Lease on Love by Falon Ballard
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Web ID: 15661031tough to connect with
To be honest, I read this over two years ago and I know I didn't really enjoy it. I had to scrape my brain to remember why. I think I didn't like Sadie, not because of her personality (I'm totally fine when protagonists are brash and in your face) but because she seemed kind of self-absorbed and only cared about things when they affected her. I remember being really annoyed by the third act breakup because it felt so rushed and I didn't think it was a valid enough reason to get mad at Jack. I barely remember Jack at all, but the phrase "cardboard cutout" came to mind when thinking about him. I think her writing has gotten better and there's other people that adore this book, so I think this was all mainly a me problem.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
The Best Drunk Mistake She Ever Made
I now feel much better about only having drunk purchased a few books & clothes on Amazon. Meanwhile Sadie, rented an entire apartment & then showed up thinking she was meeting the owner for a job interview. Luckily for her, while I’m running to return my purchases, she gets to live in a stunning townhome with the eye-candy that is Jack as her roommate / landlord. Jack, who makes the word introvert seem mild, doesn’t quite know what do with Sadie. He just knows that she is one of the few people, on of the only people, he truly likes to be around. As friendship grows into more, they both try to resists for fear of it complicating their already very complicating living arrangement. Watching this play out on the page was fantastic. Their grumpy / sunshine personalities were a perfect match.
Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
A Nice Contemporary Romance Read
This book begins with a down-on-her-luck heroine who mixed up two apps and ended up finding a roommate instead of a date. The heroine ends up sharing a home with the hero and began a new career. She ends up becoming closer to the hero and vice versa. The hero's life changed after his parents passed away years ago, and he needed a huge push to move forward with his life. As the hero and the heroine began to fall in love with each other, they must face some uncomfortable truths before they could have their happy ending. This is my first Falon Ballard book. It features the heroine's viewpoint and a found family that really enriched the story. I liked the heroine and her growth in this book, but it would have been nice to have the hero's viewpoint, too. I liked the friends that supported the couple, but I did find a certain action that prevailed in this book to be too much and would have liked some other details to replace it. Overall, a nice read. ** Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the review copy. All opinions and thoughts in the review are my own. **
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Cute and Entertaining
This book had me laughing the whole way through. I’m always a fan of people finding new directions in life so this was a fun read for me. The story drew me in and I enjoyed getting to know Sadie and her friends, though it felt like they were all given extra baggage just to add to the story. Cute and definitely a good beach read.
Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
The best kind of roommate!
I really enjoyed this book! After reading Just My Type, I knew that I wanted to read more of this talented author’s work and decided to give her previous novel a try. This ended up being another delightful romance with enough laughs to really keep me glued to my headphones. Sadie and Jack were both great characters and I enjoyed their journey from roommates to becoming a couple. After being passed over for a promotion for someone less qualified once again, Sadie needs a change. She thinks that she is meeting Jack for a coffee date but it turns out Jack is looking for a roommate instead. The house is perfect and the rent is much more affordable, which is perfect since Sadie has just lost her job. She takes this opportunity to change gears and try to make her dream of running a florist business a reality. I thought that Sadie and Jack were great together. I liked the fact that things moved rather slowly between them and they developed a friendship before anything else. They have both had some big issues in their past and I liked getting to see them start to open up to each other. I thought that they had great chemistry and I really wanted to see them find their happily ever after. Sadie’s friends were great and I thought that they added a lot to the overall story. Addison Barnes did a fantastic job with the narration of this audiobook. I loved the voices that she used for the various characters and felt like she really was able to bring this story to life. I thought that she had a very pleasant voice and I had no problems listening to her narration for hours at a time. I do believe that her narration added to my enjoyment of this story. I would not hesitate to recommend this book to others. I thought that this was a very solid romance with just the right amount of added humor. I wasn’t completely sold on the reasons behind the third-act break-up but I really enjoyed the journey overall.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
A sweet read
I was hooked from the very first chapter. It was humorous yet very unfortunate for the main character, Sadie, whom the story is told from her perspective. Sadie gets fired and she is going through this struggle of feeling a bit lost on what to do, especially since her lease was running out soon in the expensive city of New York. On one drunken night out with friends, she scrolls through what she thinks is a dating app and sets up a date for the next day. Turns out it was roommate finding app, and this is where we are introduced to Jack. This is a strangers-to-roomates-to-lovers romance, and the growing relationship between Sadie and Jack felt very realistic, and was overall enjoyable to read. I also really loved the friendships that exist within the book between the main characters and the secondary characters. These secondary characters added to the story without being distracting from the main plot. It was also great seeing Sadie grow throughout this book as she finds herself and follow her passions. There was more spice in this book than I was expecting, but that is no issue to me. I think if you are a fan of Emily Henry, I think you would really enjoy this book! Overall I give Lease on Love a 5/5 and a 2/5 on my spice scale. Thank you PENGUIN GROUP Putnam and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Fun and new!
I quite enjoyed the amount of cursing in this book, it made it realistic and relatable. I enjoyed all of the characters and their different stories and issues. The romance was a slow burn but once it got there it was hot! I highly recommend this book if you need a good laugh, a tearful smile, or even some spicy lovin’.
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Customer review from barnesandnoble.com
Escapist Fantasy
I was so stoked when this romance became an escapist fantasy: a brownstone in Brooklyn for a pittance (yea, that word was in the book. Twice.), a girl beginning her dream career, with supportive friends and a hot roommate. I was left wanting at the end though. The conflict in the story wasn’t conflicting enough, a supposed lie blown way out of proportion, and a self-conscious MC who overcame emotional and verbal abuse from her father. I never want to discount anyone’s trauma, but I wish Sadie’s self-esteem issues had been more thoroughly fleshed out. As a character who thought in absolutes, instead of questions, her self-doubt was confusing. I could not figure out WHY she felt worthless, WHY she felt like a jerk, WHY she felt selfish. It was so unclear until she admits her childhood home life to Jack more than halfway into the story. Even then, her abuse is only alluded to, which felt like a cheap way to add conflict into the story. As an escapist romance, I suppose the story didn’t NEED conflict, but as a piece of literature, it could have been so much more, even if it was still escapist, they are not mutually exclusive. The conclusion of the story is nice enough, but the build up had me expecting so much more, and that climax was not what Sadie and Jack deserved. Despite the lackluster ending, I was a huge fan of Jack’s nerdy shirts (NOT hipster, I resented Sadie calling him a hipster, he was clearly a gamer and Sadie was the hipster), Gemma’s pottymouth, and the subtheme of the problems with the American education system, from underpaid teachers to student loan debt. In the end, I’ll give this 3 stars.
Customer review from barnesandnoble.com