Cheers to sluts in love!

This book may take up the number one spot of Casey mcquinston books and that’s coming from someone whose read rwrb 5 times. Theo and kit are some of the most beautiful characters I’ve ever read about, and this book had me laughing, kicking my feet, and crying in public because I just couldn’t put it down. Theo and kit love for each other is so beautiful, when Plato talked about soulmates needing to be torn from one body to two because they are too powerful together, he probably based his theory off of Theo and kit. Not only does this book have a beautiful love story, it also takes you on an adventure across Europe, and has amazing side characters you just can’t help but fall in love with.

CMQ is one of my favorite authors, and this next book from them absolutely does not disappoint! I devoured it in just over a day; the whole cast of characters, but of course mostly Kit and Theo, are loveable and ridiculous and just so enjoyable to read. As with their other novels, the dialogue is top-notch and the rich descriptions of the European travel spots show that CMQ did a great job researching on their own trips. Because there are some difficult relationship moments and lots of spice or referenced spice, this should probably be geared towards readers 16ish and up. The only problem I have is that now I've consumed it already and have to wait for more CMQ prose on the horizon!

Another lovely read by Casey McQuiston!

Kit and Theo had a devastating break-up years ago, so they are shocked to find themselves on the same tasting tour of Southern Europe. As they travel to gorgeously described cites and countrysides, they eat, drink, and question everything they thought they knew about their former relationship. Can they salvage a friendship since they are stuck together or should they go their own ways?

4.5 Stars!

When I tell you I am now currently planning a food and wine tour around Europe because of this book, it’s happening! This book was delightful, delicious, and overall so refreshing to read.

The exes to friends to lovers story is all my little heart wanted and more. The story was well written with flushed out characters, packed with cultural references, and of course food and wine! Did I mention a hookup competition to prove how over each other the main characters are??? McQuiston exceeded my expectations with this book and I will absolutely be recommending this book to anyone who loves a travel romance with lgbtqia+ rep and a little spice along the way. 🌶️🌶️🌶️

Thank you for the arc NetGalley and St Martin’s Press!

3.5 stars.

Casey McQuiston does it again and creates two characters that absolutely capture my heart and make me almost sob on my Kindle.

I'm not a first person or dual POV person, but considering Red, White and Royal Blue is my all time favorite Romance I had to give this one a try - and I'm so glad I did. This book is so rich in everything - history, food, love, sex, the whole spectrum of human emotions. I've always wanted to visit Europe and now I'm thinking of saying "fuck it" and booking a trip right about now, just to see the places I saw through Kit and Theo's eyes for myself too, find these characters I loved in every corner.

Kit, I swear I would die for you, no joke.

That's where the strength of this book comes from. The characters are deep and complex and distinctly different, even when they fit together so well. There are times I wanted to smack a character upside down, and times I wanted to swaddle them in blankets in equal measure. I loved that they were allowed to be messy - it made the eventual growth so much more satisfying.

If not for that ending, this would've been 4.5 stars. Curse you [insert common romcom trope that would be a spoiler].

This is one of my most anticipated reads of 2024, and I truly squealed when I realized I was able to get an early copy to read and review. I usually don't read ARCs this far before pub date (6 months) but I truly could not stop myself from picking this up and devouring. I started in the evening and stayed up until 1am reading. Casey is an auto-read, auto-buy author for me and this book did not disappoint in any way.

There are a lot of descriptions of food, wine, locations, and art - it does perhaps get a little wordy at times but honestly I still loved every second of my reading experience. For those of you who can visualize what you're reading, I think you'll have a particularly good time with this book because of the lush descriptions.

I really loved both Kit and Theo so so much. I think they're both really complex characters and I'm glad we got a chance to be in both of their heads. This is one of the more unique dual POVs I've read - instead of the POV alternating every chapter, the first half of the book we get Theos POV and the second half we get Kit's. I think this actually worked really well for the story!

This book is also HOT and HORNY. Like GODBLESS at two separate points I had to put the book down briefly because I was blushing so hard and I read some of the smuttiest smut. I just ATE this up with a spoon

Truly I already can't wait to reread and this is now just behind RWRB on my Casey scale (RWRB will always be number 1, no exceptions)

Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the eARC. All thoughts and opinions are my own and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

Here is my favorite thing about McQuiston's books: they're all wildly different. Now, I love me a good series or book where I know exactly what to expect from the author—but I love even more going into a book and having no idea what it will look like except that it will be good.

Secondary to that, here is my favorite thing about "The Pairing": McQuiston can make even a package tour of Europe sound appealing. Folks, I am my mother's daughter; usually I think the only vacation less appealing than a package tour with a bunch of strangers is a cruise. (So, a package tour, in a germ vessel, with a bunch of strangers...whom you can't escape.) McQuiston presents something a bit more interesting.

In "The Pairing", Theo and Kit were inseparable...until it all fell apart. In the years since, they've built lives and careers independent of the other, and things are fine. They're fine. There's just the small matter of the trip they'd booked together, and postponed, and the voucher Theo has to use before the deadline. Just the small matter of Theo arriving at the tour bus and finding none other than Kit, who has cashed in his last-chance voucher too.

What follows is a romp through Europe complete with a *whole* lot of local food, complex wine descriptions,* and no-holds-barred sex. Well—some holds barred. Let's just say that Theo and Kit find other people easier to fall into bed with. There's quite a lot of sex throughout, but much of it is with other people, and (perhaps because a lot of readers are very vocal about disliking even consensual sex that is not between the two main characters? Though who knows) most of *that* sex stays off the page...but I think if you read this on the subway you will have some very invested seatmates peering over your shoulder in no time. In any case, I love that this manages to feel so fresh even while playing on 'done' themes, I love Theo all the time, I love Kit most of the time, and I'd happily read a book about any number of the side characters...but I expect McQuiston has something else, and less expected, in mind for the next book. Hopefully that comes soon, whatever it is.

*I admit that my palate is severely unrefined, and reading Theo describe the particular undertones of a given wine made me want to revive the game where my partner and I drink our cheap grocery-store wine with dinner and attribute the snobbiest, most outrageous notes possible to it.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.

An utterly fabulous, vibrant trip around France, Spain and Italy following 2 characters and their second chance romance. The descriptions in this were top notch and made me hungry! The way the characters rediscovered each other was so tender and poignant, I’m so glad they got their happy ending🥰🥰

Overall, I really enjoyed this book!

This book will make you wish you were traveling around the world yourself and probably pick up a book on pastries and wine! I want to do this tour of Europe myself now!

I also enjoyed the detail about the trip itself. I will say it made the pacing of the book a little slower for me but I still enjoyed it. I don't believe it distracted from the romance too much.

Love the nonbinary representation in this book!

I don't usually like second chance romances but after they had a talk about what actually happened (communication, who would've guessed!), it was hard not to root for them.

I wasn't expecting the dual perspective at the mid-point. It was great to hear what Kit was thinking the whole time because I had my own version of his monologue in my head while reading Theo's perspective.

Typos:

Chapter Beginning, Loc 20,
"The rent house in cathedral City" should be "the rental house in cathedral City"

Chapter Barcelona, Loc 1984:
"And I'll take the only the orange zest from it", there is an extra "the.

Chapter Nice, Loc 2342
"The crinkled corners of his eyes and salt-and-paper stubble..." Should be salt-and-pepper.

Chapter Chianti, Loc 3463
"Part of wants to move their touch..." I believe is supposed to be "Part of me wants to move their touch..."

It’s no secret that I will read anything by Casey McQuiston, and that this was one of my most anticipated reads of 2024. It did not disappoint.

This is a hedonistic love story of the sweetest variety, wrapped in writing that is more beautiful and mature than anything McQuiston has shown us before. I love Theo and Kit with my whole heart. I screamed. I gasped. I hid under a blanket when it all became too much. I doubted the HEA, needlessly. I pined with these two crazy kids, so hard.

This was everything I wanted.

This very quickly surpassed RWRB as my favourite CMQ book - and that's saying something, from someone who has been reading and consuming RWRB fanfic in HIGH amounts for the past year. The Pairing is a rich, lush reading experience that truly puts you right in the height of european summer, and I really loved that.

Theo and Kit are both extremely loveable characters, both in very different ways, that i felt contrasted each other really well. I got so many gender feelings throughout, Theo is so relatable in so many ways. I felt like The Pairing showcased CMQ's growth as a writer - it still felt distinctly them, but it is more lyrically written and has a very strong voice. I especially loved the poetry, art, and sculpture intertwining with the narrative, and thought that piece was very well done - it felt intentional but not overwhelming.

It was also very horny, very sexy, and I really appreciated that CMQ truly let these slutty bi's be as slutty as they wanted to be. The sex scenes felt fresh, too - I didn't feel like it was just another romance novel.

All in all, 5/5 reading experience, and I'm going to be re-reading when this comes out in August so that I can annotate it and put in some visuals of the art and sculpture that's mentioned, while I'm at it.

Thank you to St. Martin's Griffin for the ARC!

I loved this book and think it is McQuiston's best to date! The premise of two exes ending up on the same European food tour was something I didn't know I needed. The food and the scenery were described so exquisitely I felt like I was there. I can't remember the last time I was this hungry while reading a book. This is the perfect steamy summer read!

Another queer love story! 💖

Theo and Kit used to be best friends. After realizing they’ve been in love for a long time, they try their hand at a relationship. It was great, until Kit up and left Theo and moved to Paris. 4 years later, Theo decides to finally use that voucher they have for a European wine and food tour. It just so happens that Kit decided to use his at the same time. Now, they’re on the tour together with a bunch of unresolved feelings between them. When they decide to make it more interesting and hold a hookup competition just to prove they’re over each other, what could go wrong?

I really wanted to fall head over heels in love with this. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. I’m not a foodie by any means and I think that’s where this fell apart for me. I love wine as much as the next person, but knowing everything about it has never been a priority. I found myself skipping over all the descriptions of food and drink and going straight to the dialogue. It was all so boring. 😬

I did, however, really enjoy that dialogue and the incredibly sexy chemistry between Kit and Theo. The spicy scenes were hot asf. I also enjoyed getting the story from both of them and how things fell apart and miscommunication destroyed them and how they put it back together.

So, the love story was an absolute yes from me, but the descriptive scenery was not. I think there are a ton of people who will absolutely love this!

Four years ago, Theo, a sommelier, and Kit, a pastry chef, broke up before a planned food and wine tour of Europe together. Now, just before their vouchers are about to expire, they've accidentally both re-booked the same tour.

This second chance romance had lots to love -- some magical setting descriptions, the exploration of the main characters' gender and sexuality, and a nice mix of lovely, supportive dialogue and banter between our main characters. The beginning of The Pairing sucked me in quickly.

But a few factors fell flat for me too. I struggled with the length and the amount of food and wine descriptions, which I admit to breezing through in the back half of the book in order to get back to the romance. The plot was full of background characters, but none were given enough airtime. I wish we'd had fewer secondary characters but gotten to know them better, especially Theo and Kit's family members. Finally, the miscommunication plot is not my favorite, so that gripe might be on me, but I struggled to believe that it took Theo and Kit so long to reconcile what happened with their breakup when they've been lifelong best friends, know each other so well, and talk through everything else.

I enjoyed this one but likely won't revisit it. I recommend as a summertime beach or poolside read!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

Perfection. Casey McQuiston has truly outdone themself in this novel. I instantly fell in love with Kit and Theo. The characters were so real and relatable and incredibly charming. All the small details that showed the lifelong friendship of Kit and Theo were authentic and set the story apart. And all of this set on a breathtaking food tour of Europe. I found myself completely immersed in the tour stops and dying to try all the foods and wine the characters were sampling!

I love this story so much! It's so much more than a novel; it's a whole immersive experience. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6194447153

In support of the SMP boycott, I will be withholding my review of this title until SMP speaks out. If the boycott is resolved, I will update with a full review.

LOVE LOVE LOVE EVERY ASPECT OF THIS BOOK. I want to erase my memory and experience it all over again. Beating out Red, White and Royal Blue as my fave Casey McQuiston book is a hard feat, but the experience this book gave me might be my favourite ride to take.

The setting is such a star, it’s freaking LUSH. I’m up to my nips in atmosphere. The tastes, smells, and that euphoric feeling of travel all create a beautiful experience so complete it’s like I took a trip to Europe myself. Kit and Theo have so much passion for food, wine, art, and experiencing as much joy (and lust) as they can, it’s infectious and makes this book such an immersive read.

And PHEW THAT CHEMISTRY I have not read smut this inventive and steamy in a good long minute. So many romance novels feel like cut and paste when it comes to sex scenes, but CMQ is being so creative and using all this sexual tension to drive the characters forward, it adds so much to their relationship and makes the story way more unique than most romance novels I’ve read.

Theo and Kit have a beautiful relationship, their story is one I easily fell for and had no hope of ever getting back up. The queerness is also delightful, the way both characters express and experience their queerness is fresh and yet easily relatable. I loved watching their story unfold and desperately pining along with them. AND THAT USE OF DUAL POV PHEEEWWW I WASNT READY.

This is a perfect book, there is so much love packed into it and I want to experience it over and over again. I’m so grateful for this early chance to fall in love with Theo-and-Kit ❤️

When two bisexual exes accidentally book the same European food and wine tour, they decide to be mature and challenge each other to a hookup competition to prove they aren’t attracted to each other. Because they obviously aren’t.
This book is full of chaotic bisexual behavior- in the absolute best way. Full of different culture and hookups throughout the tour, Casey McQuisten does it again. I really don’t know how they do it half the time, it just really impresses me. I flew through this book, eating up all of the plot and character interactions, just waiting for them to get together.
Thank you to NetGalley and St Martin’s Griffin for an eARC of this book.

When SMP addresses the concerns of readers and reviewers I will send my full review. Until then I am withholding my review during the St. Martin's Press boycott.