only acted upon their attraction to each other at around 65% of the book; prior the 65% was all about them being friends and denying their feelings, and tbh, the novel would have been just a tad bit shorter if a ton of the scenarios during the first 65% of the book was cut off from the story. Things just got interesting for the couple at 75%.

While the story could have been shorter, I did love the main characters individually. I loved Hailey’s determination to make her business succeed and her perseverance to stay focused, and while Wes was a tad overprotective with his family and also with Hailey, I did love his reason behind all his actions – he just wants to take care of the people he cares about.

Rating A Guide to Being Just Friends ⭐⭐⭐/5. Releases January 17th, 2023. Would recommend if you love slow-burn romances!

And with that the Jansen Brothers books are concluded.

I'm happy that Sophie Sullivan decided to end this series with a friends-to-lovers romance because I don't read a lot of this trope so it felt refreshing for me!

This book follows the oldest Jansen brother, Wes, who recently followed his younger brothers out to California to start a new life out from under their father's thumb. Because he was the oldest he was the one who shielded them from the force of their parent's nasty divorce, so now that experience, coupled with a strong of bad dates, has convinced him that he does not want to fall in love, he simply wants companionship. Enter Hailey who recently moved to the area to start fresh after a bad break up. She has decided to focus all her attention on getting her new salad shop off the ground and not on jumping into another relationship. Perfect!

I really enjoyed getting to know Wes and Hailey. I loved that she was more of the sunshine character while he wasn't necessarily the grump, but definitely more reserved. The fact that their friend activity was going grocery shopping every Saturday was adorable and made me want to have a grocery shop friend!

However, both characters were stubborn to a fault when it came to their independence. Neither would accept help from anyone to the point where it became frustrating to read (though that may have been the author's point).

I liked how the author tied up not just their story, but the stories of the other brothers at the end as well! I would recommend this one!

Hailey and Wes have a cute friends to lovers transition in this 3rd book of the Jansen Brother series. It works well as a stand alone and has a dual close 3rd POV, which is great because we get to see the way their minds go through doubts, fear, and even some excitement as they develop romantic feelings for each other.

I get that Hailey owns a salad shop, but everyone talks about salad waaay more than what is necessary and I often wondered what else their conversations consisted of.

The writing is okay, the dialogue isn’t strong, and sometimes events just happen and there’s no context until halfway through the chapter. The first few chapters were hard to get through and, but the rest of it was smooth sailing mainly because Wes and Hailey have a really sweet friendship and I was deeply invested.

I appreciate that while there was a happy ending, it was a very bumpy ride getting there BUT everything that Wes said in that breakup convo was wild and so out of nowhere. Honestly, these characters both need to go to therapy because they’ve both carried so much childhood trauma into their relationship–it’s almost too much at certain points.

An emotional rollercoaster for sure, with some tender moments and funny moments.

I can't remember the last time I read a book that was this boring. Almost nothing happens. There is a truly insane amount of talk about salads. Yes, salads.

A GUIDE TO BEING JUST FRIENDS started off really strong, but after the first quarter of the book is turned into a non-stop cycle of low-drama story.

Salad. Just friends. Mild sexual tension. Salad. I can grow this business on my own. Salad. My ex made me feel worthless. Just friends. Salad. Mild miscommunication. More than just friends. Salad. I can grow this business on my own. Mild miscommunication. More salad.

The female friendships were great. The brothers' dynamic was great. Everything else was incredibly boring. A GUIDE TO BEING JUST FRIENDS was filled with curse words and sexual innuendos, only to be very closed door. It felt very incongruent.

𝗥𝗔𝗧𝗜𝗡𝗚: ⭐️⭐️💫
𝗦𝗧𝗘𝗔𝗠 𝗟𝗘𝗩𝗘𝗟: Rated PG / Kissing and awareness that characters sleep together. Closed Door.
𝗧𝗥𝗜𝗚𝗚𝗘𝗥𝗦: parent who cheated, awful ex
𝗙𝗘𝗘𝗟𝗦: 2/5 - A bit of drama, but still a pretty light read.

I didn't realize this book was the third in a series when I requested it, but it ended up working out okay, it was fairly easy to follow.

I really did not enjoy reading about mostly salads and business, rather than character development or romance. Also, how is a salad restaurant groundbreaking, especially in CA? There are chain salad restaurants all over the country. Anyways, I also don't like reading about rich business man as love interests, it's so frustrating.

The dialogue was also a bit stilted and overall, it was pretty boring and forgettable.

Rating: Enjoyed It, 3.5 stars, rounded down to 3

This is the second book I've read by Sophie Sullivan, and ultimately I think I've decided that her books are fun, but not my favorite romance books. This is the third book in the Jansen Brothers companion series, and in this one we get the love story of Wes, the oldest Jansen brother, and Hailey, the new owner of a to-go salad company that just opened in town.

This is a slow burn misunderstanding-to-friends-to-lovers story. It was not just slow-burn, it was extremely slow-burn. It took a veeeerrry long time to get through the sparks and the pining, but it was overall a really fun story if not as memorable as I would like.

What I liked:
- I like friends to lovers, and this one was drawn out over time so it didn't seem to just happen all at once, which can be annoying. I thought it was an interesting premise of two broken people who are coming together as friends to heal.
- I liked Hailey and her boundless optimism. I love a good restaurant story
- I like the banter between Wes, his brothers, and their group of friends. I love a good found family and that's just what this is.
- It's a dual POV, so we get both Wes and Hailey's perspectives, which I appreciate

Things that didn't work as well for me:
- I don't love the writing style. I think that it's a lot more telling than I like. I feel like we get the characters thinking about their feelings and thinking the same types of things over and over again to really hammer home the same point, which got very repetitive and annoying
- I also really hated the third act conflict. I thought that the reason for the conflict felt really dumb, especially given how many times Hailey expressed her feelings to him. Overall, it made it all feel like the characters were really terrible at communication. And even though it was kind of a dumb conflict. Wes had such huge trauma from his parents divorce that was impacting him, and he just got over it all with one conversation with his brothers and it completely changed everything, which was so very unrealistic.

Overall, it was a fun story and I wanted to know what happened, but I doubt I will remember much about this in a few weeks. I recommend if the tropes sound good and you want an easy-breezy popcorn read.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an eARC in exchange for an honest review. A Guide to Being Just Friends releases on January 17, 2023.

A Guide to Being just Friends is a super cute friends-to-lovers (obviously) contemporary romance. I loved the characters and the variety of their personalities. Wes and Hailey had a group of friends that makes you want to be part of their circle.

What I probably appreciated most about this book is how Wes ACTUALLY COMMUNICATED his feelings and apologized when needed. He seemed more self-aware than many male MCs and I found it refreshing. That said however, there is a bit of not necessarily miscommunication, but withholding of information later in the book that seemed very out of character for him.

I loved how Hailey was all about being a strong independent woman. I loved her salad shop and the crew she eventually hires. While I appreciated how she didn't want anyone stepping in to rescue her and that she stubbornly resolved to make it 100% on her own, I felt it went a bit too far at times.

I did love the relationship between Hailey and Wes the whole way through, from the meet-cute, as a great pair of friends, and as a couple. They were kind of (endearingly) awkward for a while, but also had great chemistry.

My only complaint is the ending. I'll try to keep this as spoiler-free as possible, but ***stop reading if you don't want to know what happens to Hailey and Wes in the epilogue!***
I was very disappointed that we didn't get to see the proposal, and the fact that the epilogue was taking place later on the day he proposed just seemed weird. Plus, the timing of the proposal with the other event happening the same day almost seemed to de-value it in my eyes. Dude, make your own special day!

Other than that, I really enjoyed this book and would highly recommend it to fans of strangers-to-friends-to-lovers, found family, MCs who own a restaurant, and male MCs who know how to communicate and don't act like petulant children.

A heartfelt thank you to NetGalley and St. Martins Press for the advance copy in exchange for my honest review!

This was a super cute rom-com. It was a very easy read that went by really quickly. I loved how it was a true friends-to-lovers slow burn. The characters actually got to know each other, instead of instantly falling in love, and I really enjoyed experiencing the shift in their relationship. I think Hailey is a super fun, independent woman who would be an amazing friend to have in real life. I loved watching Wes thaw for her and open himself up more. I really enjoyed this book and will definitely be going back to read the first two books in this series, I had no clue this was the 3rd book, and enjoying Chris and Noah’s stories.

3.5 stars rounded up to 4.
I enjoyed ‘A Guide to Being Just Friends’ by Sophie Sullivan, which I read as a stand-alone—though I now have plans to go back and read the series.
The friends to lovers trope plays out with Hailey, an ambitious shop owner new to town, and Wes, the always serious eldest Jansen Brother. I enjoyed seeing their friendship build, truly feeling chemistry and sparks as they discovered little quirks about each other and of course a HEA ending. I do wish that Hailey had not been so closed off to the idea of Wes, someone she claims to love providing her with any help or support, but this does get resolved by book end. I also felt that the meet-cute was not all that cute.
Overall a quick, lighthearted read with a HEA to make your heart happy.

Thank you to St Martins Press & NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I didn’t realize this was book number three in a series when I requested it on NetGalley. If I had known that bit of information prior to requesting it, I don’t think I would have requested it. I felt a bit lost throughout the book and probably would have known the characters better had I read the first two books. This is a slow burn romance that didn’t capture my attention. Unfortunately it was a miss for me. Maybe I would have liked it better if I had read the first books in the series, or maybe not.

This book was cute. I was not blown away by it, it didn't stay with me days past finishing it, but I enjoyed it while it lasted. The characters were cute, the friends to lovers story is always a fun one. Their relationship was fun to read about. It was a quick, fun romance read. If you want a steamy, can't put down type of book, this one is not it. If you want a cute rom-com, definitely pick it up.

Hailey opened up a salad shop and is doing everything to make it a success, with no distractions. Wes doesn't understand relationships. He focuses on work and his family. When Wes and Hailey accidentally meet, they plan to go their separate ways. But of course, they run into each other again and strike up a friendship, since friendship is all either of them want.

Thank you Netgalley for my advanced reader copy.

When Hailey and Wes find each other in a disastrous meet cute that wasn’t even intended for them, they embarrassingly go their separate ways. But when Wes finds Hailey to apologize for his behavior, they strike a friendship.”

Who doesn’t love a good Friends to Lovers trope?

Not this girl.

I liked a lot about this book, actually. I liked the friend set. I liked the family background depth. I liked the money weirdness.

I especially liked knowing that there were other stories before (and maybe after?) that I can track down, but that it didn’t hinder my enjoyment of Book #3.

I DON’T love Miscommunication as a trope – are romance writers contractually obligated to use it? – and so quickly got tired of the whole, “We like each other, but couldn’t possibly have a legit conversation about our feelings, so we’ll just continue to misunderstand each other’s motives.” thing.

Luckily that didn’t last long.

I can’t say this books was super action-packed (the girl sells salad, for goodness sake), but it delivered exactly what was promised.

6.5/10

Thanks to NetGalley, St. Martin’s Press, and Macmillan Audio for this feel-good ARC.

I liked reading this continuation of the Jansen brothers, though it wasn't my favorite of the series. It was a sweet romance between Hailey and Wes, filled with a growing friendship, avoidance of feelings, building businesses, seeking dreams and supporting one another through it all. But I felt like there was potential for so much more depth that just fell flat.

If you are looking for a lighter romance book that has the strangers-to-friends-to-lovers trope, this would be a good one to pick up. I didn't realize it was one of a series, but can definitely be read as a standalone. I wish the plot was a little less wordy/detailed. But overall a nice read.

Read this book if you like: Dual POV, friends to lovers, slow burn, nerdy MC

Hailey Sharp is in a new town starting over. She has just opened Get By the Cup, a salad shop. With a head full of entrepreneurial ideas and a bad ex in her rearview, her one and only focus is living life the way she wants to. No distractions.

Wes Jansen has also just moved to town. With a string of lackluster first dates and the pain from his parent's angry divorce following him around, he’d much rather find someone who he likes, but won’t love. Companionship, not passion, is the name of the game.

When Hailey and Wes find each other in a disastrous meet cute that wasn’t even intended for them, they embarrassingly go their separate ways. Wes finds Hailey to apologize for his behavior leading them to strike a friendship.

This was cute and sweet. Wes is smart, analytical, nerdy, very particular. Hailey is more carefree, sunshiney. She left an abusive relationship to start over. I loved the meet cute with Wes and Hailey. I like the friends to lovers trope but not that it takes so long for them to realize sometimes. I prefer to see the couple together longer. The story felt slow and uneventful at times leading me to mentally check out. I will likely read the previous two books. I liked the characters. I loved the salad recipes and parts with the salad shop. This was a good book and I do recommend it!

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and St. Martin's Press for the gifted book! ❤️