Review: The Honey-Don’t List by Christina Lauren

The Honey Don't List by Christina Lauren

Published by Gallery Books on March 2020
Genres: Adult Fiction
Pages: 308
Format: eBook
Source: Publisher
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3 Stars

Carey Douglas has worked for home remodeling and design gurus Melissa and Rusty Tripp for nearly a decade. A country girl at heart, Carey started in their first store at sixteen, and—more than anyone would suspect—has helped them build an empire. With a new show and a book about to launch, the Tripps are on the verge of superstardom. There’s only one problem: America’s favorite couple can’t stand each other.

James McCann, MIT graduate and engineering genius, was originally hired as a structural engineer, but the job isn’t all he thought it’d be. The last straw? Both he and Carey must go on book tour with the Tripps and keep the wheels from falling off the proverbial bus.

Unfortunately, neither of them is in any position to quit. Carey needs health insurance, and James has been promised the role of a lifetime if he can just keep the couple on track for a few more weeks. While road-tripping with the Tripps up the West Coast, Carey and James vow to work together to keep their bosses’ secrets hidden, and their own jobs secure. But if they stop playing along—and start playing for keeps—they may have the chance to build something beautiful together…

I soooo wanted to love this book! But alas…

I really don’t want to write this review.

Christina Lauren’s writing style has changed going from fun and smutty to more contemporary women’s fiction, which isn’t a bad thing overall. While I really enjoyed Beautiful Bastard (early Lauren) and Love And Other Words (later Lauren) I have to admit the last few books have fell flat for me.

This book was problematic. I didn’t like any of the characters. Melissa and Rusty were flat and awful selfish people. Carey and James were fine but there was nothing sparkly about them. And there was zero, zip, zilch chemistry. There was barly any sexy, (not until half way through the book) and ok, I can get on board with that, if the rest of the book was really intriguing.

But no.

I felt like it was a slow moving clean romance contemporary. (I say this because there was no hot and heavy steamy sexy scenes until maybe halfway through the book and even when the characters do get together, it’s very… PG.) Where is the heat ladies?

I sped through the second half of the book. Carey seems to develop a little as a character, but there was some tiny, undramatic misunderstanding between her and James that was blown totally out of proportion. There was also some mention of the Love word between two characters and it felt really forced and awkward. And Melissa and Rusty never really redeemed themselves as characters. I mostly wanted to punch everyone in the face.

I think fans of theirs will enjoy the set up. There’s a certain celebrity reality couple that is currently divorcing so while I was reading this book, I did think about them a lot! And I liked the setting of a book tour and visiting new places and the social media aspect.

But in general this story didn’t really do it for me.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m still going to buy the next Christina Lauren book. And the next. and the next. I’m still a fan. But can we get a little more romance?