I fell in love with the first book in the series, and yet I keep getting disappointed with the rest of the series.

The Plus One had the potential to be an amazing romance read. The problem I had with it was the heavy tones that weren’t warned about in the beginning. It was so unexpected that it took me by surprise. I was expecting a spicy rom-com read, but instead I was reading about two characters who have major mental issues that they need to sort out before becoming officially together.

There are so many heavy topics discussed throughout this book that I had to take mini-breaks in between. It’s not something to brush aside. It’s something important to read about, but it should have been warned about. If I had had any warning of how heavily these topics were going to be discussed, then I would have enjoyed reading this book more.

Thank you to the Netgalley and the publisher, St. Martin’s Press (St. Martin’s Griffin), for the opportunity to read this advanced reader copy. This honest review was based off my experience reading this eARC, which in no way biased me. All opinions are my own.

A Brush With Love was my first exposure to this author and I completely adored that book, The Plus One is another win in my book. Just like with the first book in this series of interconnected standalones that follow Harper (Book 1: A Brush with Love) and her friends Lizzie (Book 2: Lizzie Blake’s Best Mistake) and now Indira (Book 3: The Plus One) Mazey has this amazing way of writing where she interweaves pretty heavy themes into contemporary romance.

So we have Indira, who at the beginning of the book is trying to make it work with her normal, boring relationship, but QUICKLY realizes that it is not going to work for her anymore. Indira’s brother, Collin is getting married so naturally wedding shenanigans ensue. Collin’s best friend, Jude, is in town and is crashing at Collin’s house, Indira finds herself temporarily homeless and also crashes at Collin’s house. But here is where it gets good, Jude and Indira? They HATE each other, and they have since childhood.

So what do you get when you get put in the same house (with rooms next to each other) with your older brother’s best friend who just so happens to be the bane of your existence? (Oh and throw in some fake dating into the mix)

Indira is a psychologist, and Jude is a doctor who specialized in emergency medicine/surgery and travels all over the world getting sent to where he is needed. Some of the places he is needed are active war zones, and come with a boatload of traumatic experiences. The medical facilities he is working in are less than ideal which also cause patient loss and this is Jude’s story on how he comes to terms with his job and the toll it is taking on his mental health.

Indira herself has her own issues to deal with, stemming mainly from paternal abandonment at an early age/ growing up with divorced parents.

I honestly have never seen a couple so perfect for each other and it was wonderful to see their development happen and for both of them to realize how perfect the other is for them. This was perfectly heartwarming and meaningful. It deserves more than 5 stars, but here we are.

🌸Review - ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.5/5🌸

📗The Plus One by Mazey Eddings
🗓️Pub date: April 4, 2023 (out now!)

Indira comes home to find her boyfriend, Chris, in a compromising situation with another woman. Indira packs her bag and heads to her brother’s house to stay there for a little while. When she gets to Colin’s house, she isn’t expecting his best friend and her childhood enemy to answer the door.

Jude has just returned from an extensive and traumatic work assignment for his best friend’s wedding. He’s staying with Colin and is surprised when Colin’s sister shows up to stay there too.

While being forced to stay across the hall from each other and having to help out with wedding festivities, Indira and Jude start spending more time together and decide to fake date to get through all of the events for Colin’s wedding. But after awhile, the fake dating doesn’t feel so fake anymore…

I really enjoyed this one! I loved Jude and Indira and found both of their characters relatable in some ways. I thought the mental health representation was written really well and represented in an honest way.

Read if you enjoy:
🌸Fake dating
🌸Brother’s best friend
🌸Enemies to lovers
🌸Forced proximity
🌸Dual POV
🌸Mental health representation

⚠️Please read trigger warnings from the author prior to reading.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martins Press for the opportunity to read this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you SMP for the gifted e-copy.

I loved this enemies to lovers, brother's best friend, steamy romcom! Indira moves in with his brother and his fiancé, Jeremy, after walking in on her boyfriend and another woman. Little does she know, but her brother's best friend, Jude is staying with him while on. break from his overseas station. Jude and Indira HATE each other - or do they?

The steam in this book is on point, and when Indira and Jude first get together I was like YES! Their banter is hilarious, but it's not all fun and games. There are a lot of very heavy topics in this book, so check out CW before reading.

Mazey Eddings does it AGAIN! Another amazing, spectacular book that absolutely stole my heart and ran with it. Indira and Jude's story was beautiful and I loved every bit of it. Probably one of the best enemies-to-lovers, fake dating I've ever had the pleasure of reading. This one was cute, steamy, and just so entirely heartfelt.

This had good mental health representation and it was written very well but the fake dating wasn't all that fake for long? I also think that some things were just glossed over and not given enough time to be properly dealt with and addressed,

I also think that Jude benefitted a lot from Indira and she helped him so much more than he helped her. I get being there for a partner and supporting them but we also saw that Indira was going through some things as well, which Jude didn't provide support for.


The way the characters from the other books were involved was also a little odd and almost awkwardly to me? I don't quite know how to describe it, just that I didn't love it all that much.

Overall, not a bad read but I did thoroughly enjoy the first book so much more, and even the second book a little more.

Indira and Jude from The Plus One were such special characters and I'm so grateful to Mazey for creating them. From the moment I met Indira in A Brush with Love, I knew I was going to love her sassy and funny personality in a romantic setting. Jude was equally precious, a little grumpy, and my heart ached for him. The Nesta and Cassian vibes with Jude starting out as Nesta were so strong! Mazey knows how to write her spice and it always slaps me in the face. The Plus One was a beautiful and emotional read that had me laughing out loud and crying in the club with the epilogue. Mazey simply can do no wrong and I can't wait to read more from her.

⚠️TW: mental illness, panic attacks/disorders, infidelity, abandonment, war, violence, medical trauma

Indira and Jude (who has happens to be both her childhood nemesis and also her brother's best friend) they make a deal to be each other's fake dates for a wedding. But the more time they spend together and the closer they get, the more the lines between fake and real start to blur.

One of the things I love about Mazey's books is that she approaches her characters with so much love and care. All of her books focus on grounded representations of neurodivergent characters, characters who deal with anxiety, depression or PTSD. I've loved every single book in this series, but this one might be my favorite one!

Indira and Jude are childhood enemies. Jude is best friends with Indira's older brother Colin but has never seen eye-to-eye with Indira. When Indira's latest relationship crashes and burns, she ends up staying with her brother Colin and his fiancé. But guess who is also staying with Colin -- Jude! Now Jude and Indira are forced to live and attend all of Colin's pre-wedding activities. But soon Indira and Jude realize that been forced together is actually the best thing for both of them.

The love story that develops between Indira and Jude is so beautiful! Although Indira is dealing with her own inner demons and struggles, it's Jude's struggle with PTSD that really pull at your heart strings. But even though his struggles are hard and very real, Mazey shows that even while experiencing dark moments, you can still find love and joy and happiness.

And if you've read the other two books in the series, you will love the epilogue at the end -- it was a nice wrap up for everyone.

This is currently my favorite childhood enemies-to lovers book to-date. As always, Mazey writes a beautiful content warning to readers, so read that before reading. But I can't recommend this book enough!

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press/ St. Martin’s Griffin for the arc of this book!

Such a wonderful read with a great message - you can be heal, be brave, and fall in love. It was a beautiful story with one of the favorite tropes - enemies to lovers. It doesn't get much better than this one!

The Plus One, by Mazey Eddings, is the story of psychiatrist Indira Papadakis and the time surrounding her brother Collin’s wedding. A few weeks before the wedding, Indira walks in on her boyfriend, Chris, to find him in quite a compromising position with Lauren. Indira packs and, having nowhere else to go, heads for the home Collin shares with his fiancé Jeremy, both of whom are anesthesiologists. While they do have a guest room for Indira, their other guest room is occupied by Collin’s best friend and Indira’s worst nightmare, Dr. Jude Bailey.

Jude joined an international medical team to serve those in need worldwide, but mostly to forgive the loans necessary to achieve his goal of physician. Emergency surgery is Jude’s forte, but it has sent him to the most awful assignments and this has taken a toll.

Since Chris is also a part of the wedding party, Indira is not happy in her role but Jude proposes they act as though they are together for the events leading to the wedding. As Indira has already picked up on the PTSD issues Jude is dealing with, she agrees. But what unravels from this agreement makes the story.

This story is written to showcase PTSD, an issue that is becoming more prevalent in life today. However, there is so much more to this book! I very much appreciated what I learned from this story and absolutely do recommend this book!

The Plus One is book #3 in the Brush with Love series, but can 100% be read as a standalone...which is what I did. I just discovered Mazey Eddings with this book, and I really enjoyed her writing style, her storytelling, and her characters, so I'll definitely be going back to read the first 2 books in this series, and I look forward to whatever stories she comes up with next.

🔹 Stellar therapy and mental health rep!
🔹 Tropes: Brother's best friend, enemies-to-lovers,
fake dating
🔹 Content warnings: severe PTSD, anxiety, panic
attacks, parental abandonment, and infidelity

What I liked:
🔹That Indira was a mental health professional, and while she was very good at it, she still had her own mental health struggles. It felt very realistic. And because of her training and her own experiences, she was able to recognize what Jude was dealing with and help him navigate his way through it, while not attempting to "fix" him.

🔹The strong female friendships! I can't wait to go back and read the first 2 books to spend more time with these women.

🔹While it's on the heavier side for a rom-com, I really appreciated that the author didn't shy away from challenging topics.

🔹 Indira and Jude! Their banter was on point and very natural, and it was fun to watch their relationship change and grow.

Thank you to netgalley and St. Martin's Press for my eARC in exchange for my honest review! I loved reading it!

Out of the three books in this series, this book is my favorite of them all! It was cute and sweet and steamy and heartfelt all in one. It had a perfect mixture of all of the emotions with an adorable couple at the center of it who worked together to fight their own demons.

This brother's best friend/fake dating book dealt with some serious topics like PTSD, parental abandonment, and other general mental health issues. The author did a good job at juggling all those issues while still keeping the romantic relationship at the focus of this story.

Mazey Eddings has become one of my favorite authors and this one hit the spot, as her work always does. I loved watching Indira and Jude fall in love as well as the cameo appearances by Harper and Dan as well as Lizzie and Rake. Those girls are just #girlsquadgoals! I have to admit that Lizzie Blake's Best Mistake is my favorite book of hers so far but this one still made me laugh, cry, feel, and ultimately rejoice when the happy ending occurred. I do feel somewhat sad that there aren't any friends left in the group but I truly can't wait to see where Mazey goes next as I feel she can do no wrong!

Mazey Eddings can do no wrong! I always enjoy her books and devour them! I appreciate that she includes neurodiverse characters and really represents them well.

I read this a couple months back on a flight and didn’t expect to feel as many emotions as I did. I may have even shed a tear or two in public over this one! This book has a lot of soul. It tackles some deeper topics like mental health struggles and PTSD so it is heavy at times. (Mazey Eddings included a note to the reader at the beginning which I appreciated.) The characters are endearing and their connection is deep and genuine. I enjoyed watching them grow individually and together.

My only issue with this book is that I felt that the use of common romance tropes trivialized the story being told. Jude and Indira begin fake dating at a point where their connection feels palpable and deep. They had known each other for decades and their relationship already felt inevitable by that point so the use of the fake dating trope cheapened their genuine connection. It almost felt like fake dating was used to be able to market the book as a “fake dating” book.

Setting that aside, this is a fabulous spring romance and I’m surprised I haven’t seen it floating around on bookstagram more! It has over four stars on Goodreads so it seems like most readers agree.

(Thank you to @netgalley and the publisher for an advanced digital copy of this book!)

The Plus One by Mazey Eddings ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Eddings does it again with another love story that you can’t help to root for. Indira and Jude are beautifully flawed human beings, initially frenemies as kids. Their story is tough, but fun. Eddings continues to write characters you can’t help but root for.

Also, I love the amount of spicy scenes in her books. Just the right amount. Thank you @netgalley for the opportunity to read this gem!

I have never read a book by Mazey that I did not love . I love how the books catch you from the first line and make you want to read more.
This one is an enemies to lovers brothers best friend. They always rubbed each other the wrong way until they are forced to share a space when her brother is getting married . She left her cheating ex to temporarily move in with her brother. Brothers best friend also is there for the nuptials. They are forced together and he starts to see indiria in a different way. He is dealing with ptsd and she has her own issues. I like how the issues are dealt with and not just glossed over. They seem genuine and brings life to the characters

Mazey does it again! Love love love this book! And loved the character development! Tho as much as that peanut butter was bonkers, I don’t think I could give up my love for it, tho I am scarred!

i LOVED this one.

fake relationship, brothers best friend, trying to get back at the ex, mental health rep.

Mazey truly knocked it out of the park with this one. I haven’t read any others in the series, but i’ll go back & do that now.

The Plus One by Mazey Eddings is a contemporary romance. We follow Indira and Jude, Jude is the best friend of her brother Collin. Indira and Jude have always hated each other growing up, that is until Indira asks Jude to be her fake date to her brothers wedding. That’s when their relationship begins to blossom. This was definitely a fun read, the fake dating scenario is always a great trope to read and i think it was done pretty well here, especially the frenemies to lovers aspect. I think there needed to be a bit more when developing their relationship, I was expecting a slower pace when it came to that in a few sections of the book. This novel was very charming and I am excited to try the other books in the series. Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC.