This book is adorable, steamy, and all the things I want in a rom com. While it was a classic miscommunication trope, there was so much going on here. I would highly recommend if you need a lighter read.

This book had so many good elements to it, but I really struggled to feel the chemistry between the leads.

I don't usually mind 3rd person POV writing, but i think in this case it is to blame for the disconnect. I think had this exact same book been written in first person dual POV I might have loved it.

Female Author Writes Under Male Pseudonym

Finding Mr. Write by Kelley Armstrong is a rom-com that centers around Daphne McFadden, an author who has faced numerous rejections for her book about a teenage girl in a zombie apocalypse. Frustrated with the industry's bias, she decides to submit her manuscript under a male pseudonym. To maintain the facade, she hires an accountant named Chris Stanton to pose as the male author in public, leading to a series of humorous and heartfelt events as they navigate book tours and media appearances.

Overall, Finding Mr. Write by Kelley Armstrong is a delightful romantic comedy that offers a unique take on the challenges faced by female authors in a male-dominated industry. With its charming characters, witty dialogue, and beautiful setting, it is a must-read for fans of the genre. Armstrong's exploration of identity and authenticity adds depth to the story, making it more than just a light read. If you're looking for an entertaining and thought-provoking rom-com, Finding Mr. Write is worth picking up.

I’ve read a few books by this author now, and I’ve enjoyed all of them. This one was no exception! It was a funny and heartwarming romcom with…wait for it…NO miscommunication trope! Chef’s freaking kiss because honestly, I want to chuck a book across the room when the main characters can’t have a discussion like normal people.

I appreciated the comments surrounding misogyny in the author world, and I thought it was a unique idea as the foundation of the story. It’s no secret that things in life are usually easier for cisgender, heterosexual men (especially if they’re white), and this book really got me thinking about what female authors have to deal with that male authors don’t.

On a totally different note, Daphne and Chris had amazing chemistry and were both smoking hot. Those spicy public scenes??

Try this one out for your next romance fix. It’s a fun one!

Thank you to Forever Publishing for my gifted copy!

The first part of this book was great. The second part was meh, just fine, almost just unnecessary. The first part when they were texting, and he was spending time at her house for the interviews was great. You could feel the chemistry but once they went on tour it was just all lacking.
It had so much potential to be very cute but there was a lot going on that it was just all over the place. While there were great points that were talked about like being a woman in the author world and getting paid less, facing more rejections, etc. Watching Daphne using a pseudonym to sell her book was intriguing. Seeing all the work that a woman must do to get a book published under a different name because her own name wasn’t good enough was engaging. But that was about it for me.
It was a light, soft romance read, but I just didn’t really connect with the story or characters like I usually do or would have liked to.

Thank you Netgalley and Forever publishing for the eARC in exchange for my honest review.

I received a complimentary copy from the publisher and all opinions expressed are mine.

The book follows Daphne a romance author who writes under a pseudonym because she wanted ro be published. However she hits it big time and so she hires Chris to act as her alter ego.Its a forced proximity romance and its full of witty moments and is a perfect read for people that love fiction about authors.

Title: Finding Mr. Write
Author: Kelley Armstrong
Publisher: Forever
Pub date: 06/24/2024

Daphne wrote a book but, in order to sell it, she felt giving it a male pen name would do the trick. Well, the trick worked but, now she needed to find a man to play the part. Here Chris enters. He immediately gets into character and the fun begins.

This is a cute rom com with a dash of spice. I’ve never read anything by this author before so, I was pleasantly surprised. There are plenty of misunderstandings, that in some cases are funny. I also appreciated that the main female lead was independent and had a good head on her shoulders and that the male lead wasn’t a total cad.

I found this a fun read complete with some laughs along the way.

Thank you #NetGalley and #Forever for the opportunity to read this rom com. I look forward to reading more from Kelley Armstrong.

First thought: I’m a nature girlie so I instantly fell in love with this FMC and her dog Tika. It’s a cute story and gives a little insight into the life of a debut author. I loved the mash up of the characters and the MMC support of the FMC - we all need a Chris in our lives.

Daphne dreams have happened: she lives in her dream house she designed in her ideal location on a lake in the Yukon. She is an architect by day and works on her debut novel in her downtime. She’s tried to get her manuscript picked up but there hasn’t been much interest. So she takes a risk after too much wine. Daphne updates her cover letter and changes her names to a pseudonym making her seem male. Guess what it worked and her book just got signed for 500k.

Enter Chris an accountant who owes a favor to Daphne’s bestie who is a lawyer. He has agreed to play Zain the persona Daphne created as the author of her book, in exchange for some legal help. The problem is Chris is nothing like Zane he is a math geek who blossomed late in life, he may be hot now but he doesn’t have the confidence to rock it but somehow being Zane allows him to channel super macho man.

The problem is Chris become a little too good at impersonating Zane and he goes viral and Daphne books becomes a best seller and all of a sudden there’s a book tour and media appearances. Things are starting to spiral and fast. Follow these two on a wild ride through the wilderness, don’t forget the bear spray!

Literally Themes you’ll find:

* Fake Relationship
* Architect & Debut Author vs Accountant
* He Falls First
* Forced Proximity
* Slow Burn
* Dual POV
* Fade to Black
* Nature Lover Vibes
* Set in Yukon, Canada

🐻🌲🏔️❓🐻🌲🏔️❓🐻🌲🏔️❓🐻🌲🏔️❓🐻

Finding Mr. Write by Kelley Armstrong was as delightful to read as you can imagine! The plot is both entertaining and thoughtful, with a satisfying mix of tension and humor. While the romance is the centerpiece, the underlying themes of self-discovery and personal growth add depth to the narrative. I laughed while reading this book but found some of the dialogue a little out there. I thought the plot was original and fun!

This is a cute premise for a book, but the writing was lackluster and started to become distracting. It felt kind heavy amounts of narration and not dialogue and like a lot of the ideas were half-baked.

Imgur link goes to Instagram graphic scheduled for August 26
Blog post goes live Sept 3
Amazon Review submitted

TL;DR: Funny and adorable. I really enjoyed this and smiled my way through it.
Source: Thank you to the publisher for the eArc via Netgalley!

Plot: Daphne is writing under a pseudonym and needs to hire an actor to be portray that person. The actor she picks is the farthest thing from the man’s man she expected.
Characters: I love a cinnamon roll hero and that’s what we have here. I also love a very capable female lead, this just has the golden pair for me.
Setting: The setting was lovely, a woodsy remote cabin followed by book festivals and signings? Yeah. I enjoyed that a lot.
Romance: I ate this up with a spoon, not going to lie. These two were so cute together.

Thoughts:

Finding Mr. Write by Kelley Armstrong is an almost cozy romance about a writer who hires a man to be her ‘face’ after publishing her book under a male pseudonym. Daphne is fairly desperate to get published and one night after some wine and moping she submits her book, yet again, to a publisher under a male name with a tweaked synopsis. It’s picked up, and not in a little way.

This worked so well for me for a few reasons. This is a ‘He Falls First’ type of story with a cinnamon roll of a hero. Chris is beyond adorable, acting out the role of Zane while also supporting and being Daphne’s rock for most of this novel. I also loved Daphne and her attitude and strength. I’m always, always going to be a fan of physically strong female character who can keep up with her male counterpart. The situation they find themselves in is also engaging.

There is a mix of text and traditional prose in this, but Kelley Armstrong did a great job with it, and I found myself giggling several times at the exchanges between the two characters early on in the book. I really loved this and if you’re a fan of the tropes it carries and the premise you won’t be disappointed in this one.

4 out of 5 homemade brownies

I love it when an author can take a tried-and-true trope and give it a good spin into something fresh and interesting. Finding Mr. Write does just that. After numerous rejections of her book, Daphne decides to use what would be perceived as a man's pen name, and then ends up having to hire someone to play that role when the book becomes popular. Oh, and did I mention that she's falling for Chris, the embodiment of her fake author's name?

With the book doing well, there are plenty of opportunities for Daphne and Chris to get together. Chris might even have a few secrets himself. They will have to come clean with each other if they want the prize. Of course they do, and it's a fun ride getting to the HEA.

I thought this was a creative and entertaining comedic romance. This usually isn't my go-to with romance, but I do love a rom com that is done well, that has me laughing in all the best spots and satisfies my romantic notions. Finding Mr. Write does all that. I really enjoyed this.

This book was so much fun! The banter was absolutely delightful, and the characters were charming.

When Daphne decides to use a male pen name for her book, Chris is hired to pretend to be the author. The book ends up being wildly successful, forcing the two of them to spend a lot more time together than originally planned. Their efforts to keep the secret end up being a hilarious sequence of hijinks. And as with all great romcoms, this leads to them falling for each other!

I adore books like this! They make me blissfully happy, and as usual, Kelley Armstrong does an amazing job creating characters and an engaging story. Whatever genre she's writing, I will be reading!

I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are my own.

Thank you Forever for providing me an ARC.

Daphne lives in the Yukon and has written a YA book that she is eager to get published. After sending it out to a few agents and not receiving much response, she decides to make some revisions to her book. On a whim, she decides to use the pen name Zane Remington. Unexpectedly, her book gets picked up, and she is offered $500,000 for it—an unheard-of amount for a debut author. Her friend Nia, who is a lawyer, helps her set up a company so that she can be paid under her pen name. The publisher requests a bio and photo for the back of the book, and with Nia’s assistance, Daphne is introduced to an actor who is willing to be photographed and give interviews as though he is Zane Remington.

Chris agrees to take on the acting gig, even though he’s not an actor, because his lawyer Nia has offered to help him with his legal troubles. Chris’s business partner was involved in illegal activities, leaving Chris’s accounting career in jeopardy, which Nia is able to help with.
Chris and Daphne end up going on tour to promote her book, and things get out of hand in more ways than one.

The book is a quick and fun summer read. I enjoyed it more than I expected. I really enjoy reading books set in Canada, as there aren’t many that do. I was able to visualize the Yukon and the wooden home built next to the water. If this isn’t on your radar and you enjoy romcoms, I would suggest giving it a read. The main characters were likable, and the miscommunication wasn’t drawn out too long, which I often find is the case in most romcoms.

I really enjoyed this book. It was a quick read and quite funny. I loved the banter and believed it really showcased how women in the industry would not get noticed unless they used a pen name or something of the sorts to suggest that the author is a man. I would definitely read another book by this author.

This was such a fun and light hearted rom com. The characters are likable but I wasn’t took emotionally attached to them. Their romance was cute, but I think that it would have been nice to slow it down and not make it feel so rushed. I would definitely give another book by this author another try. I think that this one just wasn’t for me

This book, while an entertaining romcom, is much more too. The book is a quick read and includes fun banter between two very likeable characters, and hilarious internal monologues shared with the readers. The romance, however, is almost secondary to the story of how after repeated rejections, Daphne submits her manuscript under a male pseudonym and has an instant hit on her hand. She hires a man to play the role of the author in public, they both get a lot more than they bargained for!
I think the book did well in delving into the disappointing and different treatment of women in the publishing world. And who would know better than a woman author. This part of the plot was well developed. The romance side of this book was a bit different than I expected. I never felt the build up, felt a bit forced and didn’t necessary feel like part of the story.
I did like the characters. Daphne is a strong, independent women and surprisingly her book is a Zombie Apocalyptic genre. Chris is a soft cinnamon roll play acting a hard ego centric character that just doesn’t come naturally to him. The setting is beautiful rural Canada – yes lumberjack vibes!
Interestingly, I’m also reading By Any Other Name by Jodi Picoult which deals with a very similar plot of two women, generations apart dealing with authoring their works. Jodi’s book is more literary fiction and I almost think this one was geared more to that but trying to make it a rom com.

**Disclaimer: I received a free eARC of Finding Mr. Write by Kelley Armstrong through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.  Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for this opportunity.

Finding Mr. Write by Kelley Armstrong is an adult romance novel about a female author who decides to try and publish her novel under a male pseudonym and needs to find a man to pretend to be the author.  Hijinx ensues.  The novel was set to be published on June 25th, 2024.  I rated it 4 stars on GoodReads.

Here's the summary from GoodReads:

A  fun romantic comedy about a woman writing under a male pseudonym and the man she hires to play the role in public.
Daphne McFadden is tired of rejection. After submitting her manuscript to dozens of agents, she's gotten rejection after rejection, and now it's time for something drastic. And so, Daphne submits her manuscript again… under a man's name.
Imagine her surprise when it sells for big money at an auction and soon becomes a publicity darling. Only she needs a man to play her super macho alter ego Zane Remington. Enter Chris Stanton, who absolutely looks the part of a survivalist and has a talent for pressing her piss‑me‑off‑I‑dare‑you buttons while somehow being endearing at the same time. But Chris has a few secrets of his own, including the fact that he’s really an accountant who has no idea how to chop wood or paddle a canoe. When Daphne's book becomes a bestselling sensation and they're forced to go on tour together, Daphne finds herself wondering if this city‑boy geek is exactly what she needs to push her to claim her dreams.

Kelley Armstrong is an author that I totally love, but I do admit that I have a bit of a mixed track record with some of her works.  However, this ended up being a book that I really enjoyed on the whole.  I will admit that I went into it with different expectations for what kind of romance this would be, and I thought it would be spicier than it was.  However, this is definitely more of a fade to black romance, which there is nothing wrong with, but I did want to give other readers the heads up about.

To start off with review wise, I really enjoyed both of our main characters.  Daphne was a really interesting character, and I related to her desire to do whatever it takes to get her book out there in the world and also the anxiety that she felt about what it might be like for that book to be out there in the world.  I enjoyed the way that she had chased her dreams, and the way her past issues came to light in how they affected her.  Her motivations and conflicts made a lot of sense to me.  I also found that Chris was a really interesting main character.  The explanations for why an accountant was so buff were well done, and I appreciated his motivations for getting involved in the situation at all.  He was into Daphne pretty quickly, and it's very much a he fell first situation.  I would have liked a bit more development of the romantic tension on his side of things, but I did enjoy his personal character journey and the way that he learned to be himself and not anyone else.

Chris and Daphne had a great dynamic, and he was a very supportive partner for the most part.  The conflict that built between them made sense to me, though I did wish that maybe they had talked just a bit more.  However, again, it was realistic for them not to talk based on their pasts and how they coped with the world.

Each main character had a support character who kind of acted as a voice of reason.  For Chris it was his sister and for Daphne it was her best friend.  I loved both of these side characters and how they talked sense into the main character.  They maybe weren't as developed, but on the whole they played a key role in the book and it wouldn't have been as good without them.

The pacing for the book felt a little strange, as parts felt a bit rushed.  I also wanted more consequences for the nemesis, Daphne's gross neighbour.  However, on the whole, I had a very fun time reading this book and discussing it with my friend who was reading it at the same time as me.  The plot and the writing were both great, and I can definitely add this onto my list of solid Kelley Armstrong reads.

The idea was good but the execution felt lacking. The connection between the two characters was hard to get behind as the reader. The two character POV could have been stronger in first person because it was hard at times to tell who’s lens we were uncovering the story through as it changed so often.

Thanks to Forever and NetGalley for access to Finding Mr. Write in exchange for my honest opinion. I had not read this author before, in part because this was her first romcom. However, I found I have the audiobook for one of her previous thrillers, Someone is Always Watching, which has a main character with my name - kind of funny that I posted earlier this week about a book where that was the case.
Last summer I spent most of August in Alberta, Canada, which is closer to the setting for Finding Mr. Write, where the FMC owns a remote home in the Yukon. After getting another rejection for her YA fantasy novel, Daphne changes the wording of her cover letter and submits it under a male name and gets an agent and publishing contract! Daphne uses a friend of a friend to pose as “Zane Remington” for the book tour of her bestseller, while keeping the pen name and her true identity hidden. But of course some issues pop up…
I really enjoyed this book, doing a mix of the ebook and audiobook. I loved the concept, and while it didn’t quite go where I thought it would, I was along for the ride. My favorite scene was when Daphne and her stand-in are out near her lake and have a bear encounter, with a publicity team visiting to catch it on camera!