Fourteen years ago, Daniel and Liyah were at the same Jewish summer camp, and have not spoken since. They reconnect after being seated next to each other on a plane, and even that interaction goes badly. But it seems the universe is determined for them to be in each other’s lives when the museum Liyah works at hires Daniel’s marketing firm, and they are forced to not only confront their past, but try to rebuild their friendship as they work together.

This was such a sweet story. I loved watching Daniel and Liyah rebuild their relationship - first becoming friends and learning to trust each other again, continuing to bond over their experiences being both BIPOC and Jewish, helping each other through grief and trauma, and ultimately falling for each other. This love story was beautiful in so many ways. I look forward to reading more from Rachel Ruyna Katz.

The audiobook was narrated by Raymond Lee and Tyla Collier. I thought both did a wonderful job bringing this story to life. I enjoyed listening to their narration.

Thank you to SMP Romance, Macmillan Audio, and NetGalley for the advance copies.

I am blown away by how much I loved this book! Also, how can I join this friend group, seriously! There were so many wonderful things about this book, the friendships, the romance, the character development, the diversity, and the tension. I think what I love best about it was how easily and beautiful Katz wrote about diversity with its struggles but also how it is common place and should be. Liyah and Daniel are two friends who had a falling out and are working their way back to each other and more! The friendship, the tension, and ultimately the love was so beautifully done.

Thank you to #Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review

I absolutely loved this book! Daniel and Liyah had so much chemistry from the beginning, and I loved the setting and side stories. I can't wait to read more from this author, an amazing debut!

A solid debut! I really enjoyed the late 20 somethings support system between Liyah, Daniel, Siobhan, and Jordan. The meeting notes were such a great snippet of the conversations between friends at this age!

Liyah and Daniel’s mutual pining is what I crave!! Their story of friends to enemies to strangers to friends to lovers is so satisfying. The way they support each other during the Jewish holidays without family around, opening up to each other on their past trauma, and falling into an easy relationship was all so sweet and real.

Their history together from summer camp was intriguing at first, but felt a little repetitive at points. Their original conflict was immature, but of course it is! It made their conflict as adults more nuanced.

It did feel like it was dragging a little toward the beginning, but once I hit the middle, it was great!

I enjoyed this debut from Rachel Runya Katz!

I really loved the inclusion of Jewish rep in this book. From the summer camp where the hero and heroine met, to the high holidays, making latkes for Hanukkah, and all the other mentions, it was really inclusive and exciting to see so many Jewish cultural references.

Read this for:
- Jewish rep
- Summer camp childhood crushes
- Enemies to lovers
- Friends to lovers
- Forced proximity
- Just a hookup/friends with benefits
- Bi rep
- Workplace

Liyah and Daniel find themselves thrown into working together on the marketing for a new exhibit Liyah is spearheading. They have history from Jewish summer camp years ago where Daniel wronged Liyah and she has never forgotten.

The two are forced to work together but also forced to become friends when they form a friend support group, the Speakeasy Survival Club, weekly after work. After clearing the air from the old wounds, the two are able to move forward as friends. The chemistry is there and continues to build. The problem is that Liyah doesn't date. Her past trauma causes her to absolutely not believe in romantic love. Meanwhile Daniel is dealing with the grief from his father's death.

As the two grow closer and open up to one another, they each begin to heal a little more. They find comfort in their friendship and their closeness and soon they decide that friends with benefits is the right way for them to go. That is until they fall in love with each other and face that truth causing lots of challenges for the pair.

It was fun to go through the seasons and the Jewish holidays from fall to winter in Chicago and enjoy all the cultural elements. I really respected the author's way of including the challenges and blending of cultures that Liyah and Daniel went through as not only being Jewish, but Jewish people of color from mixed races.

The friend group was super fun, and I'm obsessed with Sweet Potato the cat! I think the book had a great blend of humor, and depth with the serious issues it tackled. Make sure and check the trigger warnings.

I'm looking forward to seeing what Rachel writes next!

Thank you to SMP and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martins Press!

In this book we follow Aliyah and Daniel who had a falling out at their Jewish summer camp and 14 years
Later they run into each other on a plane. Turns out they’re both living in Chicago Liyah works for a museum and and Daniel is in marketing. The museum
Hires the marketing firm Daniel works to get more younger people into museums. Liyah and Daniel now have to work together.

This is a unique love story because both Daniel and Liyah are biracial and we get to see how Jewish POC experience Judaism and both characters have a lot
Of baggage. We see them go to therapy and work on themselves, we see them become friends to lovers and I really love how they family and friends were supportive of them. I felt like this romance was very real and true to todays generation. I think this was a great debut novel for the author

Meet cute glory, old flames, Jewish summer camp vibes.

Liyah and Daniel were childhood friends, then enemies but now??? Liyah is going for a curator role at the museum she's at but finds out that marketer for her proposal is Daniel's firm and he is assigned to the project. Can they work through their issues and work together successfully?

Bi-racial Jewish rep is on point! It was cute, but I wasn't invested in the main characters. I can't imagine holding a grudge for 14 years.

Liyah and Daniel have not seen each other since they were 13 years old at summer camp and have ended up seated next to each other on a plane home to Chicago. Thanks to what happened back then, Liyah wants nothing to do with him, but ends up working with him when his company is brought in to work on a marketing campaign for the museum that she works at. A desired promotion is tied to the success of the campaign, so she is stuck. Their shared Jewish heritage of coming from mixed race families provides a foundation for their growing friendship. I am very happy with the flow of the story and how it turned out.

Rachel Runya Katz gifts us with an incandescent story that reminds us of the complexity of love and the ability to heal and regroup. Liyah is grumpy and socially awkward; her goal is to get to the end of her travels. When Liyah has a less than stellar encounter with her seatmate on a flight, she soon realizes that not only does she know Daniel, but she also has no reason to expect anything else from him. Their relationship goes back several years to summer camp where Liyah experienced a life changing event. Liyah blames Daniel for the situation and is not open to his peaceful overtures. While Daniel is not totally a “sunshine’ character, he is likable and accommodating. The story is told from the point of view of both characters, so we are given insight into the situation from both sides. I loved this story and found both main characters to be authentic and relatable. They made an awesome couple…each somewhat flawed but complete together.
Thank you Netgalley for providing a copy of this ebook in exchange for an honest review.

Last time Liyah and Daniel talked, their friendship came to an end. They bump into each other on a plane 14 years later, and Liyah soon finds out that the museum she works for hired Daniel's marketing firm and they have to collaborate.
This is a childhood friends to enemies to lovers, forced proximity romance with amazing representation. I have read amazing reviews for this book, but I don't think it was for me, I simply didn't vibe with the writing, everything felt flat and the FMC was annoying. The found family side of the story was sweet.
I received an advance review copy of this book for free and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

This is kind of second chance romance, enemies to lovers.
While it took me some time to become fully engaged, the second half of the book flew by for me. Overall, I absolutely loved this debut and eagerly anticipate reading more from Katz.
I want to thank NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with the eARC

Am I the only one who loved this style of writing? There were of course 2 POV’s the main characters and I can’t explain how great it felt to see both of their own voices at the same time when something is happening in their lives….. I hope I’m making sense, but I adored this book. The enemies to lovers, friends to lovers, sort of second chance romance feel I got from this book was a huge YASSS!

I loved how the LGBTQ+ community being represented here, and I also love the biracial characters, Daniel is a DREAM!!! I was rooting for him throughout the whole book. Liyah at times was a little annoying and petty as hell, but I loved them together it was such a great balance. Overall, since I’m expressing more about how I feel about this book, the plot was awesome, loved the banter between the MC’s, and also how they opened up to each other, can’t wait for this book to launch so everyone can get their hands on it.

Rating ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ /5
Spice 🌶 🌶 .5 /5

I just finished this book last night and the characters are still at the forefront of my mind.

First and foremost I loved the characters in this book. They were real in the way that they weren't perfect. They were messy and they struggled with themselves, their jobs and the way the world reacted to their very presence. Liyah really resonated with me in how she processed her own trauma and the walls she built around herself because of it. Reading her journey as she worked through this and found help in spaces she never expected was beautiful.

Daniel was such a beautiful character. He had so much internalized pain from his own trauma but his approach to Liyah was beautiful and gentle. The safe space they created for each other was absolute perfection. This book made me laugh (the SSC should be mandatory for everyone) and cry throughout the story. Just absolutely beautifully written and fantastic debut for this author. I absolutely recommend this book.

Thank you to NetGalley and SMP for the ARC of Thank You For Sharing. DNF pretty early on, but I really struggled with the authors writing style and the tense this book was written in. For some reason, it felt very choppy and less storylike, but more like someone who has written a potential screenplay. I was so excited for the representation and plot for this one, but just couldn’t get into it.

I love childhood friends to lovers to enemies to friends to lovers! It sounds complicated but it’s not. Or is it? We’ll let our main characters decide that lol. I found Daniel and Liyah’s relationship in this book almost realistic. Mainly Liyah’s feelings. Was it realistic or relatable? To be determined. I actually liked this book. I always liked learning about different cultures through romance books in general and this book showed the the dynamics of being mixed race. It was also funny which I really loved. I love the SSC Meeting Notes, they were clever and funny. I love a funny rom-com, who doesn’t??? Also, this might be a weird thing to love but I loved that both of our main characters were commuters! As a commuter myself, I too share Daniel’s ongoing vendetta with our city’s transit. For a debut novel, this was great!

Thank you NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Liyah and Daniel meet as teenagers at camp and develop a connection, but things end badly. When they meet again as adults on a flight to Chicago it’s awkward to say the least. Especially when Daniel and Liyah end up having to work together to make Liyah’s possible promotion worthy exhibit as a curator a success. Slowly Liyah comes to learn more about adult Daniel and their relationship begins to mend and eventually turns romantic. But Liyah has never been one for relationships and that’s all Daniel wants but he is afraid to tell her. With the ghost of their teenage past lingering and communication as well as commitment issues to work through, will Daniel and Liyah make it? Or will they end up reliving the same messy past again?

This romance has so many layers! First off learning a few facts from Liyah the curator was so fun! Second, the kind of friend group Liyah and Daniel have I am extremely jealous of because they don’t shy away from those hard conversations. And lastly, the dedication and scope to mental health and sexual assault makes this book extremely powerful. What a wonderful and beautiful book!

This was an interesting read. I learned a lot more about the Jewish culture! I loved the dynamics of Liyah (leah) and Daniel. They were childhood friends and a first relationship (for one of them at least), then Liyah left without saying goodbye. About 15 years later, Liyah is on her way home from visiting a friend when who should sit next to her on the plane, but Daniel. Neither one of them recognize the other at first, but by the end of the flight, they both know, and she is pissed! They don't say anything to each other. What happens when their world collides AGAIN on a work project? Read this delightful book to find out!

This one just wasn't for me. The premise is cute. I LOVE the museum setting and that they knew each other at camp. It just wasn't the right book for me right now.

This one was difficult for me at first, because the tension/animosity between the characters seemed so contrived, but as the story developed and so did the characters, my love for this book grew immensely.

This book touches on the trauma that people face and how we adjust to it overtime, and can become a part of who we are, yet still not let it rule our lives. The way the main characters process their trauma and are not always perfect was so realistic and beautiful to read.

I loved following the development of the friendship, and then watching that blossom into something more. Friends to lovers just truly hits different when it's well done.

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

M/F Romance For The Queer Theory / Traditional-Masculinity-Is-Toxic crowd. I've read a lot of books in a lot of genres with nearly every bent you can imagine outside of swords and sorcery fantasy - which I simply can't get into, no matter how much I try - and this one has some interesting things going for it. Our female lead is a museum curator - not usually shown in such books, male or female - and has an awesome career opportunity laid out in front of her. Our male lead is a digital marketing specialist - has there ever been a more "Millenial/ Zoomer" job? - who is unsatisfied in his own career, and this next project is make or break for him. So there's a lot of work angst here in addition to the history of these two together. Combine their friends into one common group, and you've got a solid story that at a high level, the Hallmarkie set can easily enjoy.

But then... then you've got the pervasive bigotry against virtually anything non-queer, traditional, and/ or white. To the tune that this line deep in the book gives a good indication without even being anywhere near the worst examples: ""I fully endorse lesbian country songs and murder ballads about abusive husbands if you want to play those. It's the I-like-guns-and-women-and-beer-and-trucks stuff I can't stand." (For the record, this reviewer has a problem with murder and domestic violence *no matter who is being attacked or why*.) So, Carrie Underwood and the Dixie - oops, I mean, just "The Chicks" - are perfectly fine, Brad Paisley (whom Underwood has worked *many* events with) and Alabama are out. Got it. But again, this is just a minor example that is concrete evidence of the overall problem. And to be clear, since readers of this particular review may not follow *all* of my reviews and may not know how I work this particular issue (and really, if you want a wide range of good books to read that you'd likely have never found on your own... you really should follow me wherever you're reading this :D), I look at bigotry by flipping the demographics involved. If [insert demographic A] was behaving this way or saying these things about [insert demographic B], would it be seen as a problem? If it would, and yet [insert demographic B] is behaving that way or saying those things about [insert demographic A]... *it is still a problem*.

But, as I also say quite frequently, there will *always* be someone out there who LOVES the book (or item, more generally) for the EXACT reason a particular reviewer HATES it (and vice versa), so the more you agree with the title and the line I quoted, eh, the more you're probably going to enjoy this book.

Overall, again, if you remove the pervasive bigotry here, it actually is a rather interesting tale that fully hits everything a younger Millenial/ Zoomer would expect in a romance and meets all genre requirements I am aware of. Combined with others sharing a similar political bent across the generations, and I'm sure Katz can still make quite a career playing into these same ideologies - we see both in books and elsewhere these days that what I once thought impossible is now a daily occurrence, so far as cutting out roughly half of your potential market and yet still having a wildly successful career goes.

Recommended, if you're open to the particular biases here. The more opposed you are to them... the more you're going to want to throw this book through the nearest window and DNF it, then leave a scathing 1* review strictly because you didn't like the politics/ biases at play. Spare Katz the drama and yourself the heart and headache, and just skip it in that case.