As a fellow asian, I love to see and read books my people like me. I think that this was a fun read and something that I probably would not pick up again but it was good enough to keep me occupied while it lasted. The cover is very cute and drew me in right away.

Helen's very public break-up during what was supposed to be a romantic Valentine’s Day dinner. A video of her ex-boyfriend saying, "It's not me, it's you. You're holding me back" went viral.

Desperate to give everyone something else to talk about and with Valentine’s Day approaching once again, she asks her long-time friend Taylor Li to be her fake boyfriend, just to prove that she's moved on and hasn’t sworn off love

✔️ Fake dating
✔️ Friends to lovers
✔️ Grumpy x sunshine
✔️ Holiday read
✔️ Valentine’s Day

This is a quick and easy read with a simple plot.
There's a bit of humor and it's quite relatable.
I instantly fell in love with Taylor for how sweet he was and enjoyed their outtings.
The food element in this book was great.


Thank you NetGalley and Kobo Originals for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.
3.5⭐

Not Your Valentine is out now!

i really adored this book! It is a perfect February read that really encompasses the "I hate valentines" mood. It was a fun quick read and I really loved it.

Plot- 1.5/5🌟
Spice- 2/5🌶️

It started off okay, but soon lost my interest. For a book that's only 136 pages long, I had such a hard time finishing it.

✔️ Grumpy x sunshine
✔️ Fake dating
✔️ Friends to lovers

Helen, our FMC has stopped dating after her ex dumped her and the video went viral on social media. With no plans to date and Valentine's right around the corner, she turns to her friend Taylor, our MMC and then it's the usual fake dating to real love scenario.

The blurb seemed nice, the cover is super cute but somehow the book lacked character. It was bland. There was humour but the way it was presented by the author came across as absolutely dull. And don't even get me started on the weird obsession with charcuterie chalet. There were multiple times I wanted to dnf it.

I don't think this author is for me. For such a short book, it sucked the life out of me.

eARC provided by Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I adored the funny awkward friendship that developed between the two main characters, who started fake dating because the fmc is tired of everyone asking when she'll start dating again. Her long time friend doesn't seem at all opposed to pretend that he's her boyfriend. What follows is an awkward, but funny story about two people that start to develop feelings for each other.

There is some spice in the book, which is fine but they felt a little too on the nose at times. I'm not sure this book needed the spicy scenes at all, even though spicy books are in high demand.

But overall a very enjoyable book, that I will definitely be recommend to my followers.

2.5 stars. This was meh. Not great chemistry and I just can’t get excited about a dainty guy. Helen is a firecracker and loved all the f-bombs. The food element in this was great. Just wish there was some witty banter and better chemistry. Thank you to NetGalley for a digital copy

A cute Valentine read!

Helen doesn’t want a relationship after her boyfriend broke up with her the previous Valentine’s Day. In public. And someone filmed it. And it went viral. So she asks her friend, Taylor, to be her fake boyfriend this year to get her through Valentine’s Day, and so her friends and family (and strangers) will stop giving her looks of pity.

But, of course, never “fake” date unless you want to fall in love for real!

Thanks to NetGalley for this book in exchange for my honest review.
Not Your Valentine is out now!

This is a really quick and lite read. If you want to feed your romance serotonin but not be stuck in a 300-500 paged book, this one's for you

Not Your Valentine was a really sweet romcom that was the perfect way to get me in the mood for Valentine’s Day coming up! I really loved the grumpy/sunshine dynamic of Helen and Taylor. Having a grumpy FMC made the book so much more relatable, because same here haha. I did find that the book was a little fast paced, and I wish we got more detail about the characters and their story. When I finished the book I just wanted more!

Overall, great book that I’ll definitely read again :) Thanks again to NetGalley and Kobo Originals for providing me with a copy of this e-book in exchange for an honest review!

“Although I’ve never been the super romantic type-roses and pink hearts? -meh”

I have to admit I fell in love with Helen at this sentence. A female protagonist who is slightly cranky, doesn’t care for the whole valentines day show, and would rather be at home alone.

I loved this book. It’s a quick read without the overused trope of big man small girl.

Thank you NetGalley and KoboOriginals for this gifted ebook copy of Not Your Valentine by Jackie Lau.

This was such a fun story with just the right amount of sass and spice. I absolutely loved all the descriptions of food (I may have drooled a bit) and places Helen and Taylor visited on “dates”. I love that this was around 125 pages of fake dating, friends to lovers, and grumpy/sunshine. It wasn’t overboard and I loved both main characters. I actually wish that it would have been a little longer.

This was such a perfect read for the days leading up to Valentines Day. Taylor is definitely a new book boyfriend favorite!

I really really wanted to love this book but, unfortunately, it wasn’t the right one for me.

The book itself is a little over 100 pages so not much plot wise really happens. The book is based solemnly on romance. It was a very cliché fake dating romance and I could immediately guess the ending. I felt like the romance itself wasn’t bad but it’s how they got to it. Again, I wasn’t expecting to have an amazing plot from such a short book but I feel like their relationship could have been built more step by step since it was a bit out of the blue.

The book didn’t really wow me! I couldn’t get into the writing style but that is in no way the author’s fault but mine and mine alone. I didn’t feel a connection to the female main character and I might also add that I thought she was a bit annoying at times.

I did enjoy their dates and I felt like Taylor was a total gentleman. I also liked the thing that brought together the entire fake dating plan since it was a very original idea which I had never read about about before. All in all, I felt like this book had a lot of potential but it lacks a lot of basic points such as character development, plot development and details.

Oh man I loved this!!! It makes my heart so warm to see more Asian characters and my own experiences to be reflected in the literature that I read.

Helen was a very relatable and lovely character. I loved the part about her last breakup going viral!

Fake dating is always fun and I also appreciated the Asian family pressure components..

I'm going to need to check out all of Jackie Lau's other books!

Jackie Lau has given me all the things I needed in this gem. From the lovable characters to the spice that was just perfect for this story.

Grumpy and sunshine rolesthat are switched just rocked my world and I LOVED IT! With such a bang on the beginning to show what kind of dynamic we are dealing with was mind blowing! But it made everything else just that much sweeter in comparison to what was before.

These characters were an absolute delight and I couldn't have loved their dynamic more. With this being a short read, I couldn't help but want more! I want so much more of their life and how well they mesh!

Thank you to NetGalley for sending me an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Such a fast and sweet read! 3,5 stars!

This was my first time reading a Valentine's book novella and I love to pick up novella's for my busy days of classes in University so I can have something to read on my pauses. For a Valentine's theme, I think it was really well done and what can you expect other from a happy ending? I also loved how the female main character was a bit grumpy, giving us something from what most of the books seem to have now.

I love a grumpy heroine, it's so refreshing! You can feel her glowering off the page at you and it just totally makes me fall in love with her harder.

Taylor is the cutest sweetest cinnamon roll and even though it's first person POV you KNOW he's got it bad for her and she's oblivious, ugh, my fave 😩

This was a very very quick read (too quick!) and the steam came out of nowhere. I thought it might be closed door but then suddenly there was sex and lots of it and it was DELICIOUS. The sex scenes were super hot and quite a sweet surprise.

The characters felt really three dimensional and I loved their transformation arcs and backstory. I just want to give Taylor the biggest hug for what he went through, and his ability to recognize his own issues was swoon-worthy.

I don't love every contemporary I read, or even a big percentage of them, but this one ticked all the boxes. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thank you so much to netgalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This book is a sweet, sexy, quick read! Perfect to read with Valentine’s Day just around the corner!

Helen’s last Valentine’s Day was not a good one - her boyfriend broke up with her saying “it was her, not him”…to make it even worse, it was all recorded and posted online! It’s almost a year later and it is still haunting her. People still look at her like she is broken and honestly, she is. She won't allow herself to get in another relationship because she is afraid it will happen again.

When she agrees to dinner with her childhood friend, she comes up with a great plan to end those looks that she has gotten all year. She decides to ask Taylor to be her “fake” boyfriend until after Valentine’s Day to prove that she still believes in love. But her plan backfired and not only did she start looking at Taylor differently but herself too!

I don’t really read a lot of books with the female MC being the grump so it took me some time to like Helen but as she started to change the more I started to understand her grumpiness and liked her. I was smitten with Taylor from the beginning. It was great that he never pushed or tried to change her(like her ex)! I loved how he treated her like a “real” girlfriend from the start. How sweet was it that he remembered that she loved hot chocolate with tons of mini marshmallows!?!

This book is told in a single POV but I can’t help thinking it would have been even better as a dual. I would have loved to read Taylor’s thoughts throughout this whole experience. It always bothers me when a guy has to shame a woman and take away her self-esteem. It was so good to see Helen reclaim that and to realize that she too is lovable.

Thank you to NetGalley, Kobo Originals and Jackie Lau for the Advanced Readers Copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!

Helen had a BAD Valentine’s Day experience - her boyfriend not only dumped her, but it was public and accidentally went viral. As Valentines Day approaches, all she wants is for her friends and family to stop walking on eggshells around her. So, she cooks up a plan to fake-date her friend Taylor just until the staring stops. What she didn’t expect, was to actually enjoy having a fake boyfriend.

This was a really sweet read - absolutely perfect for Valentine’s Day. Helen’s character is easy to relate to, especially her love for chocolate and staying home. She is written like a real person, not someone that is always put together and living an exciting life. Taylor is sweet and RESPECTFUL. I appreciated their banter. I love a fake dating trope. This was also a short read, just long enough without being too much that you get bored.

Thank you to @netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read and give an honest review!

Helen is perfectly content being single. Who needs relationships and love? Certainly not her. Especially after the fiasco of last Valentine’s Day. She would much rather leave all the pink flowers (gross) and heart-shaped everything (gag) for everyone else. But, she’s growing tired of all the looks of pity she gets from her friends. They’re all either in relationships or determined to find the one through dating apps and think she should be doing the same. Not to mention her mother’s constant reminder that she isn’t getting any younger and needs to find someone. So when Helen meets up with her long-time friend, Taylor, she gets an idea. Ask Taylor to be her pretend boyfriend until Valentine’s Day. It’s the perfect way to get everyone off her back. She won’t have to subject herself to all the mushy grossness that she so desperately despises and the nightmare of last Valentine’s Day will be forgotten. Nothing could possibly go wrong. Right?
*Review*
⭐⭐⭐⭐
🌶️
I’m not exactly sure what I was expecting when I chose to read this book, but I can say that I was pleasantly satisfied with it once I was done. Helen was entirely too relatable. It was scary how much of me I saw in her.
Helen and Taylor are the most refreshingly average people I’ve ever read in a book. They are not models who are wealthier than God with the world at their fingertips. This isn’t something I see in many books I’ve read, and it was so welcomed! I really enjoyed the slow-burn, natural growth of their relationship. The characters, especially Helen’s mother, were so charming and likable and I laughed more than a few times.
While I thoroughly enjoyed this book there were a few minor things I didn’t enjoy. Mainly that it got kind of repetitive. Also, I would have liked to learn what actually happened with Helen’s ex. For being mentioned so much, we never learned what was said or why it went so viral.
All in all, this is a quick read that I would recommend to anyone looking for a light-hearted read that is sure to make you chuckle.
This book was provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This review is going to be a thought dump from my notes app as I read:

I feel like I relate to this character. She doesn’t like clubs on New Year’s Eve. She’s 29 she was anti-dating apps and putting yourself out there. She needs a week to think of a comeback when she’s having a conversation. Incredibly awkward. Sending five texts in a group chain and confirming that that’s enough socializing for the moment. Hates cinnamon candy

I like the writing style it feels very conversational and light and easy to read.

The idea of the fake relationship seems to blossom out of nothing, but it’s not the first time I’ve read someone starting a fake relationship to get people off her back

I appreciate the character development for such a short book. I’ve read novellas that have absolutely no background on the characters, so it’s hard to really get into the story because there’ no connection. Definitely did NOT feel that with this quick read.

I don’t know why, but I hate the phrase “I released a breath I didn’t know I was holding” so the line “I release a breath, but I was very much aware of holding” made me crack up. Thank you for poking fun at that cliched line!

I am used to the whole act, oblivious and question all of your feelings about your fake relationship sort of act, but sometimes I think this book takes it too far. A certain point she realizes that she has feelings for him, but the narrative keeps questioning: “why am I doing that?” “Why am I feeling that way it’s too much?” “There’s not way he feels more.” Around the halfway mark, the romance, denial, started to get a little old and tired

The horny light park date felt up to me, because there was almost no dialogue. The whole thing seemed rushed.

It’s definitely because I’m 6’1”, but Taylor being 5’5” just really irks me. I think that combined with the ponytail…just not my type.

“Shy boy always had a crush on the girl too afraid to tell her how he feels”, and “the emotionally wrecked girl who feels unlovable” really always gets me in the end.

Overall impressions, the beginning and end were good, but the middle was a little scattered for me. I liked the characters connection and stories. The main character really clicks with me. I definitely want to read more by this author, because I feel like I would like different tropes.

I was also going to slander the cover, but she really makes you wait for 99% of the book to be over before it makes sense. And them each making their own heart shaped cakes at the end was super cute.