The American Roommate Experiment has a lot of tropes going on - slow burn, roommates/friends-to-lovers, forced proximity, fake dating, and best friend's cousin to name a few. The majority of these I love, but considering the length of this book, the slow burn was a bit long for my personal preference. Once we got to the fake dating, I could feel more of the connection between Rosie and Lucas and was finally invested. Honestly, I did really enjoy this story and these characters, I just wish think I may have loved it more if it wasn't so long (aka the slow burn wasn't so long).
Thank you Simon & Schuster Canada, Atria Books, for the copy through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

unfortunately, i just don't think this author is for me at this moment. i know a lot of people love her but i just can't get into her books.

I found this book slow and I could not finish it. Sorry it just was not for me. I can imagine it be a wonderful read for the right person.

This one was good! A bit quirky and fun but definitely a slow burn (although shout out to the shower scene we’re all still thinking about 🧼🛀🚿). This one definitely was cheesy but definitely had me swooning a little bit and maybe just maybe finding my best fictional crushes 🥰

Honestly, I enjoy this author and Spanish love deception despite its slow pace. This book, however, did not give the same vibe, nor did I enjoy reading it, It's slow and took a million years to get to the point. I like her writing style but this book was definitely a miss for me. That being said it wasn't a terrible book so I would recommend it to those that may enjoy it.

I got bored and just couldn’t finish this book
I can’t recommend this book to my readers. It did sound good so I was very disappointed.

The American Roommate Experiment has plenty of tropes that are common in romance but still manages to give all the feels.

This is the author’s follow-up novel to The Spanish Love Deception but follows a different set of characters.

Rosie Graham recently quit her engineering job to pursue her writing career. Her first book was a huge success, but now she’s experiencing writer’s block and staring down the deadline for her next book, which is due in a few short weeks.

To make matters worse, the ceiling in her apartment collapses, forcing Rosie to move into Lina’s apartment, her best friend, who happens to be away on her honeymoon.

But it turns out Lina forgot to tell Rosie that her cousin Lucas would be crashing at her apartment while she was away. The same gorgeous cousin Rosie has been lightly stalking on Instagram for months.

What follows is an irresistible story of fake dating, friends to lovers, and forced proximity that is hard to put down.

It alternates perspectives between Rosie and Lucas. The tension between these two led to some hilarious and awkward moments. I liked both characters, but occasionally I did wish Rosie had the confidence to believe what Lucas was telling her; instead of constantly convincing herself he didn’t mean it.

I had no clue this was a spin-off of the super popular Spanish Love Deception, which was probably a good thing since I haven’t read it yet and had no inclination to do so. But if it’s as compelling as this one, I might have to reconsider it.

This is a great choice to pull you out of a reading slump. I raced through the second half of it.

I’ve been enjoying my foray into romance, it’s a bit outside of my usual genres, but the few I have read have been delightful.

Whether or not you’ve read The Spanish Love Deception, I highly recommend giving this one a try.

Thank you to Atria Books for providing me with an arc via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review

I didn't really love The Spanish Love Deception as much as everyone else did but I still thought it was cute and enjoyable with a bit of spice. However The American Roommate Experiment was even slower and harder to get into. I found the characters to be awkward in a not-cute way and the secondhand embarrassment was real. A letdown unfortunately!

Read if you like: friends to lovers, close proximity
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Rosie goes to stay in her friend Lina's apartment after the roof of hers caves in. But what she doesn't realize is that Linda told her cousin, Lucas from Spain, that he could stay in her apartment while visiting NYC. The two have to navigate sharing a studio apartment together.
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This was really cute and fun! I loved the chemistry between Lucas and Rosie and thought they worked well together. Lucas was adorable and so great toward Rosie. You could tell that Lucas not only cared for Rosie but also respected her. This book is the definition of a slow burn romance and I really enjoyed it!
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CW: sexual content, injury, panic attacks, violence, abandonment, infidelity, mental illness.

4. 25 Stars (I received an e-arc from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review)

While I didn’t read it as fast the authors previous book, this was a sweet slow burn of a book with a way less cringey sex scene. The setting is almost similar to how it would be nowadays with the how an actual romance would develop. This was a lot sweeter due to the fact Rosie actually followed Lucas on social media before meeting him and had developed a little crush on him. Both characters are going through their own struggles but Rosie is a bit a of a pushover and quite self deprecating, which at times makes me want to shake her. Honestly it’s a good thing she has Lucas through the book because she is too soft for the world at times. Her brothers storyline was an interesting addition to the book which did help Rosie bring out her more protective side. This is more of an emotional romance than the first book but still a good read.

Loved this title so much! Lucas and Rosie’s story was such a sweet friends to lovers; slowburn story.

My access to this title expired before I had the chance to read it but I’ve heard many amazing things about both of the books by this author and will definitely be recommending them for that reason alone

3.5 stars, rounded down.

The American Roommate Experiment was one of those books that I really wanted to love, but just didn’t live up to the hype for me.

I had intended to read this book as a standalone, but right off the bat I felt like I was missing a whole lot of backstory between Rosie and Lucas – she’s just way too immediately excited about meeting him without any kind of context? I ended up pausing my read to read The Spanish Love Deception only to find out that there’s just a lot that happens “off screen” in between the books. The set up might not have bothered me as a first book in a series or if I’d just read TSLD to begin with, but without reading it first I felt like I must have missed something.

Authors writing about characters in the publishing industry is also really hit or miss for me and this was a huge miss. Rosie felt way too much like Elena Armas writing herself into the story. An author who self-published her first book and then was picked up by an agent for a second one after it became wildly popular sound familiar to anyone else?

It took me a long time to feel any kind of investment in Rosie and Lucas (like half the book), but once they actually started going on dates it picked up a lot and I was really interested in reading the rest (it took me probably a week to finish the first half of the book and a couple hours to read the second half).

The fake dating really redeemed this book for me.
1. Lucas is an absolute sweetheart who plans the cutest dates for Rosie and they’re all so fun to read.
2. Lucas and Rosie really connect and you can see how well they really get to know each other and look out for each other through the rest of the book.
3. Around the same time the dates started, the roommates trope started feeling way more fun and cute than awkward.

Overall, The American Roommate Experiment was a cute read but nothing really stood out to me as special and it had some issues with pacing.

*Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you Simon And Schuster Canada for a copy of The American Roommate Experiment for review. I liked The Spanish Love Deception but definitely enjoyed this one a lot more. Rosie and Lucas seem to have an immediate connection and the date experiments that Lucas prepares are so cute. This book really made me smile. It was a little slower closer to the end and the non-communication between these two when it came to their feelings for each other did seem to make it drag a bit, but the pizza date did inspire me to have a date night with my husband so I loved that too. Really cute story and fun characters who need to learn to talk more!

4.5 stars!

The American Roommate Experiment was one of my most anticipated releases of this year and IT DELIVERED!

Our main characters were Rosie and Lucas. Rosie, we met briefly in The Spanish Love Deception and I absolutely loved her. Lucas on the other hand, we only got a few veerryy interesting mentions of and I was intrigued to meet him.
This story served one of my favorite tropes, the fake-dating one and I didn't imagine it to be as slow burn as it was.
Lucas, on my mind and given what we had heard about him previously, was giving grumpy- bad boy vibes but boy I was wrong...
This man was an absolute sunshine. He would do anything not only for Rosie but for his family as well.
(Extra points for his dog, Taco 😭)
Now the romantic aspect was executed well and I must say, even if I'm not the biggest fan of friends to lovers, I had such a fun time with these two and their amazing chemistry!
Last but not least I wanted to thank Elena herself for making Lina and Aaron cameos bigger than what I expected. They had A LOT of screen time and let me tell you, I was eating it all up!

I would totally recommend this one to not only the fans of The Spanish Love Deception but also to someone new that wants to try Elena Armas and what better way than a sweet fake dating love story!?

3.5 / 5
THE AMERICAN ROOMMATE EXPERIMENT (TARE) by Elena Armas is a trope-filled rom-com that provides a romantic escape.

Ingredients include: forced proximity, fake dates, grand gestures, swoony rain scene, airport scene, sexual tension, and man that cooks.
Active ingredients: His and hers POVs! My favourite!

The plot: Ermm… all the sexual tension made me forget the plot. The sexual tension IS the plot. The sexual tension was peak and suddenly I didn’t care about the cheesiness or the fact that they kept using each other’s names in almost every sentence (no one speaks like that, Rosie — It can be annoying, Lucas). I even overlooked the overuse of being “pinned” by someone’s stare. Yup, the sexual tension was that good.

Lucas Martín: *Added to list of book boyfriends*

I did not read The Spanish Love Deception but I will now because of how much I loved Lina in TARE.

Recommend to a friend? Yea — if you love sexual tension and are looking for a romantic escape.
I may not have fallen in love with this book, but there was definitely LUST!

Thank you to Simon and Schuster Canada and NetGalley for sending me this! 💙

The American Roommate Experiment is a slow burn friends to lovers contemporary romance.

The first half of the book had so much potential for me - I loved how smiley and easy-going Lucas was. Rose has been the most awkward character I’ve ever met. I really enjoyed their interactions at the beginning, especially how charming Lucas was. I did enjoy the cameos made by Lina and Aaron from the Spanish Love Deception!

However, the second part of the book was such a let down for me. The fact that neither of them realised the other one is in love was honestly mind-blowing. And Rosie's book that was supposed to be a central element was never mentioned in the epilogue. Overalls, the characters lacked depth and their miscommunication issues were so annoying and made no sense.

I loved this book right from the very beginning. The way that Rosie and Lucas are thrown together is a new take on the forced proximity trope. The fact that Rosie had been social media stalking him for months just added to the chemistry.

The premise of the book is a fun one. Rosie is a successful author trying to write a second romance book with a deadline fast approaching. She lacks inspiration and can’t seem to get started. Enter Lucas from Spain who not only lives with her but agrees to take her on a series of dates meant to motivate Rosie to start writing. These dates stimulate more than Rosie’s need to write.

It is this level of electricity between the two that sealed the deal on my love of this book. While each of them tried to deny these feelings knowing that Lucas’ stay in the U.S. had an expiry date. The passion is real and both continue the dates knowing that it will never be able to last.

While the book is part of the author’s Spanish Love Deception series, it can certainly be read as a standalone. This was my original intention. After reading this book, however, I want to go back and read the first book in the series The Spanish Love Deception. There is an overlap of characters in these books.

The American Roommate Experiment has well-developed, likeable characters and is one of my favourite romance books I’ve read this year. I look forward to reading other books written by the author.

4.5 stars

I received an early copy of this book for review purposes. All opinions are my own.

The American Roommate Experiment has plenty of tropes that are common in romance but still manages to give all the feels.

This is the author’s follow-up novel to The Spanish Love Deception but follows a different set of characters.

Rosie Graham recently quit her engineering job to pursue her writing career. Her first book was a huge success, but now she’s experiencing writer’s block and staring down the deadline for her next book, which is due in a few short weeks.

To make matters worse, the ceiling in her apartment collapses, forcing Rosie to move into Lina’s apartment, her best friend, who happens to be away on her honeymoon.

But it turns out Lina forgot to tell Rosie that her cousin Lucas would be crashing at her apartment while she was away. The same gorgeous cousin Rosie has been lightly stalking on Instagram for months.

What follows is an irresistible story of fake dating, friends to lovers, and forced proximity that is hard to put down.

It alternates perspectives between Rosie and Lucas. The tension between these two led to some hilarious and awkward moments. I liked both characters, but occasionally I did wish Rosie had the confidence to believe what Lucas was telling her; instead of constantly convincing herself he didn’t mean it.

I had no clue this was a spin-off of the super popular Spanish Love Deception, which was probably a good thing since I haven’t read it yet and had no inclination to do so. But if it’s as compelling as this one, I might have to reconsider it.

This is a great choice to pull you out of a reading slump. I raced through the second half of it.

I’ve been enjoying my foray into romance, it’s a bit outside of my usual genres, but the few I have read have been delightful.

Whether or not you’ve read The Spanish Love Deception, I highly recommend giving this one a try.

Thank you to Atria Books for providing me with an arc via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

https://booksandwheels.com

There’s a slight possibility that I loved this more than The Spanish Love Deception.
While we have another slow burn on our hands here, the chemistry and the banter between Rosie and Lucas is top notch. The meet cute between the two was so good, it had me laughing, and the experimental dates were so sweet, that is was lovely to watch their love story!

I loved Rosie in The Spanish Love Deception, so I was ecstatic when I heard she was getting her own book! She was sweet, vulnerable and loyal as ever.
Lucas was just, ugh.. dare I say, I love him more than Aaron? Also sweet and vulnerable, I loved getting his POV and how he helped Rosie gain inspiration for her latest endeavour.

Of course Lina and Aaron make appearances throughout and it was fantastic to see how well they’re doing. Charo also made a few appearances, still as vibrant and funny as ever (I wouldn’t complain if she got her own book).

The American Roommate Experiment has solidified Elena Armas as an auto buy author for me, and if you loved The Spanish Love Deception, I highly recommend picking this one up.

Many thanks to Simon & Schuster Canada for an advanced digital copy via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.