Thank you @netgalley @prhaudio for copy of this book. This book is part of the Donut Fall In Love series and can be read as a standalone. I really enjoyed Mel and Vivian's story and their backstory from the first book. I enjoyed the forced friendship as they are in Ryan and Lindsey's wedding. Mel's grandma stole the show - I love how funny she was. The narration was spot on with grandma's voice.

Four and a Half Stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭒
The Stand-Up Groomsman by Jackie Lau is the second book in her popular Donut Fall in Love series but can be easily read as a stand-alone. This romantic comedy is laugh-out-loud funny with an endearing romance.

Story Recap:
Vivian Liao’s roommate just got engaged and has asked Vivian to be her bridesmaid. Vivian is excited until she finds out that Melvin Lee will be the best man. Vivian doesn’t know Mel well, but when they met, Mel made derisive remarks about Vivian’s career in finance. She loves his comic routine and watches videos of him online, and has gone to his shows when he is in Toronto, but she knows he’s a self-centered know it all.

Melvin Lee is a stand-up comic and he’s intrigued with Vivian, but he can’t get past her cold exterior. When they are forced together to do wedding stuff for their best friends, they start to get to know each other better.

My Thoughts:
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and laughed a lot at the jokes. Just like at a comedy club, not all the jokes hit a home run for me, but most of them were funny in my opinion. Also, just like at a comedy club, there was a lot of bad language, however, I did not find it gratuitous, but it was obvious. I also believe it was authentic as most stand-up comedians I watch use a fair amount of bad language so I thought it fit the character.

Mel is such a wonderful character. He is loud, abrasive, and likes to be the center of attention, but deep down inside he has a heart of gold. He’s funny, endearing, and authentic. Vivian is shy, aloof, and well-controlled. Vivian has had a tough upbringing and has her reasons for wanting to be alone and keep her life neat and tidy. And although she becomes attracted to Mel, his chaos does not fit her lifestyle.


Recommendation:
I highly recommend The Stand Up Groomsman to anyone who enjoys romantic comedy. I received a complimentary copy of this book. The opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

Lovely, lovely book. It stands alone sufficiently, and it joins the ranks of my favorite Jackie Lau books. (I just checked; I've read 21; I'm still two books behind in her Cider Bar Sisters series.)

When they initially met, Vivian and Mel got off on the wrong foot: shields up, weapons out. Being in the same wedding party (for Lindsay and Ryan, the couple in the first book) means they're forced to interact, however politely and distantly. They struggle to see each other, until in one completely in-character moment during karaoke, their trajectories intersect, and they see each other, and they start seeing themselves better, too.

Which is an abstract way to say that this is an introspective, opposites-attracts romance, in which the two of them find and make common ground. There's so much interesting character work going on, with their family backgrounds and their ideas of themselves and their futures. I loved reserved Vivian so much. And Mel's stand-up was so interesting: it's easy to see the humor as a self-defense mechanism, an audience-friendly processing, but I really enjoyed the way we saw Mel externalize the pieces of his life and his relationships, and how with that first bit he wrote about Vivian, he was able to give that back as a gift to her, to see and understand her, to weave her into the story of his life, to give her that bit of security and reflection and connection.

I was not wild about the Bleak Moment. I know that sort of insecurity-accumulation is realistic, but it felt so obligatory a plot point, a stark comparison to the rest of the book's interesting, nuanced character work and thoughtful, personal character dynamics. But this is mostly me being a jaded romance-genre veteran. The story works, and I did really enjoy this book.

FTC Disclosure: I received an advance review copy of this book.

3.5⭐️
Thank you Penguin Random House International for my e-ARC

Vivian hates meeting new people. She wasn’t at ease around an unfamiliar face, but over the years, she’d become adept at hiding her anxiety. And now she was going to meet a man. She felt like she knows him because she’d watched every episode of Just Another New York Sitcom. Melvin was her favorite comedian. But when they met up, everything was a disaster. Mel was being a jerk and judgmental in her career. After a year, they met again because of the wedding, both of them will be the bridesmaid and best man. They don’t have a choice but to see each other again.

Melvin was a comedian. He knows that Vivian was mad at him because of what he did 1 year ago. But then he saw her at the audience while he was at the stage for his comedy show and he can’t believe it. After everything, they finally get along. Overall, this is a fine read but I loved Donut Fall in Love more.

The stand-up groomsman is a slooooooow burn, dual POV, enemies to lovers/opposites attract open door romance featuring two bisexual Asian MCs. One of my most anticipated books of the year, I was so excited for this sequel to Donut fall in love by Canadian author Jackie Lau and it truly did not disappoint!

I think what I loved most about this book was that both MCs were in their mid-30s, trying to navigate life and love and their big Asian families. Vivian Liao is a prickly, butchish, newly out bisexual who has always been the caretaker in her relationships (both familial and romantic). A big fan of Melvin Lee as an actor and stand-up comic, the two meet at their friends' bachelor/bachelorette parties only to get off on the wrong foot.

Eventually the two slowly build a friendship and start to take things to the next level but it takes Vivian a long time to trust Mel and give in to the love and comfort he offers. I thought both characters were so well developed and it was refreshing not to see a simple, easy romance. Each has work to do in their personal lives before they're ready for the romance and I enjoyed seeing them go on that journey individually and together!

Great on audio narrated by Eunice Wong and James Sie. My only critique was that I thought the story was a tad longer than it needed to be. Highly recommended, especially for fans of authors like Jayci Lee, Lillie Vale or Lily Chu. Much thanks to NetGalley and Berkley for an early digital copy in exchange for my honest review. I switched between the audio and ebook versions and enjoyed both!

I read and loved Donut Fall in Love last year but if I thought I was easily swayed by sweet treats and abs, I was wrong. In this second story--beautifully connected but wonderfully different--we see quiet, focused Vivian forced into spending more time with depressed, loud comedian Mel for their BFFs' upcoming wedding. While Vivian was once a huge fan, their disastrous first meet left him thinking her cold and her thinking him rude. But the initial attraction from before Mel stuck his foot in his mouth remains, and their shared interests bring them closer together.

I love Vivian and Mel, I love their story, and I love everything about this book even thought there's no doughnuts. Our two deliciously imperfect stars seem perfect for each other in a relatively realistic love story. I'm also deeply impressed by Lau's ability to actually include funny stand-up in a book--which is typically a different skill many authors lack. Extremely impressive!

Thanks to Berkley for my eARC! All thoughts and opinions are my own.

5 stars- 10/10

An absolute *hug* of a romance book! The Stand-Up Groomsman is sweet, funny, and sexy. There is nothing swoonier than a man who can make me laugh. Mel is a perfect book boyfriend, and this is a charming, feel-good story!

• Enemies to Lovers
• Forced Proximity
• Opposites Attract
• Wedding
This was what is sure to be my first of many Jackie Lau reads. I really enjoyed this book immensely; it had a great balance of romcom banter and levity that was enriched by some deeper issues and representation woven in throughout the book.
I found both leads (Mel and Vivian), to be interesting and well-rounded characters. I loved that they each had their own clear driving experiences and journeys. I think that both were a unique blend, not necessarily the personality or experiences I’m used to reading about in a romcom and it made it feel very fresh.
I enjoyed that Vivian was a strong female character, I loved her reasoning behind her job vs hobbies and I really liked that she was put together and a came off a bit serious and sophisticated when we meet her. I loved reading about her family experience since I don’t often see the age gap of siblings dynamic and that was very relatable for me.

With Mel, I could not help but picture him as Kimchee (from Kim’s Convenience, a recent watch and easy favorite), and his bestie Ryan as Jung from the same. I loved his character. I loved that he was a bit over the top and fun, but that he had his own struggles and varying sides to him. He was so sweet and just had a great heart (also, the hedgehogs 💖). I also adored his grandmother.

I had fun reading this one and definitely recommend for those who enjoy a balanced romcom with the levity, deeper issues / representation and heart. I’m excited to try my next Jackie Lau read (the one before this in the standalone series) now that I’ve picked up a copy and find out what happened for Lindsey and Ryan.

Thank you to Netgalley and Berkley Romance for the opportunity to read an early copy. All thoughts and opinions are my own and freely offered.

I have to admit that I was quite bored by this book. Because of that, I had to DNF it about halfway through. The plot and premise seemed interesting, but I just couldn't get through it.

This was my first Jackie Lau book, and I think it might be my first of many! I quite enjoyed this fun little romance novel filled with banter and tension. This book was so cute and I loved the opposites attract trope, I read this on the plane, and while driving (don't worry, I wasn't driving), and I think it's a perfect travel book, or a great book to bring along on vacation to pass the time. Very cute, a lot of fluff, and an all around good time.

The Stand-Up Groomsman by Jackie Lau might be my favorite of hers! Jackie is such a talented author that makes the characters drip off the page. I love it!

So I thought this was was great and sexy and just awesome. I remember these characters from the author‘s previous book, Donut Fall in Love. I honestly didn’t know that this would be connected to that at all which I thought was super cool I love books like that. I love that both characters are bi. I feel like books need to have more of that. But all in all I really did think this was like a fun contemporary and I think people really like it that liked the authors previous books.

I know a Jackie Lau romance is going to make my heart happy. In some ways The Stand-up Groomsman is a departure from the types of Lau books I’ve enjoyed in the past. In this follow up to last year’s Donut Fall in Love Lau takes a more serious tone and unpacks some bigger emotional truths, in this case how we handle expectations and how it interacts with larger family dynamics. But in most ways, this is almost exactly the type of book I’ve come to expect from Lau – there’s tropes that she’s going to play around with and there’s going to be spades of representation.

When Vivian Liao's roommate gets engaged to her favorite actor's costar, she has no choice but to come face-to-face with Melvin Lee again following their terrible first meeting the previous year. He's just as funny and handsome as he is on-screen...but thinks she is a snob and a sellout. Mel is used to charming audiences as an actor and stand-up comedian but can't connect to Vivian even though he wants to make up for judging her based on his own fears and experiences. The only thing uniting them is their goal for their friends’ wedding to go off without a hitch. As they collaborate on wedding cake and karaoke parties, antagonism turns to burgeoning friendship to something more.

The Stand-up Groomsman features both opposites attract and enemies to friends to lovers. It's also a queer m/f book as both main characters are bi. Vivian and Mel have vastly different temperaments and personalities, which made for an interesting chemistry. Lau writes well-rounded leads who understand and respect each other's boundaries. It was not a typical relationship, and the ways in which Lau steps outside the “norm” meant a great deal to me personally and I was excited to see it. This one doesn’t shy away from making a happily ever after for its characters that makes sense for them, not for what might be expected for them.

A major emotional beat is worth and family expectations about Mel and Vivian’s relationships with their families. Vivian is made miserable by her family, specifically by their expectations of who she should be and the way they robbed her of her childhood by forcing her to act as a third parent for her younger siblings. Between her family and her terrible ex Vivian is convinced that people only want to be with her for what they can get from her. She must find that she is worth happiness and someone who sees her as she is and loves her without expectations, which paves the way for a consistent undercurrent of how consistently kind the leads are to each other. Mel also has trauma he must work through, and Vivian is steadfast in her support of his healthy boundaries as she has fought for her own.

It could be easy to get frustrated with Vivian, and I was for sections of book, but at the same time Lau uses Vivian’s past experiences well in explaining who she is today and how her personality formed. There were some things that weren’t great – the grovel was too quick for my tastes. I also got possibly irrationally angry with the break-up at the 80% mark. Lau occasionally falls back on telling the reader how the characters are feeling, instead of letting the characters’ behaviors and actions do the speaking, but overall this book and its predecessor are worth your time.

3.5 rounded up to 4.

I really enjoyed this book! I loved the dynamic between our two main characters, and the inclusion of a stand-up comedian gave this a unique twist.

Jackie Lau knows how to keep a story flowing. Her writing is amazing in both Donut Fall in Love and this follow up novel. Loved reading about old characters being elaborated on as well!

Second book in the series that started with Donut Fall in Love, which I loved.

This story focused on two of the supporting characters from the first book - Vivian, the roommate, and Melvin, the co-star. The romance had some fresh takes - long distance and no drive toward the altar - but I found the characters lackluster. Melvin's stand up bits were quite simply... not funny. They tended to rely on physical gags that were very difficult to conjure in my head, which made them land pretty flat.

I really enjoyed this follow up to Donut Fall in Love. I think it would be easy to get frustrated with Vivian but at the same time it was well shown how her past experiences shaped who she is today and how her personality formed. And so when someone like Melvin treats her differently and more in line with how she prefers, it’s hard to trust. It was great how Melvin never attempted to change anything about her.

Thank you to the author and NetGalley for the ARC!

I didn't realize that this book was a series when I started it. This story follows the couple’s respective close friends from In Donut Fall In Love.

Melvin is a stand-up comic with a vibrant personality rivaled only by his bold shirts. Vivian is a buttoned-up finance professional who loves the color gray and makes fan art in her spare time. The two definitely don’t hit it off at first, but opposites might really attract as they’re thrown together for their friends’ wedding activities.

I really liked this book and will go back and read In Donut Fall In Love now!

The Stand-Up Groomsman by Jackie Lau features Asian protagonists who don't quite hit it off when they meet, but who have to repeatedly see each other because of the wedding of their best friends. Contempt leads to attraction, but is it the kind of love that will last? Vivian and Mel have an unmistakable chemistry that is fun to read about, but there are some repetitious scenarios that distract from the plot.

This was a cute book but it was hard for me to get into it to start. It was almost a DNF. However, it did get a lot better and I was able to enjoy the story. I really enjoyed the character Vivian but Mel kinda annoyed me through the book. still, it was a really cute read and I recommend it for anyone that enjoys enemies to lovers trope.