Between classes, bills, and roommate friction, Natalie is struggling. So when a classmate offers up a quick way to make money, it’s hard to resist. Being a sugar baby is simple: meet up with rich men, do whatever you both agree to, and collect the cash at the end of the night. At first, Nat’s conflicted about her new line of work, but then she meets Gabe: rich, handsome, and surprisingly normal. And after weeks of fine dining and Broadway shows, what starts as a financial arrangement turns to love … at least for Nat. While she’d do anything to have him, Gabe has a secret—and a life—that he’ll keep separate from Nat at all costs.

Author Robyn Harding is a master of complicated characters. What starts as a story of a survival for Nat who can’t seem to get ahead in life quickly shifts to one propelled by obsession. She, much like Gabe, starts as likable. Both are internally struggling with their circumstances, and both seek an outside force to soothe their problems—Nat, money; Gabe, women. Yet when these two needs draw them to each other, it results in a toxic relationship that reads like a train wreck.

It’s purely pulse-pounding action. Harding slowly drops hints that all is not what it seems, with Nat’s sections occasionally alternating with ones from Gabe’s viewpoint. There’s enough hints early that their relationship has the potential to come to a disastrous head, and yet Harding also knows how to throw out a few surprises along the way. This is all enhanced by short, punchy chapters that, as the arrangement turns sour, make the case for, ‘Just a few more pages!’ It’s unputdownable.

Harding does deserve praise for her ability to treat the sugar baby/daddy arrangement with tact. While it would have been easy to sensationalize the relationship, she instead treats it as legitimate. She doesn’t shy away from the danger that sometimes permeates this arena, but she also doesn’t cast wide judgement over how some adults spend their time and money. The real trouble stems from two out-of-control characters, not what immediately connects them.

By pulling back and focusing on characters and all of their messy complications, The Arrangement has an edge that packs plenty of twists.

Great book. So very well written. Interesting and intriguing. Very entertaining. The characters are so very flawed.

At first, when I read the description, I thought it sounded kind of interesting. Once I got into the story, it really pulled me and I couldn't stop reading it. Great story.

3.5 stars. I felt like this started out so incredibly strong and I was so excited at about the 30% mark and then it just fizzled for me a little bit. I think the character development felt a little bit weak and the tone of the story felt overall disjointed. The twist ending was good—I kind of saw it coming, but not to the extent that it did. Over use of the descriptor “angular” to describe Natalie’s roommate, and I think the cancer thing was over-impressed, though I see the reasoning behind it.

I wanted Gabe to be more of a “hate to love him” character... he started off as one of those “sexy prick”-type characters like in romance novels,which I was totally into, and then he just got annoying, crumudgeony and whiny. And just unbelievably and unnecessarily shitty to his daughter for no reason.

Still, pacing was good, and would read whatever Harding puts out next.

Natalie Murphy, an art student in New York City, is a small hometown girl with big dreams. Only, living in New York City is way harder than she ever thought it would be. Between paying bills, rent and other necessities Natalie is barely keeping her head above water. When a friend suggests she goes online and find a sugar daddy, someone who can make life a little easier in exchange for companionship, Natalie hesitates but finally agrees. In walks Gabe, an experienced older sugar daddy. In his 50’s, Gabe seems to have it all. He is a ruthless corporate lawyer who gets what he wants and he wants Natalie to be his exclusive sugar baby. But, when feelings get in the way their relationship turns toxic. When someone winds up dead, Natalie has a new fight on her hands. Will Natalie ever be able to get her life back?

Wow! Where do I even begin? Well, first let me say I did not like either Natalie or Gabe. Natalie is very needy and gullible, but she is sympathetic whereas Gabe is just a complete narcissistic jerk! What makes Natalie sympathetic is her back story. Abandoned by her father at the age of ten, Natalie never really feels like she belongs especially once her mother remarries and has two more “perfect” children. Natalie feels like an outsider to her family. Getting away from her hometown afforded Natalie the ability to finally be herself and out on her own even though she is still young at twenty-one years old. Natalie is also relatable because of her struggles especially financially which I am sure many of us can relate to. Gabe, right from the start, is a successful and wealthy lawyer who has the world right at his fingertips. He is not easily likable and as a matter of fact, he really doesn’t have any redeeming qualities I can even list. But, he sure does make for some good storytelling!

Right from the first chapter we learn someone is dead, but who is it is the big question? The deeper you go into reading this story you come to realize that there may be multiple suspects along with some red herrings thrown in the way to keep you guessing up until the very end with the final reveal which was quite a shocker!

I can see all of the research the author, Robyn Harding, has done when it comes to sugar daddy/sugar baby relationships especially when it comes to the lingo as well as terms that are even used today like “woke.” I really did have a laugh at “splenda daddy” though. I do admit when I was a college student, I don’t think sugar daddy/sugar baby relationships were so highly recognised as they are today. This is going back 20 years ago *cough.* I may not agree with this sort of relationship, but if its not hurting anyone, and you are above the age of consent, I think its a personal decision to go into this line of sex work. You have to do what you have to do, I guess.

I really enjoyed this story and found it to be pretty fast paced with a level of crazy I have not seen since the days of the movie Fatal Attraction. All we needed is a boiling bunny and you could have just stuck a fork in me! I couldn’t help but notice the irony of Natalie, with a crazy ex-boyfriend, when she turns out to be the same type of crazy and stalkerish. Natalie’s spiraling really took center stage when the lines between what is real and what is not were blurred, I do have one little negative thing to say and this is just something personal for me, perhaps because I am in my 40’s. There is a huge emphasis on Gabe being older, or having sex with someone older and wrinkly or any other term you want to insert meaning “old.” This was just hit on so many times throughout the story that I started to roll my eyes. But, I had to try to get out of my own mind and think more like a 21 year old when it came to “dating” an older man.

If you are “ahem” older like me and remember the good ole days (heh!) of Fatal Attraction, then you will definitely love The Arrangement. I highly recommend!

Natalie couldn’t wait to leave Blaine, Washington behind for New York City and art school, but her dream is quickly shattered when she’s confronted by boring courses, a low paying job, and two overly judgmental roommates. Struggling to make her share of the rent, Natalie is intrigued by one of her classmates, Ava, who is putting herself through school while working as a sugar baby. Though Natalie thinks she could never do that, the easy money sucks her in, and soon she’s found a sugar daddy of her own.

Gabe is a successful attorney based in Manhattan. He brokers high powered deals all day long, and with his wife and teenaged daughter living out of the city, he is free to develop relationships with beautiful young women who are paid to enjoy his company. Natalie looks fresh and real, not a practiced and phony persona, and Gabe is attracted to her profile picture. They hit it off, though Natalie drinks too much and talks too much, Gabe finds her charming. The relationship progresses until Natalie tells him she loves him, and then it ends, with Gabe gifting her a beautiful necklace and an offer to continue to pay her rent until the end of the year. Natalie loses it, calls Gabe twenty times a day, begs, pleads, negotiates, and finally threatens him.

I loved the suspense of not knowing exactly what Natalie would do. Would she shoot Gabe with the little gun his driver had given her? Would she go out to the Hamptons and introduce herself to Gabe’s wife and daughter? Would she jump off a skyscraper? Would she have to go home to Blaine, in disgrace for being a sugar baby? Would she figure out a way to stay at school somehow? My interest was on fire while reading this, and I think there are many of us who can relate to Natalie’s feelings of professing love and then receiving the kiss-off. This was definitely an enjoyable and interesting read, with a lot of details threaded through that kept my attention riveted.

A proper page turner! Great read to get me back in the zone after a break. The Arrangement focuses on “sugar babies” and what happens when such an arrangement gets out of hand. It’s told in alternating viewpoints of the girl (Natalie) her benefactor (Gabe) respectively, which I liked. Natalie and Gabe have a good relationship till the latter decides to end it to protect his reputation. At this point, Natalie believes she’s in love and can’t let go, and it all unravels pretty quickly from there. I enjoyed the insight into this world, although it did end a little too quickly!

Robyn Harding is talented and I believe this is her best book yet. I read this book rather quickly because I couldn't put it down. It was well-researched, planned, and she creates fascinating characters. Definitely one of my favorites of 2019.

Thank you Netgalley for the advanced copy of The Arrangement.

To say Natalie "Nat" Murphy is a struggling NY college art student would be a gross understatement. She has just lost her job at the local dive bar where she was hooking up with the bartender, her roommates are one strike away from evicting her and she is surviving on boiled spaghetti. To top it off her crazy ex boyfriend is starting to stalk her again. Her life is crumbling when she befriends Ava a well dressed student living in a beautiful apartment. Ava encourages Nat to become a sugar baby. She can get wealthy men to pay her for the time they spend with her. Nat quickly meets Gabe a well off lawyer who quickly becomes infatuated with her. Nat and Gabe's relationship blooms into more than a sugar baby/daddy relationship...their love is real...until someone ends up dead.

Robyn Harding's thriller the Arrangement is very well written with interesting characters and a twisty plot line. I enjoyed this book a lot. Highly recommend checking it out, it will satisfy your thriller sweet tooth.

I love Robyn Harding. Each one is better than the last. The Arrangement is no exception, very unlikable characters but fun as hell. Just what I like! Fast paced, stalkerish, obsessive, controlling and just plain terrific! Loved this book!

Natalie, a young, starving art student, meets Ava, a fellow student who is living the good life. When Nat explores how Ava is able to do so well in life, she finds out that Ava has a “sugar daddy” and thus has all she needs and more. When Natalie goes on the site to set up her profile to meet someone, she is a little perturbed about the whole thing but resigned that this is the only way out of the hole of debt that she finds herself in. When she meets rich attorney Gabe, Nat locks onto him like sonar on a target. Although Gabe has a wife and daughter, he has not been faithful at all and Natalie is just one in a long series of younger women whom he pursues to satisfy his own needs. The story devolves into a series of twists that are somewhat intriguing and at times very predictable. The plot was moderately interesting, but the fact that ALL of the characters were broken made the book not so great a read for me. I couldn’t find any redeeming qualities in them although I looked hard. The Natalie who was a sympathetic character at the beginning becomes a really feisty and deceptive manipulator, not likable at all. Fans of mystery, suspense and thrillers may enjoy this book.

The Arrangement by Robyn Harding is about a young art student who gets involved with an older man in exchange for money. When the arrangement is broken off, Natalie doesn’t take it well and retalites and someone ends up dead.

Tale as old as time. No string attached relationship turns into a full on affair and someone catches feelings. A girl with an absent father finds an older man to give her the security that she lacked in her youth. Feeling like an outsider in her mother’s new family and an ex-boyfriend who won’t take a hint sets the stage for a small town girl to get into big city trouble.

I gave this book 3 stars. I wanted badly to give it more, because there was considerable hype around this book. The first 50 pages were a predictable boring rambling mess. I started reading this book in August and didn’t pick it back up until late September. I was really that annoyed with it. There were so many times when I was reading a certain passage that I would get confused, so natalie’s thoughts oscillated between present and past and daydreams. It felt utterly disjointed, as if intentionally as she gets more and more involved with Gabe, she starts to get confused.

The exasperation I felt every time something happened had me throwing my phone. It wasn’t about the things that were happening but the reactions to them. The changes that happened to Natalie seem to happen so quickly that I felt like I had whiplash. She goes from I need this money to he’s perfect for me, neglecting the reason why she came to New York in the first place. I know she’s only 22 in the book, and I know she has daddy issues, but it didn’t take her any time at all to completely change her entire personality.

Once I got through the first 50 pages, it went pretty quickly. However the characters with the exception of our main two are not fleshed out. there are plenty of interesting characters we are introduced to however we are not given more backstory because this is written in the first person. And then of course the ending is spelled out so perfectly that it felt convenient instead of correct.

There was a lot of man bashing in the book disguised as feminism. I felt like every time a man was introduced, there was going to be something wrong with him and with only one exception, there was. And I hesitate to say that because the exception isn’t that great either.

I think this book would’ve benefited from a small style change or editorial change. For instance it would’ve been really interesting to hear from two or three characters but they’re different perspectives of the same event.

The big twist of the ending left a lot to be desired. I was expecting a lot more considering how much this book was hyped. In the end the book was perhaps a three star read. I think it would’ve been higher if there was a more complex plot or if it did more to explain certain aspects.

Loved this book by a new to me author. This was a great story I could not put down. It had many twists and turn.

LOVED this juicy thriller!! I'm very intrigued by the "Sugar" lifestyle so I was drawn in by this story from the very beginning. Natalie has just told her father that she killed someone. We will not know who the victim is until later in the book. The phone call is a very difficult one, as Nat has been estranged from her father for many years.

Nat had been a struggling New York City art student, overworked but barely making ends meet and constantly arguing with her roommates. She is desperate for a solution but loves the city and does not want to leave school.

Nat's friend Ava lives in a beautiful apartment, always had money for luxuries like coffee and wears lovely clothes. Ava clues her in: she has sugar daddies, men who pay her for companionship and even a relationship. At first Nat is absolutely horrified but Ava helps her navigate this brand new world of sugar relationships.

"She made it sound so mature, so reciprocal, almost liberating. Ava and her suitors were up front with their needs, their wants, their parameters. It sounded positively evolved."

Ava explains that the sex is completely optional and only if the feelings are mutual. Ava seems so financially secure that Nat is ready to jump in. After positing her profile online, Nat receives many messages. Some of the men are positively repulsive, but one man stands out: Gabe Turnmill.

Gabe is handsome, brilliant, cultured and older than her father. Nat immediately feels safe with Gabe and soon becomes absolutely entranced by the wealthy older man. The theater, opera, fine restaurants...Nat loves her new lifestyle and begins to fall for Gabe.

"As clichéd as it sounded, she had never felt this way. Not even in the early days with Cole. Not with Miguel. Those boys couldn’t make her feel secure, cherished, adored. That took a man. But this was not a storybook romance; she knew that. It was a financial arrangement between two consenting adults who had laid out the parameters of their relationship up front. "

Gabe, too, begins to develop feelings for Nat that he knows he shouldn't have. He loves her honesty and fresh-faced beauty and the way she looks up to him. But could he divorce his wife and leave his family behind for her? Their chemistry was honest and well-written and I could feel them both falling in love with each other!

"No strings. No commitment, obligation, or drama. And above all, no emotional attachment. This was about enjoying their time together, as limited as it may be, with no thought for the future. Because there wouldn’t be one. Her brain knew it, but her heart begged to differ."

The story begins to get very complicated as Gabe becomes afraid that someone will find out about his "arrangement". The plot takes a VERY dark turn. Reading Gabe's perspective added to the depth of this book and I loved the tension and twists in this story. Would Gabe really leave his family for Natalie? Would Nat be able to sustain her lifestyle without Gabe's financial assistance?

"He felt a surge of anger, fear, and lust. Natalie’s eyes met his, reflecting his ambiguity. I hate you. I want you. I’m going to ruin you."

It is clear that the author really did her research on this lifestyle and I was even educated on the terminology! While some of the plot was a little far-fetched, overall I loved this intriguing domestic thriller and felt very connected to the characters. I could not put it down! Sex, envy, obsession, love and suspense, this wicked, fast-paced thriller has it all.

“Sometimes, we do things we don’t feel good about to survive. It doesn’t mean you’re a bad person.”

If you want a quick fast paced read then this is it. I read it in one sitting and enjoyed the the story line, the pacing is spot on.
Nat is an art student, struggling to make ends meet by working while attending school. Living in a run down apartment with two snobby roommates, she’s barely getting by. Her friend Ava, a fellow student introduces her to the “sugar daddy” “sugar baby” lifestyle. She meets Gabe thinking she’ll go on a few dates to make just enough money to catch up on her bills. Well of course it doesn’t go as she planned because she fall for him! Nat is young and naive...Gabe is a vain narcissist who uses Nat until she becomes an inconvenience to him.

Thank you to NetGalley, Gallery/Scout Press, and Robyn Harding for this ARC, in exchange for my honest review!

Natalie moves across country to go to art school in NYC but finds it hard to stay afloat financially. A friend turns her on to a Sugar Daddy website and she quickly ends up in an arrangement with a wealthy older man. What starts out fun, quickly turns into a spiraling obsession brought on by deceit. This was a great twist on a thriller and I recommend it.

I thought I would enjoy the idea of this story but Nat was not an enjoyable character, very immature for someone her age. I however did enjoy the ending twist, not what I expected who had committed the murder.

I love the way this author writes! I was pulled into this story quickly and it didn’t let go until the end. She creates great characters (not that they’re necessarily likable).

This story was really interesting. I had no knowledge of the sugar baby/daddy lifestyle and this book allows you to see how a young naive woman can wind up in such a situation. It also wasn’t surprising, given the treatment that she received, that she assumed it was more to each of them than a business transaction.

Did I see where it was going? Yes, some of the time I did but I was surprised a few times as well. My one gripe? She was told to get the daddy’s last name and to google the hell out of him. She was warned right of the bat, but she didn’t! Ever! Had she done this she would have known he was married and this maybe would have put things in perspective for her?!? Maybe not, who knows...

Regardless, I was quite entertained by this story and I look for to her next story! Thanks to NetGalley, the author and Gallery, Pocket Books for a copy in exchange for a review.

This was a great, quick read. The characters are real and relatable. The reader will find they care about the direction of the plot and characters. By fleshing the characters out so well, Harding makes you care about them and understand them and their actions. I thought this was a well-written and well-plotted book with a great twist at the end. I will certainly be looking for more to read from Robyn Harding.

Financial stress and worry is something that every single person can relate to, at least on some level. Whether just out of high school, going through college, being let go from their job, buying a house, having an unexpected illness - so many people experience that weight of financial worry at some point in their lives. We understand it, we've been there, and so when we read about Natalie - a young college student who is on the brink of losing everything and scared to death - we relate to her.



Throughout this book, the reader learns so much about the world of sugar babies and sugar daddies. The author conducted interviews and did research to make this story as real as can be, and it's truly illuminating. Within just a few short chapters, I was swept up in this world that's been around forever but, due to the discrete nature of it, I've never been aware of before.



My heart broke for Natalie in so many ways. Driven to desperate measures to simply keep afloat, to keep pursuing her dream, and yet still trying to find a happily ever after of her own. Despite Gabe being 100% up front that this is a temporary arrangement, Natalie allows herself to fantasize that their situation will become something real, something permanent. Of course, she's operating under the lie he's told her that he's divorced. In reality, he's still married and living with his wife.



A person can only maintain two separate lives for so long before they naturally begin to converge. When Gabe's married life and sugar daddy life got too close together for his comfort, he cut things off with Natalie. Naturally, as an experienced sugar daddy, he expected Natalie to handle the disengagement as gracefully as his last baby - and to go away quietly, never to contact him again. But Natalie isn't a "real" sugar baby, and never was. She's a misguided girl who needed money desperately, and needed even more for her better financial situation to be because of a relationship rather than a business arrangement. Gabe has no idea what lengths Natalie will go to in order to keep that illusion alive in her head.



The reader starts to get an idea, though, when Natalie calls her dad from the police station and tells him she's been arrested for murder.



This is a wild ride of a story. The peaks and valleys are amazingly well balanced, with an ending that leaves the reader feeling like they've just finished the most satisfying meal they've ever had. I truly enjoyed it, and am excited to read everything else this author has written.