I love a good DIY home renovation story, so I had high hopes for this one. Unfortunately for me, this was just okay. The backstory of LaRynn and Deacon felt off, and didn't make entire sense for me, especially since they're basically cousins in a sort of way? This seemed to be a big missing piece for me. The flashbacks were okay, but they didn't help me connect to the characters any more or understand their motivations any better. The romance was mostly lust, and overall I didn't feel any true tension build between them. Perhaps the dual POV made it a bit too choppy. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to provide my honest review.

The Co-op
Tarah DeWitt
Pub 11/12
4☆

They say love and construction don't mix.
By that logic, hate and construction may as well be condemned.

DeWitt does it again! I absolutely adored LaRynn and Deacon’s story. It was not only a fun story about home renovation, it was also a heartwarming story about also relationship “renovation”. It was a wonderful mix of humor and heart and done so perfectly without the dreaded miscommunication or a third act breakup! Book by book my love for Tarah’s writing (and her covers omg 😍) grows exponentially and I cannot wait for more.


What I adored:
🪚 Slow Burn
🪚 Enemies To Lovers
🪚 Second Chance
🪚 Marriage of Convenience
🪚 Home Renovation
🪚 Forced Proximity

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

The Co-op is a beautifully layered romance about more than restoring a home. It delves into the emotional renovation in relationships, especially when two people have walls built from past heartbreak and ultimately misunderstanding one another. While the setup sounds like a lighthearted romcom, this book takes a deeper, more intense dive into the complexities of trust, vulnerability, and the slow work of unlearning self-protective habits.

DeWitt’s signature style of creating complex, messy characters shines here as LaRynn and Deacon grapple with their own insecurities and the patterns that keep them at a distance from others—and each other…one choosing to charm and keep people “close” while the other pushes them away as quickly as possible.

This book probably isn’t for you if you shy away from miscommunication or tension; The Co-op thrives on it, presenting the realistic frustrations and incremental progress of two people slowly learning to communicate honestly. Both LaRynn and Deacon are frustratingly relatable, especially in the way they guard themselves against disappointment and rejection. Their conflict might feel like a lot to navigate, but DeWitt’s careful pacing and thoughtful insights make their journey towards understanding feel genuine.

DeWitt doesn’t hold back on heavier themes either, so if you have experienced parental neglect or emotional distance, this book could hit particularly close to home. I strongly recommend reading the content warnings and author’s note to gauge your readiness for the story’s emotional depth.

Overall, while The Co-op was a challenging read at times, it was equally rewarding. DeWitt’s ability to craft characters who are real, raw, and in need of understanding is one of the best things about her work, and it shines through here. This isn’t easy for me to give a star rating to, but if you’re looking for a heartfelt, authentic love story that embraces the beauty of imperfection, The Co-op is worth every page.

Thank you Netgalley for the advance copy of this book. My apologies for not getting to it before publication day.
This book took me awhile to read and get in to. But once I really got into it and started getting to know the characters I enjoyed it! The main characters and their friends were relatable and made me think of my friend group. I wished we could have gotten more on the "Grands" story, and I loved that they were mentioned and talked about throughout the book.
I would recommend this book to my friends and family.

I have reached a point where I'm just gonna go ahead and pre-order whatever DeWitt writes next.

This love story about LaRynn and Deacon, two teens who fell into one another as teens then broke just as swiftly, grabs your heart from the start and doesn't let go.

The way she weaves the passions and stumblings of youth with the weight of a lifetime's baggage and how these two people find ways to process their past and shift those weights to be able to become what they could be together is moving and relatably awkward/uncomfortable, sweet and steamy, entertaining and unputdownable.

Highly, highly recommend.

For fans of:
Love and Other Words by Christina Lauren
The Ex Vows by Jessica Joyce
Homebound by Meredith Trapp
A Proposal They Can't Refuse by Natalie Caña

Book Review 📚
Title: The Co-Op
Series: Standalone
Author: Tarah DeWitt
Format: Audio
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Tropes:
🏚️ Marriage of Convenience
🪚 Forced Proximity
🏚️ Second Chance
🪚 Roommates to Lovers
🏚️ Dislike to Love
🪚 It’s Always Been You

Favorite Quotes:
“I’m angry at the parts of him I’ll never get.”
-This was a gut punch and I felt it in my soul.

“Alright Lar, let’s pick out a shitter.”
-I literally did a spit take 😂😂

“Because when I’m not what works for people at that time in their lives, when I’m not a convenient version of me, I always manage to lose them.”

“When you have a bad day ma fille, think about it from beginning to end. Walk your way through it. Was it really a bad day, or was it a few bad moments? What part of your day would you like to hold onto before you close your eyes? Find that good bit, and let it be the thing you go to sleep to.”

“That I’m happy here with you, in our half torn apart house. That I think—I think I’d be content to serve coffee every day and watch the waves and never do anything extraordinary and still feel like I have the best life.”

Review:
If you can’t tell by the amount of quotes I loved (that isn’t even all of them), I really loved this book! This book follows Deacon and LaRynn, who had a fling when they were teens and haven’t seen each other in years. They both inherit a home and have to enter into a marriage of convenience to pay for the renovations.

This book had me in tears because I was laughing so hard. I literally did a spit take during the toilet shopping part. The pranks they pulled on each other were hilarious. The banter and the tension were perfect and when Deacon said, “that’s my wife,” I was done for. Both main characters had a lot of growth throughout the story, which I also loved. Tarah DeWitt writes books that I feel in my soul. I always finish reading her books and have a new perspective about things. The characters she writes and their problems are so real and I really appreciate that. I highly recommend this book 🧡 The paperback releases in November 12th.

I listened to this book on Audible. Stephanie Rose and Nelson Hobbs did a great job!

The Co-op by Tarah DeWitt is 5/5 stars!
I devoured this book in one day and loved every word I read.

LaRynn and Deacon have a unique relationship. They shared a summer together a decade ago, after being introduced by their grandmothers, and now they’ve both inherited a dilapidated building from the grands. LaRynn has the money needed for the project but she can only access it once married. Deacon and Rynn haven’t spoken since that fateful summer and now the pair have to navigate renovation and restoration of both the building and their relationship. They hurt each other in the past and reading about how they healed each other in the present was an absolute joy. Deacon and Rynn are flawed, complex, and oh so lovable. They show up for each other while also bringing all the humor. If you couldn’t tell by now, I LOVED this second chance romance!
Read this if you like: second chance romance, enemies to lovers, forced proximity, grumpy/sunshine, marriage of convenience, dual pov, flashbacks, and banter!!

5/5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
🌶️🌶️

I big thank you to NetGalley, Tarah DeWitt, and St. Martin’s Press for a copy of this digital ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Synopsis: LaRynn and Deacon inherit a beach house from their grandmothers - but in order to get the money to fix it up to sell, or they need to get married. The only problem is they both ended up heartbroken after a summer fling years ago as teenagers, and now they can’t stand each other.

Thoughts: Reading this book made my heart so happy! LaRynn and Deacon are both flawed but lovable, and their chemistry is spot on. Tarah does banter SO WELL. The home renovation and forced proximity leads to some fun hijinks and humor, but there are also lots of deeper moments. And *spoiler alert* there’s no miscommunication drama or third act breakup PRAISE BE. Go grab a copy, you won’t regret it.

Read this if you like:
🔨 home renovation
🔨 forced proximity
🔨 marriage of convenience
🔨 second chance romance

This is definitely my favorite of Tara Dewitt’s books TO date.

I’ve just finished so I’m honestly at a total loss for words, but this book sucked me in so quickly. Not a single dry moment of this book. Every chapter was carefully and perfectly crafted, written, executed.

LaRynn and Deacon are some of the most realistic characters I’ve read in a romance book in a while. Everything about their personal journeys, insecurities, worries, etc was relatable in some way. The author had no trouble bringing these two to life, so much that they genuinely felt like real people I knew.

The chemistry between these characters was hot as a volcano, truly. I haven’t read a romance book in so long where they complemented each other so well. I love love love that there was no third act conflict and this was simply a well written story of real, raw, true love and all of its ups and downs.

Thank you so much to the publisher for granting me an early copy.

Thank you NetGalley for providing me with an early copy of this book!

I loved this book and I love Tarah DeWitt! Cannot recommend this book enough.

LaRynn and Deacon inherit their grandmothers’ house that is falling apart and they come up with a plan to fix it up and sell it. However, they have so much history and chemistry between the two of them that it’s not that simple. It’s a close proximity, second chance, grumpy and grumpy romance.

Although, I enjoyed sone of the characters and their development it felt spotty in timeline and slow at times.

📚 ARC Review 📚
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
🌶️

Overall, I genuinely enjoyed this book. I feel like the epilogue just made the book.

I love that their grandmothers and a summer break are what brought them together. This book was just so emotional.

I absolutely love a strong willed MFC and LaRynn is that. She was so closed off and Deacon was determined to break down all those walls. Overall, the characters were all realistic and loveable.

Troupes
🌊 Marriage of Convenience
🌊 Second Chance
🌊 Dual POV
🌊 Small Town
🌊 Forced Proximity

This is book is a standalone.

Thank you, Tarah DeWitt, and NetGalley for allowing me to have an e-ARC of this book! I truly enjoyed it.

I've finally discovered @authortarahdewitt and it kills me that I am so late to the party. This book is so fun, full of banter, heartbreak and so much else I cannot have many words to express the range of emotions I felt while reading.

This is the story of LaRynn and Deacon, who meet as teenagers when their grandmothers get married, they have a fling one summer but something goes wrong, they get lost in a sea of misunderstanding and fear of showing their true emotions, and they end up not seeing each other again for seven years when everything inevitably goes bad.

When their grandmothers died, they both inherit their house and LaRynn and Deacon have to meet again to decide what to do with it.

Needless to say this is a second chance novel that, as I said, will fill you with banter, spice and fear of showing your true feelings to the person who hurt you seven years before. It's a journey to discover you can count on other people, not just yourself, and that if you open your heart even a little bit, the love you get in return will overcome the fear of being hurt.

These two have the most beautiful souls you can find in book characters and I am so happy I discovered Tara DeWitt's books thanks to The Co-op. And that epiloge was so good and heartwarming, I fell in love with this two a little but more.

As always, thank you @netgalley for the opportunit to read this eARC, all opinions and swooning are my own

#arc #arcreader #arcreviewer #arcreview #thecoop #tarahdewitt #netgalley #netgalley2024 #goodreadschallenge #romance #romancenovel #spicy #slowburn #onebedtrope #arrangedmarriage #secondchance #smalltownromance #newadult #doublepov

This story follows LaRynn and Deacon, old flames that had a falling out many years ago. Their grandmas were married, and both passed away in recent years. Their oceanside house in Santa Cruz is in disrepair, and Deacon demands LaRynn come back to Santa Cruz to chip in and do her part, as it was left to both of them.
Tensions run high between the two immediately and tempers flare. Both holding a grudge against the other for what happened when they were young. Deacon is disappointed to find out that LaRynn is not in fact loaded as he assumed. LaRynn does have a trust fund, but her dad put a stipulation in place to keep her from accessing it: she must get married. Deacon offers to temporarily marry her in order to get this project over and done with, so they can sell the home for an obnoxious amount of money and move on with their (separate) lives.
As the demolition and renovation project gets underway, the two of them must stay in the house together, with no walls or doors. They fight, they bicker, they steal glances, they each secretly long for the other. They eventually work their way to being friends and partners. But when they eventually dive into their past, can they forgive and move on? Can they go back to being more?
I really loved Deacon (as an adult). He was so handy and giving to all those around him. LaRynn's continued attitude from teenager into adulthood was irksome, but it gets worked out eventually.
All in all, this was a great second chance love story.
5⭐2🌶️

I read an advanced copy of this book and these are my honest opinions. Thank you to Netgalley, St Martin's Press, and author Tarah Dewitt!

I really wanted to love this book, because the marriage of convenience trope is one of my favorite tropes but this one unfortunately fell flat for me. I found I didn't connect to either of the MCs, and they had no chemistry? Borderline unlikeable. I skimmed the last 10% of the book just to get it over with. The second chance romance trope is a hard one to get me to love, and in this case it didn't work for me. Their "breakup" is based on a miscommunication that could've been solved with a conversation.

Thank you to St-Martin's Press and Netgalley for a copy in exchange for a review. All opinions are my own.

The angst in this book...wow!! I devoured this book in one day, couldn't put it down! This forced proximity/marriage book had me in all the feels! I was laughing, I was crying and I was melting!
LaRynn and Deacon have inherited a beach house together and the up and downs on the renovations, had me hooked!
I highly recommend you read this book ASAP!

*Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's for this ARC in exchange for an honest review*

After reading Savor It, I was so excited to pick up another book by Tarah DeWitt. This book did not disappoint. If I'm being specific, this is probably a 3.5 star book. I really liked the couple in this one. I liked that they had very clear and strong lines of communication between each other. I enjoyed the overall story. I think my one complaint is that the characters are quite young in this one. I wish they were aged up a little bit considering this book gets pretty steamy, and for me it just felt a little awkward reading about people so young (because I am not that young). The author does provide a content warning page at the beginning which I appreciated. Overall, I had a good time with this one and definitely recommend it.

“I don’t care where we end up or what we do as long as I have you.”
~~~~
This was a great quick palette cleaner and I loved this story! Absolutely enjoyed this book, especially the plot and the banter! The characters were a blast as well!
Would absolutely recommend and reread this again! Thank you NetGalley and Tarah DeWitt for approving me for this title!

Messy, imperfect and emotional 🥹 There’s just something about a real life love story that just brings me to tears. Plus the 🌶️🌶️ spice was just right 😉 Really loved the parallel story of building, restoring construction project and the work it also takes in a relationship — it’s not shared enough!

🔨 grumpy fmc working at a cafe
🌊 sunny handyman mmc
🔨 so much pining and tension
🌊 marriage of convenience
🔨 forced proximity
🌊 second chance
🔨 “my wife”
🌊 dancing in the kitchen

★★★★★♾️
🌶️🌶️🌶️

This book is so seriously, stunningly gorgeous, it’s insane. I have had the hardest time trying to put my love for this one into words, and it’s taken a few weeks for me to finally pen my review.

I’m SUCH a sucker for stories about beautiful, sad, imperfect, sometimes quite sh*tty, h*rny, real people, and gosh The Co-op is a shining example of this weirdly specific category.

LaRynn and Deacon are far from perfect and have hurt each other deeply. But by the hands of fate—or their sweet departed grandmothers—they are back in the same orbit, dancing around one another while attempting to ignore the confusing swirl of Big Feelings™️. Because while they haven’t seen each other in years, they both still love and hate the other. The question is, can they rebuild what they once had? And will they survive renovating their shared townhouse as they attempt to figure that out?

You need this phenomenal book in your life. Read it, cry, highlight basically every single line, cry some more, probably. I don’t know, that might just be me.

This book means so much to me and will forever have a little piece of my heart. Tarah writes with a rhythmic grace, and every line is so poignant, lyrical, and tender. I wish I could carve her words onto my soul—but a tattoo might have to suffice.