i LOVED this book. it was absolutely precious. sophie sullivan ate. she not only crushed this fake engagement trope but she truly made it come alive in such a unique way. the way she wrote lexi + wills story through battling grief + familial expectations was heartfelt and pure.

while some of the writing felt awkward at times, overall it was a fun read and i genuinely cannot wait it’s publication. this is going to be the most perfect fall read.

Lexi is working part time as a waitress to pay for her classes, after her life fell apart. When her “successful” old friends from high school come into the restaurant, Lexi sits down and pretends to be on a date with one of her customers.

This snowballs and through a series of accidents and miscommunication, people think Lexi and Will are engaged. Backed into a corner, they go along with it.

It’s dual POV, fake engagement, and the cover art is so pretty. It’s cute and fun. I laughed a lot!

In terms of spice level, it’s technically open door but the scenes are vague.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for my advanced digital copy!

Alexandria Danby, better known as Lexi, has three more colleges classes to complete before she graduates with a business degree. Her dad died a few years ago and her mother, who she lives with hasn’t fully recovered from the loss. He left a great debt to be paid which Lexi has been chipping away at by working several jobs.
Lexie has worked at the same dress shop since high school and recently took on a waitressing job that she is terrible at. To make matters worse, while at her waitress job, three of her best girlfriends from high school, come into the restaurant. She hadn’t seen them in years. They are all highly successful. She was horrified to have them find her as a waitress and immediately sat down at the table of a friendly customer who had been enjoying his lunch while reading a book. Who knew it was Will Grand, one of the most sought-after, wealthy, eligible bachelors in Seattle. Her friends assumed she was with Will, and Will played right along with that assumption and after a friendly exchange, both she and Will were invited to an engagement party that evening for one of her friends, that they attended. The next day pictures from the party went viral, and one even appeared in a Seattle newspaper announcing an engagement between Will and a mystery woman who is non-other than Alexandria Danby.
This is a well-written delightful, heartwarming and humorous story of rising above difficult circumstances, working hard to achieve goals and acceptance of ourselves. The characters are relatable, loveable and not easily forgotten. I gave it 4 starts instead of 5, which the actual story deserves. The profanity, and the frequent use of the F word throughout, diminishes, for me, the potential prominence of this book.
I received a complimentary copy of this book. All comments and opinions are my own.

Lexi is down on her pick and takes a part time job as a waitress but is really really bad at it. Will is a CFO for the family business and one of Seattle's most eligible bachelors. After a miscommunication Lexi and Will end up fake engaged and have to somehow prove it.

This meet cute story was original and hilarious. Lexi was my favorite protagonist in a while. Sophie Sullivan is a phenomenal writer and I loved this book!

Thank you to NetGalley for providing this opportunity in exchange for an honest and thoughtful review. This book was rather slow, which is what took my review so long, but it was an enjoyable read in spite of that. The characters were quirky and refreshing. It also had the fake dating/fake engagement trope. It is not my favorite trope but I do enjoy it from time to time.

This was a cute read with tropes of fake dating and friends-to-lovers. I enjoyed the story and found myself rooting for Lexi and Will. I would have liked Will’s personality to be a little more developed but otherwise this was a very enjoyable read. Fans of Sophie Sullivan’s other books will definitely love this one!

It was almost a disadvantage to get an eARC of this book: the fall setting really shone through! This was a well done fake-dating-to-real-love trope and I was HERE for it. Sophie Sullivan is one of my favorites for lighthearted reads that keep me turning the pages. Thank you to the Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you for the ARC!

I want to start off by saying that I have read previous Sophie Sullivan books and I can definitely tell how much stronger her writing has become. With that said, I didn't entirely enjoy this book. I went into this book blind as I usually do, so I was a bit shellshocked to find that this was a fake engagement romance. Normally, I wouldn't mind it, but in this case their fake engagement ended up on the news and the whole time we could read Lexi's inner monologue, she was adamant that their whole thing was temporary and that it would end; so it was very much just me waiting for this to blow up in their faces and it was STRESSFUL and made me want to DNF multiple times and had me skimming the book from around 20% & onward.

Lexi was fine? It was really frustrating to read Lexi's POV because of how much she would tell herself that her and WIll's "relationship" was temporary, and how could he ever fall for someone like her when he's so different. At some point it just started getting on my nerves. I actually really liked WIll's character, much to my surprise. (In my past experience with Sophie Sullivan books, I loved her FMC and hated her MMC) Can I mention a specific thing I liked? No but I know i enjoyed reading his few (too few in my humble opinion) POV chapters. I also really liked that the romance was very much there and I didn't feel like I was scrambling to find little pieces of their relationship, if that makes sense.

Would I read this again? Absolutely not, this had me stressed like crazy. But I do think that this is a book that people will like. It just wasn't for me.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC!
Another enjoyable Sophie Sullivan read!
I quite liked both characters in this book and their adorable wholesome budding relationship. The elements of struggle particularly for Lexi with her mom and career were relatable.
Fluffy, not much to it, but entertained.

Not my favorite Sullivan novel 🙈🙈🙈 But I did enjoy reading it. Probably a perfect beach read, to be honest.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Sweet, easy read of a fake dating romance with characters that were easy to like.

The story flowed well and was super enjoyable — liked the plot development and nuance woven into the banter. Also thought the main characters were well developed and fun to read.

First book I’ve read from this author and I’d definitely read more!

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for providing an advance copy of this title for review.

My second Sophie Sullivan novel and second winner! Such a sweet, fun romance novel with likeable characters who you really root for as they are figuring out what they want out of life. Would definitely recommend this one for people looking for a fall-themed contemporary romance. 4.25/5 stars.

I’ve read a lot of fake dating/fake engagement trope books up to now and it can be tough to find an author who can take that plot line and make it completely their own.

Sullivan has created a book that will not only stand out but stand on its own because of her great character development.

I have to say I completely fell for Will. He is just a sweetheart of a character. He is so swoony, loving, kind, and the chemistry between Lexi and him is off the charts.

I really did enjoy Lexi’s character as well. She’s strong and independent, almost to a fault, because by the end of the book, I was really annoyed with her. I wish the author had chosen a different route in terms of her stubborn, unwarranted end-of-story drama. It changed the whole vibe of the book for me.

However, Can’t Help Falling in Love gave me so many feelings. The story is fresh, unique, and so relatable in many ways. It’s a romance that is sweet, heartwarming, and memorable. Another winner for Sullivan and me!

Pretty cute love story with some deep messages.
Definitely missing some spice, there were times i had a hard time connecting to the FMC, I wanted to shake her and tell her ITS OKAY, YOU CAN LIKE THIS GUY..
A cheesy romance, lacking a little. Probably wouldn’t read it again, but it was short and sweet.

I was really excited to be approved for the ARC for Can’t Help Falling In Love on NetGalley. The blurb sounded right up my alley and I was excited to see that the book is set in the Seattle area, which are my stomping grounds. I will start with the things I enjoyed about this book, before getting into the things I was disappointed with.

Things I Enjoyed:
- Will & Lexie’ meet-cute <3
- I appreciated Lexie’s struggle with feeling like her life hasn’t gone the way she planned. Very relatable.
- Will’s sisters and Lexie’s best friend were wonderful
- Lexie learning to stand up for herself and voice her concerns/opinions with her mom more freely. I enjoyed the development of their relationship throughout the book.
- A lot of the banter was really fun

Things I Was Disappointed With:
- The sheer number of f-words used throughout the book was a major disappointment. I understand that some course language can be used in a book to express certain emotions and I’m fine with a certain amount of swearing in my books. But when the f-word is used so frequently, and unnecessarily, it comes across as lazy writing. And it affected my ability to enjoy the story when I was cringing so often at the language being used.
- I also read many reviews of Sophie Sullivan’s other book, “How to Love Your Neighbor,” before applying for this ARC because I only read closed door books and didn’t want to apply for a book that would end up being open door and I’d have to DNF. I couldn’t find any reviews saying whether she wrote closed door, but also didn’t find any mentioning spicy scenes, so I felt fairly safe requesting this arc. And while I wouldn’t necessarily call this book open door, I also wouldn’t consider it closed door either. It definitely has some fade to black, which I can handle, but when clothing’s being removed and you’re wondering when the fade to black is going to happen because it still hasn’t, or a couple are in a bath together post sex, that falls outside of my “closed door” definition, as I know it would for other closed-door readers. Something to consider at least from a marketing stance when stating what kind of content can be found inside a book. Many readers, myself included, want to know if a book they are going to pick up is something within their personal reading parameters so we don’t waste time having to DNF a book at 60%.

Overall, the story itself was cute. But the language and sexual content pushed the limits of what I can handle in books I read, and I wouldn’t be able to recommend this book to friends or followers because of those issues. I gave this book 3 stars for those reasons. I’m fully willing to read another book by Sophie Sullivan in the future if I know there’s less language and the door is fully closed, so to speak.

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press & NetGalley for this ARC book in exchange for my honest opinions.

Lexi and Will were a cute couple in this fun read. Lexi was struggling to keep her mom and life afloat after the loss of her dad. By chance she meets Will and they end up being fake engaged to impress her high school friends. This was an easy read with some tough subjects about mental health and moving on after loss covered.

I really love Sophie Sullivan but this wasn’t my favorite book by her. I loved the premise and the setting but I felt like it was a little repetitive in comparison to her other books. I loved Will and I really liked Lexi!
Thank you to netgalley and the published for this arc ebook in exchange for an honest review. All opinions expressed are my own.

It’s so convenient when the title of the book is exactly what you can expect to do while reading it. It’s like it writes the review itself.

Lexi finds herself “behind” in where she expected to be at her age. She’s still not done obtaining her business degree, living with her grieving and depressed mom, and working two jobs to make ends meet. One of those jobs is a waitress and while serving a ridiculously handsome gentleman his lunch, her high school friends walk in. She panics and pretends that she’s on a date with the man. He goes along with it and decides to ask her on a real date. Turns out he is the heir to his family’s corporation and one of the city’s most eligible bachelors.

You can’t help being charmed by Lexi and Will’s relationship. Despite the obstacles in each of their lives, they make being in a relationship look easy. They come from different economic and family backgrounds and all they need is a little of what each other has to offer to make it work. This one is for the opposites attract but wholesome love conquers all romance readers.

This is one is without a doubt, Sullivan’s best work yet.

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for providing an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

A super cute story. I love these tropes and the cover is fantastic - I was so excited to dig into this book!

Super cute, easy read. This was a great fake relationship trope and I thought everything flowed well.