I thought this was very good and I will have to add this to the shop shelves. Thank you for the chance for us to review.

This was a very cute read. I enjoyed the characters - they were opposites, but you could feel the attraction between them.

This was more on the women's fiction side of romance. I actually liked that part. The characters had a life outside of each other.

The whole book felt a little long to me.

I thought this was going to be WAY sillier based on the premise of a romance between an author and someone who left a one star review on their book but it turned out to be kind of deep?? I still enjoyed it a lot, surprisingly. It didn't feel like a typical romance and instead felt closer to a slice of life literary fiction book. Excellent all around.

ONE-STAR ROMANCE was such a fun will-they won't-they romance! I also love how it takes place over so many years -- it felt incredibly realistic, plus the development of the friendships was such a great touch!

A rom com that is labeled as a light romance but delivers way more. I’m in! I will not lie, while Natalie had so much growth throughout this book, there were times I was struggling to even see her point of view. Or to even like her. She reminded me of my pessimistic bestie whom sometimes I struggle to like. She could never just be happy for someone or something without throwing her two cents of bitterness in. While the book takes place over a ten-year time frame, it was nice for it to be sectioned out into seven different parts, making it not so daunting. And I will be the first to talk about tension between two main characters, because I eat that stuff up. Leave no crumbs, I want them all!

One of my favorite reads of the year! I truly could NOT PUT THIS DOWN. Natalie is so incredibly relatable and I loved seeing her growth through out the book. A beautiful book about self growth and the evolution of friendship. The tension between Rob & Natalie DELICIOUS

Genre: RomCom/Contemporary

Format: Audio/E-book

5🌟 - I loved it!

I loveeeee @laurahankin’s books!! She is also the most lovely person. Loved being able to chat with her and our #tttbuddyread!

This is such an ode to growing up and feeling left behind, shifting friendships, navigating love and relationships, and this felt just so relatable!

Laura’s wit, storytelling, and writing style is always a hit with me!

This one fell flat for me. I enjoyed the premise and it started off well, although I had some reservations about the main character, I was curious to see how she evolved. I think I stopped around the 50% mark. The main character was not improving, in fact she was getting worse and I was just really confused. I felt like she was too self-centered. Why can't she just be happy for her friend? Why does she feel the need to say her own opinion about everything! Like maybe at one point your friend said "I would never marry at 25" but why do you need to hold her to those words she randomly said during girl chat one night? Are they some how binding? Is she not allowed to change her mind without running it by you first? Also if you have come to the realization that you may have partially based your book on your friend's life life, can you not just own up to it and apologise?

I wasn't a fan of the time jumps either and the illusion to maybe have infidelity, If you want to act on your feelings for someone else, have a discussion with the person you are with first. It is not that hard.

I love when books have books (and authors or publishers or libraries) in them.

The synopsis and the cover suggest a light romance but this is about a lot more. I’m not usually a fan of this bait and switch tactic but I’ll forgive it this time because the writing is great and I connected and rooted for the main characters. There are moments that Natalie walked the line between relatable flaw and fatal flaw but her growth helped make it relatable for me.

There is witty banter balanced with some more serious issues, I found I didn’t want to put it down.

Told over 10 years and in seven parts, the two main characters run into each other in their friends’ lives and must figure out how to coexist as enemies. I was invested more in their struggles and growth than the romance. But as the years passed I grew fond of the characters and their outcome and that they finally get their act together.

I’ve love this trend of smashed genres and this one does a great job of blurring the lines between women’s fiction and rom coms without doing either one a disservice.

Huge thank you to @berkleypub @berittalksbooks @thephdivabooks @dg_reads and @netgalley for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.
.
This book has my heart! This is a romance but it’s also a love story between best friends. I looked at this cover and thought adorable, rom-com, which it is at times adorable but it’s so much more than just a rom com. Yes, it tells the tale of Natalie and Rob from enemies to lovers, but it’s also is a portrait of finding your true self and how best friends grow together, apart and back together again. I loved this one!

Not sure why, but this book didn't resonate with me. It was missing something, and I think it was romance and tension. This should have been a friends to friends book. Idk, it just wasn't for me.

Super cute, slow burn romance! This one was especially fun because it really centered around two couples. I waffled back and forth between sort of loving and hating the men in the story throughout but that also kept me intrigued. A great read for a rainy day!

I will first start off by apologizing on the late review. Life happens on life's terms and these got away from me. However, that leads me into this book. I really feel like Laura just gets life, if you know what I mean. She writes with profound realness that has you relating and rooting for the characters like no other author. Laura captures the experience of feeling like you are living life wrong. Hence my first statement on being late to a review. I must forgive myself for not being perfect. This is played out in her novel as she explores the main characters desires to find her place with a job, a relationship and friends. It very much captures the dynamic of changing friendships as some people marry and have kids while others are not and maybe career oriented. However, I am a little frustrated by the reality that women can have both was not further explored. I do at times feel like women are often pitted against each other or grouped into categories of those "with kids" and those "without." Very relatable with a happy ending!

It took me a while to get into it; I usually don't go for slow burns, and this story was nice, but it is the slowest of slow burns. I did have to push myself through the story. It dragged too much for me. It honestly took me forever to read. That being said, it is enjoyable, and I would recommend this to readers who prefer slow burns

This book captures the messiness of love in all its forms, while also capturing the weird feelings of life in your twenties.

I enjoyed this one, but feel as though marketing it as a romcom is a misstep - this read more like “women’s fiction” (a term I don’t love), because at the heart of the story isn’t really the love story of Natalie and Rob, it’s the friendship and sisterhood of Natalie and Gabby. Which I actually enjoyed more than the romance, as it honestly seemed to have more substance.
In the last few sections of the book, too, the overall tone got much heavier than the average romcom. This, combined with the focus on friendship, makes me think it would’ve been better to have been marketed differently, as my expectations were far from what the novel delivered.

Thank you so much to Berkley for a copy of this book!

This is my 2nd Laura Hankin book and I wanted to love her last book but it just fell short for me. But I had heard this one was so good & the premise sounded promising. Guess what I loved it! I am not sure if i would necessarily classify this as romance. There was a romance element that was weaved throughout the story but I wouldn't say that it was the primary focus especially since our couple really don't get together until closer to the end.

I love that this was told over a period of time and we got to see Natalie's growth as a person and professionally. Her growth professionally shows how you think you should be going in one direction but really another direction may be the path you should be taking. And I also love how we get a taste of her and Rob over time and see how their relationship changed. Rob was very stand offish and not warm at all when they first meet at their friend's wedding. Natalie had a right to be upset when she learned that Rob was behind her one star review on her debut book. In addition to see how Natalie and Rob grow over the years we also follow their friends as well. The relationship between Natalie and Gabby felt very real to me. I did feel like Natalie was a little too codependent on Gabby and really had a hard time of letting her go.

I was engaged in Natalie's story from the beginning and even though the romance was low I still really enjoyed it!

4.5

DNF'd at 47%

After two other books with the same trope, this one clinched it: I offically do not like books with spread out time lines over years.

What also doesn't help is that in each one of these books, the characters are pretty miserable in their circumstances and in their life outlook.

I need my rom coms to have a little com and more momentum with the rom.

I thought this was a very cute book! However, if you’re expecting a normal romance, I think you’ll be disappointed. This book is slow burn to the 5,000,000th degree with many time jumps. I walked into the book expecting the normal formula romance novels typically have (I don’t know why, the blurb literally suggests otherwise), and it took me a bit to settle into the flow of the book. Once I did, I really enjoyed it. The writing was honestly very good and kept me engaged.

We have a seriously flawed FMC, and I think the growth of maturity we see from her throughout the years was so well done. I also adored Angus. He was, in my opinion, the best part of the book. Amazing side character.

I will say, I don’t think the romance was the star of this book. It was the character development. This isn’t so much a romance as it is almost a “coming of age” but later on in life story.

Have you ever written a one star review?⁣
⁣
I have for junky products I purchased that deserved it… but never for a book!⁣
⁣
Luckily, One Star Romance gets all the stars because it’s delightfully bookish, seriously sweet, and yet another reason Laura Hankin is an auto-buy author for me! ⁣
⁣
Natalie is not a big fan of her best friend’s fiancé Angus, but she’s determined to be a good maid of honor. So she is thrilled to find a handsome best man who she has lots of sparks with, until...⁣
⁣
She realizes he has given the book she wrote a
One.
Star.
Review. ⁣
⁣
You see, Natalie based the main character in the book on his best friend Angus. And it’s not very flattering.⁣
⁣
Loved! Loved! Loved! ⁣
⁣
Such a fun plot, all the witty banter, and beyond hilarious wedding shenanigans! But perfectly balanced with raw and relatable emotions, fierce friendships, and a whole lotta love. I loved this adorable and heartfelt read so much - it was such a joy to read!