The Matchmaker's Playbook by Rachel Van Dyken

First Thought: Suspend disbelief. For the sake of enjoyment, there were a lot of parts of this story where I just had to take a moment and say, "I don't think this could really happen-- but ok." Once I decided I was going to do that, and I had to do it often, then the story got a bit better. 

-Like is it possible for someone to trip and fall into someone's lips? 

-Do people really believe this guy is in a new "serious-ish" relationship every week? How have the people on this campus not caught on to a small time celebrity serial dating. 

But again, once I decided to accept these plot points, I didn't give up on the story. 

Why I read it: Okay, I swear I read other tropes! But here we've got another example of fake relationships! Really, I choose it because I enjoyed Rachel's book Dangerous Exes (review here) and wanted to check out another book. 

POV: First Person Male Narrator, Past tense 

Setting: Seattle Washington, College Campus

Tropes: Fake Relationship, Sports Romance, Virgin Heroine, Makeover  

Our Heroine: We didn't get to be in her head, but I found her the most enjoyable character. She's rough around the edges, and gets a bit of a She's All That makeover, but there's a reason that movie's so popular. We take off our glasses, or ditch our adidas slides and suddenly Mr. Popular can't get enough of us. I know that sounds a little sarcastic, but as a life long book nerd- that's actually the dream. 

Our Hero: Ian, he's kind of cocky, but in a bit of an annoying way. The author does a nice job of getting us totally into his head, but I'm not sure I always wanted to be there. I know he's growing up and learning that this playboy lifestyle isn't for him. He's a normal jock hero and I didn't come away from the book thinking "yas, this is my new book boyfriend!" In fact, I don't know that I'd even like him if I met him in real life. 

Overall thoughts: Overall, I really appreciate Rachel's writing style. There were a lot of parts of this story that mirrored Dangerous Exes. But overall, the book was fine. It took be four days to read, which is never a great sign for me. I burn through romance books when I'm loving them. It might have been that I was back to work this week, but even then. The story line fell a little flat for me, but it won't keep me from putting the second book in the series on my "to be read" list. 

The sexy scenes: Medium. 

The best part of the book: Wondering how the side characters Gabi and Lex are going to get over this serious hate they have either and hook up in The Matchmaker's Replacement. 

Worst part of the book: Any time I said, that seriously wouldn't happen like that, or there's no way... Usually when this happens, I immediately put the book down. I like realistic romance, because I like feeling like these love stories COULD happen. There were just too many things in this story that were not realistic. 

TLDR: If you don't mind giving up logic for the sake of enjoyment, then this was a fine read. 

How I read it: Free with my Kindle Prime subscription

Links: Amazon, The Match Maker's Playbook & Goodreads, The Matchmaker's Playbook