Readability: 2/5
Plot: 2/5
Recommend: No

Ever since Lumi was a child, she has been able to taste the emotions people felt while cooking. and as a result, Lumi's taste for food has only refined. Lumi’s ventures as a restaurant owner have not gone the way she expected. Needing a new job, she applies for a position as a sous chef at DAX, not realizing that it was a restaurant owned by someone who had insulted her cooking a few weeks ago. Although intent on not tasting Julien’s food, Lumi can’t help but sneak a taste and reconsider her feelings about Julien.

I thought this was gonna be a cute, contemporary romance, and at first, it was, but then things got a little off. I read this in one sitting with the physical book and an audiobook, but if I only had the physical copy (an ARC from the Goodreads giveaway) I would not have finished this in one sitting.

The first really weird thing that made me feel off of the story was Lumi’s food synesthesia. As a concept, it can be cool or interesting, but in practice, it’s a little odd and weird. Maybe it’s just how it was written, but it really didn’t work. Not only that, but the synesthesia only really came up in two or three key moments, rather than being present in the whole book. It felt like it was written in to force a couple of plot points.

If you know me, you know that I really don’t like insta-love, and the progression of Julien and Lumi’s relationship was incredibly rushed and abrupt.

The engagement/marriage at the end was the nail in the coffin that made me not like how fast-paced this relationship was.

Getting both perspectives of the relationship didn’t help, it made Julien really unlikeable. The mutual feelings happening instantly felt unrealistic and really jarring. The way this book was written felt really amateur and unrealistic. Not only that, but the story went from being a cutesy romance to that of the romance commonly seen in New Adult or any Sarah J. Maas books (if you know what I mean). I'm not criticizing the genre/age group, mainly how the scenes and transitions were handled.

The imagery of Julien touching himself to the thought of Lumi, or the words like “velvety wetness” or “deepening his exploring” was a total 180 from the original way the story was written in the beginning. Or the fact that Lumi was burned by hot oil, but only on the face/arms, so Julien thought she would be okay with having sex with him only a little while later.

The shift was incredibly awkward and bazaar.

As for the two main characters, they seemed to be really in tune with each other's emotions and behaviorisms, but only to each other. Julien’s relationship to Esme was so awkward, how could he be so oblivious? It’s clear the author wanted Julien to be that broody chef that craves a true romance, but in reality, he was more of a sex-crazed fool.

I really didn’t like any of the characters in this book, and I guess that is why I really didn’t root for the romance between Julien and Lumi. Especially at the parts where Julien interacted with his friends and family, the conversations were awkward and amateur.

Things in this book felt a little too perfect and scripted.

Like when Lumi’s mother revealed that her father hadn’t abandoned them. Suddenly, Lumi finds it is okay to listen to her mother about relationships with men, but not about the fact that she disagreed with Lumi’s ventures as a chef. It’s not that she can’t agree or disagree with certain ideas her mother speaks about, but the fact that the one thing that she agrees with is centered around the rejected engagement that just occurred. Or like the part when Julien was talking with a friend and got distracted, and his friend automatically knew it was because of a woman.

The conversation between Esme and Lumi at the end of the book was so crazy.

For some reason they were blaming Esme for feeling bad about the fact that the guy she liked didn’t like her back, and accidentally hurting Lumi though a method no one knew anything about?! It was clearly unintentional, but Lumi thought about putting the blame on Esme over something she couldn’t control, and that rubbed me the wrong way. Or the fact that Esme was written to feel guilty about it?! It wasn’t her fault at all, and it was kinda weird that Julien had her mix part of the dessert anyway. The forced plot of Esme, synesthesia, and the oil burn was totally unnecessary, crazy, and stupid.

It’s also clear that Esme was set as a miniature villain for drama, instead, it was just petty and stupid.

Another part of the story that I didn't like was how forced the mentioning of sage was. It was weirdly placed and mentioned only at the end, or barely mentioned in the middle. I'm assuming that was the intention, since the book was titled "A Taste of Sage", but not only did it not make sense, since Lumi was able to detect it, even though it wasn't an emotion, but it kinda felt like it was just placed there for the sake of the title or as an obvious point for the two love interest to talk about.

(Honestly, this feels like a book I would’ve written in 9th grade. And yes, I cringe over and hate my own writing, so it’s not a compliment.)