While this book was fun, it wasn’t all that I’d hoped it would be. The costars with benefits relationship described in the synopsis took far too long to actually get started, and barely anything happened once it did. There were only two instances of anything illicit happening on set, and only one of those had them at true risk of getting caught. They spent a couple of other nights together before the drama set in, and most of it felt so unnecessary. The fact that the story only spanned about a month made it worse, because that isn’t enough time for anyone to fall in love, no matter how you spin it. It just isn’t. And as a result, all of Bee and Nolan’s angst about being in love, whether or not it’s mutual, and what effects a proper relationship would have on various things just felt ridiculous.

The more I think about it, I don’t think I was ever really all that invested in either Bee or Nolan. They had some good moments, and I did like some of their banter, but the side characters are the ones that stole the show. I found Sunny, Angel, Luca and even Teddy much more entertaining. Maybe that’s (at least part of) my problem. Maybe it’s also a sign I’ll enjoy the other books more. I’m going to hope that’s the case, because a series of smutty Christmas romcoms should be right up my alley. I’m going to hope this one is the exception, and it’ll only get better from here.

Representation: