[I received an electronic review copy of this book from Netgalley and G. P. Putnam’s Sons in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.]
Summary
Naomi and Nicholas have been together for almost 2 years, and their wedding is just around the corner. You’d think Naomi would be feeling deliriously happy or nervous or excited. But what she’s feeling is trapped. Boyfriend Nicholas and Fiancé Nicholas feel like two different people.
Naomi feels like she’s pretending all the time. Then Nicholas acts superior, like he “knows” her so well, which makes everything feel fake because he only knows the things she displays. She has to rely on a secret document on her computer to remind her of his good qualities.
Everything Naomi has wanted for the wedding has been vetoed or overruled by Nicholas’ controlling mother. She picked Naomi’s gown and her maid-of-honor. It’s hard to be excited about a wedding that will reflect nothing of what you wanted. Naomi says she’s moving forward with the wedding, “40% because I love him and 60% because I’m too afraid to call it off.”
But in an emotionally charged moment, Naomi realizes Nicholas is just as unhappy as she is. In fact, some of her recent misery is his doing! They both know whoever calls the whole thing off will become the villain in their break up story. AND they’ll have to pay for all the ridiculously expensive (and non-refundable) choices his mother has been making for the wedding. But now that Naomi sees Nicholas’ behavior for what it is – trying to push her to call things off – she’s is NOT backing down.
It. Is. On.
Review
The beginning of this was miserable for me. I don’t do well with stories where a character is being railroaded or manipulated and doesn’t stand up for themselves. While Naomi has some spark in her own mind and in her thinking, none of it comes out of her mouth. She and Nicholas are both miserable. And reading about their misery was miserable for me.
And then Naomi catches on. She realizes Nicholas is trying to make her miserable so she will dump him. He gets to be the victim, and she will have to deal with his mother and paying for the wedding she has foisted on them. Then the story started to get interesting. But….
Now here I have to be honest. It has been my intention since I started this blog in 2016 to not post negative reviews. When I have read other books from publishers that weren’t a good fit for me, I told them so and didn’t post a review. I put another book into the schedule and moved on. But this quarantine/virus situation has seriously impacted my reading. I don’t have something else to put into this spot. And at the halfway point through this book, I just had to stop. I couldn’t read any more.
The writing is good. There are funny moments. But this is like the antithesis of books I enjoy. The one-upsmanship in the pranking started to border on immature and hateful. I started to feel like maybe Nicholas wanted to make a go of this relationship and was trying to draw Naomi out, but she refused to entertain that thought. My frustration with her at the beginning, where she had no boundaries or gumption to stand up for herself, became sympathy, but that ebbed away and became annoyance. I didn’t like Naomi, and I was cheering for Nicholas to be rid of her. And she’s the point-of-view character. It just wasn’t working for me.
I’ve read plenty of reviews that found this delightful. There ARE right readers for this book! But I am not that reader. I want warm stories, inspiring stories, and hopeful stories – especially right now. I can only handle so much of a prank war. I rarely find them funny in real life. But I know there are readers that will love to watch this couple dig through this season in their relationship and will care deeply to find out what happens on the other side. If that is you, you should definitely check this one out! (Language – content for the first half of the book only)
No rating.