Just in time! I really enjoyed this book and how open and honest it was. I really related to the struggle that the FMC was going through. I think this book is excellent for someone who wants some spice and everything nice. This is my first Dani McLean book and I can guarantee I will be picking up another, I also really enjoyed the banter that this book had, A really fun read!

Rushed and Disappointing "Mortgage of Convenience" rushes through its storyline, leaving readers with more questions than answers. The chapters end abruptly, and the characters' motivations feel unclear and thrown together.

Bee, the main character, falls flat and lacks depth, making it hard to root for her. Even the romantic scenes don't add much excitement to the story. However, Sebastian's charm and Bee's journey as an aspiring author do offer some small moments of enjoyment.

This was entertaining, fast paced. I’ve been on a romance kick lately so this was a nice addition to my collection.

Cute read but didn't grip me like I'd hoped. Liked the brother's best friend trope but felt like the book was missing something

Thank you to Net Galley, Dani McLean & the publisher for this E-Arc 💗

Bee is a ghostwriter who returns home and buys a house with the guy she’s had a crush on for a few years. What could go wrong?

Sebastian is still trying to find his way in this world. He’s pushing 40 and strives to settle down, get married and start a family. When his best friends brother, Bee offers to help him buy a house he can’t turn down the offer.. can he?

This was a slow burn, however really got me thinking what I want out of life! I love how the characters challenged each other to be open and honest

A solid 3 ⭐️⭐️⭐️

You’ll like book if
⁃ you enjoy love of convenience
⁃ best friends brother
⁃ found family

Excited to see what Dani writes next!

Oh god, the sweeetessssst book. I feel so so strongly similar to Bee, i feel so seen having my struggles with friendship, with proving myself to others, with wanting freedom as well as with Sebastian, with not wanting to be like our parents, with tunnel vision on his goals, and with weight holding him back. It is the best kind of not just chemistry but also they fit like a puzzle. I love how mature they are with things, i love how the other seemingly completes the other with domesticity, love, passion and understanding. I don't know how many I annotated and highlighted and how I wish ARC ebooks like this stay in my library for so long, i need to get back to my annotations from time to time and it is hell transferring them one by one so i just let go. I might add them here like my other reviews if I ever get the time before it archives and disappears.

But thanks Netgalley and Set the Mood Publishing for the trust and ARC.

Sadly, this book didn’t work for me. Bee’s pov was so repetitive and not fun to read about honestly. Sebastian was actually sweet and supportive, so I found him to be a little more tolerable. There was actually no tension at all in the romance and because of that, a lot of the intimate scenes came off unappealing and like the characters were nothing but horny 24/7. I usually love the forced proximity trope but it wasn’t executed well in this story, so I just ended up disappointed.

Can I just take a moment a drool over this cover art! 😍
Mortgage of Convenience by Dani McLean was so freaking adorable!
The story pulled me in from the very start and kept my interest till the end. I wouldn't necessarily categorize it as a rom com, but it is a very sweet and clean contemporary romance with many humorous moments woven in that made me smile and laugh. An adorable and heartwarmingly sweet story that I am glad to have had the opportunity to read.

Thank You NetGalley and Set the Mood Publishing for your generosity and gifting me a copy of this amazing eARC!

Thank you Net Galley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

And honestly speaking I struggled to finish this one, I didn’t think the storyline with the mortgage was realistic at all, her best friend is a major arsehole & I was quite happy to get to the end.

Bee and Sebastian are nice characters and I did enjoy how much they liked it each other and their relationship, Aidan also seems like a lovely brother. Other than that, this wasn’t the book for me.

2 stars

Alright where do i start..i was very excited to read this book (and my first requested ARC!!). I thought the cover was pretty and the plot summery seemed promising but unfortunately, i was left pretty disappointed by it.

Firstly, i didn’t feel like the characters had any chemistry between each other. Their scenes and interactions felt forced and it made it hard for me to get into the story and connect with both MCs. I’m sad to say it but i was bored. It felt like i was reading a 500 pages book instead of 260 pages. The dialogue was repetitive and the storytelling was confusing and all over the place, it was difficult to follow. If you like brother’s best friend, insta love and forced proximity, i think you might enjoy this book a little more than i did. Overall, this book didn’t work out for me.

Thank you Netgalley for providing me this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

First, thank you to the publishers and net galley for the arc in exchange for an honest review.

Brothers best friend
Forced proximity

Now, why didn't I like it
I felt zero connection between the 2 main characters, zero.

Second, I didn't understand why she decided to spend 20,000 for a house that he wanted when they weren't even close, except that she had a crush on him.

Third, her reason for coming home seemed huge, but it was really just insecurities about confidence. . . Like what??

The book had a cute premise, so I was excited, but I was hoping for her reason for coming home, asking him for help, and buying a house was something big. I thought maybe she pitched a book about a love story between her and a stripper and needed his pov or something.

This book was hard to get through it was boring, and it felt jumpy. It jumped around alot.Their pov felt like they were the same person, and honeslty boring half the time.
Some of the smut scenes were honeslty ick.

Thank you NetGalley, the Publisher, and the Author for the E-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Tropes:
- brother's best friend
- Dual POV
- forced proximity
- age-gap

While browsing I stumbled upon this book and was fascinated from the very first moment and intrigued due to the cover and the description. I was so excited when I finally could begin reading this book & I enjoyed reading it! It was so easy for me to connect with both characters for different reasons. For one Bee was very relatable with her anxiety issues and everything that came with it. And it was so nice to read about topics like outgrowing friendships and trying to open up to new people and how hard it can be. Also, the topic around Sebastian and his hard childhood is something that hit home and made the book even more relatable to me. But due to all these topics, I would say it´s very important to check out the trigger warnings beforehand! While reading the book I always squealed a bit when he recognized something in her no one else did or it became more apparent that they have feelings for each other. More than once I was swooning over Sebastian. But I must say that the last 20% of the book felt a bit slower to read than the beginning.

Some of my fave quotes
"𝘏𝘰𝘸 𝘮𝘶𝘤𝘩 𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘦 𝘥𝘰 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘦?"
"𝘍𝘰𝘳 𝘺𝘰𝘶? 𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘺 𝘭𝘪𝘧𝘦."

"𝘠𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘥𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘮𝘴 𝘢𝘳𝘦 𝘷𝘢𝘭𝘪𝘥, 𝘉𝘦𝘦. 𝘔𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵, 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘺'𝘳𝘦 𝘢𝘴 𝘣𝘦𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘪𝘧𝘶𝘭 𝘢𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘥𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘳. 𝘋𝘰𝘯'𝘵 𝘥𝘶𝘭𝘭 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘮 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘥𝘰𝘯'𝘵 𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘱 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳𝘴𝘦𝘭𝘧 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘮."

All in all, I enjoyed this book!

Thank you Net Galley and Set The Mood Publishing for this ARC of the book Mortgage of Convenience by Dani McLean in exchange for an honest review on my part. I'm afraid this book was just not my cup of tea. The pace was slow moving and the MCs just didn't have any redeeming qualities that I could latch on to so I could become invested in their relationship. I was lulled in to the request by the cute cover and title but it just didn't materialize into a great relationship book. The smut was over the top and of no substance to the actual story in my opinion. I have never read any other books by this author, so hate to be making any judgement based on just this one book. For me the 2 STARS is a bit of a generous gift.

It's almost scarily uncanny how much I saw myself in Bee.
The story is so beautifully simple that reading it felt like the most relaxing thing ever. There's no useless drama, stupid decisions, or miscommunication: just two truly wonderful people who finally confess their feelings after keeping them bottled up for so long.

A terrific relationship where they help each other grow in the most supporting way you could imagine.

Sebastian was absolutely fantastic, a remarkable person that everyone could see themselves with,
And the scene when Bee trims his beard? I was done for.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Mortgage of convenience is a romance novel by Dani McLean.
The novel was spicy from the start and continued all the way through. The story was easy to follow, which made for easy reading and had a good cast of characters. I recommend it.
❤️ Thank you to netgalley and the author/publisher for my arc ebook copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to Set The Mood Publishing and Net Galley for the arc!

The plot of this book seemed amazing and I was very excited to dive into this world but i really struggled to get into it. Dani McLean seems amazing but she seems like she is just writing to write, there is a lot going on and i understand wanting to address all your points and have your scenes come true but it just felt very rushed at times which made this book difficult to finish.

I really enjoyed the storyline, tropes and characters in this book.

Bee - I could deeply connect with the self doubt, not feeling enough and outgrowing some of your nearest and dearest. Such a beautiful self healing journey.

Sebastian - I mean a tattooed brother’s best friend plant daddy who’s helping her find her confidence…

I love how they opened up and leaned into each other and both grew through their pasts.

Cassie - she deserves a mention purely for
“Here, swap numbers with me. I want to know what you think of that. Feel free to send me all your unhinged thoughts.”

Although, at times I felt confused, not sure if my e-reader had skipped ahead, the timeline had skipped ahead or unsure who was talking. It also felt a little repetitive at times which I normally wouldn’t mind too much but already being confused at points made it difficult to flow with the story line at times.

The cute cover drew me in! This was my first read by author Dani McLean and I will definitely give another a go.

Okay where to start... Grab some tea bc I have big feelings...
Tropes
- mortgage of convenience (hey, that's the title!) - basically they both buy a house together because it's convenient, but we don't ever fully get an understanding of why Bee agrees? It's not that well fleshed out
- brother's best friend
- sexy ex-stripper (but this is barely mentioned)

Pros
- Sebastian is sexy. He's hot.
- Bee is writing a book. I liked that.

Cons
Holy fuck this book was disappointing. Firstly, was it just me or did it feel like the paragraphs and chapters ended at weird times? I got my boyfriend to read the last bit of chapter 22 and he agreed that it seemed like the author was ending the chapter mid thought. This happened a few times throughout the book and was so noticiable that I had to mention it.

Secondly, this book was SO POORLY FLESHED OUT. I'm not sure if the author had too many ideas, or too few. Nothing meant anything and the characters motivations were never truly explained. Why did Bee agree to buy a house with a guy she barely knows? Why did Bee move back home?(because she is writing a book is such a shit reason). Why did Sebastian want to buy that specific house? (again with the shit reasons, because the first house he and his mom rented was two streets away? Seriously? Again, what's with this specific house???)

Thirdly, who the fuck is Bee??? And I don't mean who is the character, I mean who is she as a person? I'm so sorry Dani McLean but Bee Montgomery (brilliant name) has to take the cake for the worst romance heroine in existence. She's such a nothing character that it fully mad me mad. She's annoying, she has no spine, and her biggest achievement of the book - ending her friendship with Morgan - was done not because SHE thought it was a good idea, but because SEBASTIAN did. Bee sucks.

Smut
- Yes this is going as a con. The smut added zero anything to the book and my god even somnophilia couldn't make it interesting.

Finally, I AM SO SORRY NETGALLERY AND DANI MCLEAN. I tried so hard to be positive about this book, the synopsis sounded so good, but by golly... It gets a (derogatory) three stars because I liked that Sebastian is a plant daddy and I want Dani McLean to keep writing because I know she can do better than this.
(Thanks for the ARC, sorry for the bad review xx)

QUESTIONS:
- I'll be posting my review to goodreads
- Review is live
- https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6264312479

Mortgage of Convenience serves up a uniquely millennial premise layered with a few other beloved romance tropes, including: forced proximity, brother’s best friend, longtime not-so-secret crush, &, while we don’t get a marriage of convenience, we definitely get a partnership of convenience (it’s in the title). I was pulled in by the premise & the beautiful cover art, but this was a new-to-me author & I didn’t know what to expect. Unfortunately, while I enjoyed some elements of this story, overall it felt disconnected & fell flat for me.

For the FMC - Bee - her story is the catalyst of this pairing. She is returning home with a secret that really isn’t as huge as we’re meant to think it is. She pitched a book that she’s basically already written to an agent who already knows that she is a great writer &, while I can appreciate that the stakes are different/higher when the work is tied to your own name vs. ghostwriting something, it just didn’t feel believable, so I never quite got invested in Bee as a character. If you’re worried about your professional (see: financial) future, it’s difficult to believe that you would just drop $20k (basically your life savings) on a mortgage with a man you have a crush on but don’t really know, to buy part of a house in a hometown that you’re convinced you’re not going to stay in.

For the MMC - Sebastian - I loved him. His life experiences, emotional intelligence, & overall general outlook makes him incredibly attractive. Then you throw in his bi identity, self-assurance, ex-stripper status, & incredible found family of both humans & plants, & I was locked, loaded, & ready to swoon. I was able to get invested in his story & wished we were able to see a little more of that. The father storyline could have also presented an alternative way to approach the mortgage issue as a premise. And at the end, I think maybe he & Bee’s brother should have ended up together instead ha.

I enjoyed Sebastian & the side characters, & the story overall was witty & fun more times than it wasn’t. Perhaps this book just wasn’t for me & that’s okay! Even if I hadn’t read this as an arc, I know I would have picked up this book at some point to check out!

Bee has known Sebastian her whole life (he is her brother’s best friend) and when he is need of a mortgage she agrees to co-sign with him in exchange for him helping her gain confidence and take charge of her life. When they move into their new house together, tensions and attractions between them rise.

———————

This felt like a book that had all the elements of what could have been a really enjoyable love story, but somehow those elements just didn’t connect properly. The plot premise was really cute but everything happened at too quick of a pace and some of it felt nonsensical. While the characters had plenty of sexual chemistry and history with each other, their quick jump to being attracted to each other felt a little rushed, awkward, and forced. Outside forces (such as her toxic friend Morgan) felt really contrived. Bee has low self-esteem. We know this because we’re reminded of it EVERY PAGE. The spicy scenes were nothing remarkable.

I admit I’m a little bummed out because the blurb about this book sounded so fun, and the cover is adorable, but I just didn’t connect with this read.

Thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.