An absolutely adorable holiday rom-com story! The anxiety rep was so amazing to read, and I loved seeing Ellie's growth. She absolutely deserved the ending she got.

Thank you so much for the opportunity to read and review this ARC!

DNF at 15%

I really did not enjoy the start of this book. I truly did not like the heroine's narration/voice, and felt like the anxiety representation was honing in on harmful stereotypes rather than giving nuance to her character. I also wasn't into the humor.

Rather than continue through and give a very harsh review, i'm DNFing and hoping someone else enjoys this more than I did.


I received an ARC copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.

Alison Cochrun's sophomore novel, KISS HER ONCE FOR ME, is the queer holiday romance of my dreams! Cochrun's premise seems cutesy and innocent enough—fake engagement, chance encounters on Christmas Eve, the overbearing and loving BFF—but in true Cochrun style, nothing is as simple as it appears.

This novel dives deep into the fear of failure, what it means to be honest with yourself and with others, and how to reconcile your own past trauma so you can fully love someone else. One of the things I love most about this book is Ellie's growth and self-discovery. Yes, this is a Christmas Rom-Com, and yes this book had me singing ALL the 90s pop and Christmas classics. Out Loud. In July. And yes, this will forever be a December re-read for me. But more than that—Cochrun gets to the heart of what it truly means to be honest with yourself and with others.

Cochrun's writing is witty, her banter is the BEST, and I love the way she handles flashbacks. I cannot say enough good things about this book. Please add it to your TBR as soon as possible. I wish I could give it six stars!

Ah well, this was too adorable for words! This book is perfect for a little Christmas in July. If you are in the mood for a queer, fluffy, holiday romance then this book is for you!

Ellie falls in love in just one night. She has a meet-cute with a woman named, Jack, at a book store on Christmas Eve. But things don't go as planned the next day. Ellie is heart broken, and soon jobless. She is broke and working ar a coffee shop. The shops landlord, Andrew devises a plan to help both of them. A fake marriage so he can access his inheritance. Sounds like a great plan, right? Well, things take a turn for the weird when they visit Andrew's family. His sister is, Jack, the woman from last Christmas Eve! Does Ellie follow her heart or stay safe?

What I enjoyed:
- LGBTQI+ representation of course! We need more fluffy holiday rom-coms with queer representation. This one was perfect!
- Ellie, I really related to her! I could understand her woes. I thought she was a very likeable character.
- The laughs I had while reading this. I caught myself giggling multiple times

This book was just SO sweet, and cute. I loved everything about it. I can't wait to re-read this during the holiday season. Thank you to Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review! 4 stars out of 5.

This book was super cute especially for around the holidays! It was a little predictable but definitely a sweet story.

Sorry, but I requested this on NetGalley so I could see what the ebook looked like. I wrote the book, so I do think it’s good, but my rating might be biased

Thank you netgalley for the opportunity. I thought this book was okay. I wasn’t so invested in it. It had some lacking just to keep my attention.

This was my first read from Alison and it lived up to my expectations after reading the description. It was super cute and I also loooved the side characters as well. 10/10 will be purchasing for my physical collection and recommending!

If you're a millennial, you'll probably know the lyrics, "I knew I loved you before I met you," and that's exactly how I feel about this book! When I read the description, I was immediately hooked. And then I read it and confirmed my suspicion that Alison Cochrun is an auto-buy author for me. Her casts of characters always slap, and I was major heart eyes over the main romance. The fake dating plot was so well written, and I loved how Cochrun wove multiple will-they-won't-they plots into the story, not just the main couple. The parental drama hit so close to home, and it kept me rooting for Ellie as she broke away from a toxic family situation. I don't reread books very often, but I'm already waiting for the day when I can sit down and read this one again.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

⇢ Sapphic romance
⇢ Christmas Feels
⇢ Found family
⇢ Meddling old grannies (there are two!)
⇢ Fake dating/fake marriage of convenience
⇢ Only one bed

I just finished this book a minute ago. Literally. And I am having a hard time getting my thoughts down because it was SO GOOD. When I read The Charm Offensive, I enjoyed it. The audio, especially, was very well done and the story just flowed in such a natural way. But Cochrun has blown TCO right out of the water with Kiss Her Once for Me. An author's second book is rarely better than the first but this one is such a standout.

Ellie and I are practically the same person. I connected with her on so many levels and the emotions she was feeling really came through with Cochrun's writing. This book isn't sad and it has such a cute HEA, but damn. Did it make me tear right up! I also couldn't help but salivate over Jack. I almost wish this book was dual POV because I would have loved to get some chapters from her perspective. But maybe AC will gift us some bonus material one day. And maybe an epilogue? I was missing that here and that is maybe my only nitpicky comment.

I am preordering my copy of Kiss Her Once for Me tonight and I also have Celine Dion on repeat. When you get the chance to read this book, do it and thank me later.

It’s blistering hot outside and this christimas book cured me of everything. I’m in love with Cochrun’s writing style and I can’t wait for everything else they come out with. This book is like a mushy hallmark movie and I can’t recommend it enough!

Kiss Her Once for Me by Alison Cochrun ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ (release date Nov 1/22)

In this anticipated second novel, Cochrun delivers holiday feels, swoony flashbacks of a Christmas past with a mystery woman, and family drama when our MC agrees to marry her landlord so he can get his inheritance and then shows up to Christmas to discover that his sister was her one who got away.

I enjoyed this one as much as The Charm Offensive. Thanks to @netgalley and @simonschusterca @atriabooks for the advanced copy!

This book truly hit all the marks for me.

I read Alison Cochrun's debut, The Charm Offensive not long ago, but this one hit me even harder and resonated with me even more.

Ellie is struggling financially, dealing with heartbreak from last Christmas, and nursing her pride after being fired from her dream job. So when the rich landlord of her terrible new job offers her a deal--a fake marriage for one year in exchange for 200,000 dollars--she accepts. But things become more complicated when Ellie joins Andrew for the holidays and realizes she's more intertwined with Andrew's family than she originally thought.

I adored Ellie, and I saw a lot of myself in her. Her struggle with anxiety, her crippling fear of failure--I really connected with her and loved seeing her work through her struggles and find herself throughout the course of the story.

And the romance! Ellie and Jack were my absolute everything. They were both flawed characters, but seeing them find themselves and come back to each other through their personal journeys was my everything.

Every character in this book was written incredibly well, the dialogue was fantastic, and the descriptions really set the scene of this being a Christmas book. (Which, honestly, it didn't even faze me that I was reading a Christmas book in July because I was just SO obsessed with this entire story.)

I truly can't sing this book's praises enough, and I can't recommend it highly enough! If you enjoyed The Charm Offensive, I am positive that you'll love Kiss Her Once for Me.

TW: Swearing, on-page sex, alcohol consumption and light drug use (weed), anxiety, depression, some ableism about ADHD (challenged on page), negligent parents, familial estrangement, biphobia (challenged on page), transphobia (challenged on page), references to cheating and adultery.

Thank you to Netgalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

I saw this book on Instagram and was intrigued by the fake engagement trope. I haven't read many sapphic novels - this one did not disappoint! This romcom is set around Christmastime and was surprisingly nice to read in the middle of summer. The plot is super fun and I love the twist!!

Thank you NetGalley, Atria Books, and Alison Cochrun for an early copy of Kiss Her Once For Me in exchange of an honest review.

While I wasn't chomping at the bit to finish this book, I couldn't help but randomly think about until I picked it back up. It's a billion degrees out so having a cold Christmasy bi and nonbinary romance was just amazing

Alison Cochrun does it again in her sophomore novel. Ellie's life is in shambles and she can't forget the woman that she had one amazing night with last Christmas. As this Christmas approaches she agrees to marry a man to help him get his inheritance, her percentage worth will help her get her life back on track. However once she is trapped at his family's cabin for Christmas she finds out that the sister of her fake fiancé is the woman from last Christmas.

I have already recommended this novel to friends. It was hilarious and heart warming. Alison Cochrun hit another home run.

*Swooning over this holiday Sapphic romance.*

Let me start by saying that Kiss Her Once for Me is easily the most Portland book I've ever read. There are so many landmarks, from Powell's to the Broadway Bridge, to all of the places that are outside of the city (UofO, Timberline Lodge) and as a lifelong Oregonian, this was almost *too real.* I'm quite fond of romanticizing this city that many visitors tend to hate on, and a freak snow storm and sapphic romance only make it better.

Alison Cochrun's second book gives us less reality tv and more meet cute reality, with two women meeting in the infamous Powell's on Christmas and falling head over heels... only for something to go terribly wrong. They meet again a year later -- when anxious barista Ellie finds herself engaged to the brother of her last Christmas romance -- the mysterious, brooding, too cool for school, smells like bread always, Jack. There are a lot of family hijinks and family drama, cute cartooning, winter activities, and some fun tropes in this book that will make it easily addicting for anyone who loved The Charm Offensive (or just enjoys a good hallmark movie and wishes they would make sapphic ones!!!).

My only issues (and that is a very, very loose term, this book is WILDLY enjoyable) is that you don't get to see more interactions with some of the secondary characters -- but Ellie is a very internal character who spends a lot of time in her own head. The mental health rep for anxiety has been really spot-on lately, and that was part of what I enjoyed so much about the Charm Offensive but there were times when I felt it lingered just a bit too long (and certainly contributes to a long bout of miscommunication). I hope there is a soundtrack full of Taylor Swift and all of Jack's favorite pop tunes for this book -- and if there is, you should definitely have it playing in the background as you read along.

I have no doubt that this will be a seasonal favorite for many and am exited for others to have a chance to read it! Thanks to NetGalley for an early review copy, all opinions are my own.

Thank you NetGalley, Atria Books, and Alison Cochrun for an early copy of Kiss Her Once For Me in exchange of an honest review.

If you loved the movie Happiest Season on Hulu, you’re going to love this book.

~ Insta-Love Meet-Cute
~ Marriage of Convenience with your meet cute’s brother
~ a full diverse queer cast of characters
~ ADHD and anxiety representation
~ hot butch lesbian who owns and lives in an airstream
~ Gilmore Girls and Taylor Swift references galore

This book was a joy to read. I definitely got a little frustrated with some of the weird blurred lines and they kept making jokes about how straights are terrible at miscommunicating and this girl is just straight up lying to the girl she’s in love with. It gets a little irritating at times. Her anxiety also gets frustrating because you just want her to get on some meds and talk to a therapist. Which she does in the end, which is great, just also gets a little irritating. I love it when books manage normalize therapy/meds and show that it’s not a miracle cure. I wish it did that a little better.

Overall, I still loved the book. There’s one or two editing issues that I’m sure will be fixed before it’s published.

Alison Cochrun seriously never fails to write captivating, heart wrenching, laugh out loud, romantic as hell stories. I am a huge fan of her first book, "The Charm Offensive", so in was absolutely thrilled to receive an arc of her new sapphic Christmas romance “Kiss Her Once for Me”.
It did not disappoint. While it was initially a bit odd to start reading a Christmas romance while it’s over 100 degrees F outside, within a handful of chapters, it may as well have been December. I got completely sucked into “Kiss Her Once for Me” and finished it in a handful of hours. The story is absolutely beautiful—and probably the only love trapezoid I’ve read that I completely adored. And I swear, Alison is the queen of writing amazing side characters. In her debut novel, as well as KHOFM, every single character has a way of working their way into your heart. I laughed out loud numerous times and nearly dropped my kindle in surprise with the sneaky plot twists and “OMG” moments that made up this book. Alison was able to take a surprising amount of romance novel tropes and shove them all into one book without making it overwhelming or cliche. I had so much fun reading this and I cant wait to get my hands on a physical copy! (Or two or three or four to give as Christmas gifts.)

Okay so this is a super cute book, the main character Ellie’s anxiety is essentially what my inner monologue sounded like at 25. I adored the “fake fiancé” trope, I REALLY love the grandmas, and I love that this is a really cute queer holiday rom-com. I love that it's set in the PNW in winter, I love that she is an artist and I love that there are TS references for daysssss.

Alright here we go, time for a lot of you to get upset with me, but I really felt like I could predict a lot of the plotline. The authors writing is so charming, truly, but it went either “too predictable” or “too unbelievable” for me at too many points in the story and the miscommunication that wasn’t really miscommunication was almost too much for me. Also the "flashbacks" really just made me wish I read THAT story instead, but also there's a lot to unpack in that story line too.

Either way, I did really enjoy reading this one. I don’t think the "negatives" would stop me from reading it again, and I do recommend anyone looking for a super cute queer rom com, this is a great one for sure. Also if this ever should get turned into a Netflix movie, I would watch it like 47 times.

Thank you to Atria Books and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC of this book.

TW: Swearing, sex, alcohol and vaping (weed), anxiety, depression, ableism about ADHD, negligent parents, estrangement, biphobia, transphobia, references to cheating.