A great read.

Simon and Lana become roommates, 17 years after getting divorced. They have both changed but the attraction is still there, so can they have a second chance to be together?

This is the first book I have read by this author and I am really looking forward to more.

Thank you to Netgalley for the ARC for an honest review.

I find that I really do love Ruby Lang's writing. There's something very real there, and she really tends to get to the heart of the story very quickly without it jeopardizing the plot. I really adored Open House, so when I saw the ARC for this book up on Netgalley, I hoped that I would get approved for it. This book felt shorter than Open House, but I still really enjoyed it.

We have Simon and Lana who were once married over 17 years ago. They see each other for the first time while looking at an apartment. Lana has become a ramen noodle maker, and Simon is still music teacher who also works with a community child's chorus. They end up living together for logical reasons (rent, needing to change), and they learn how to love each other and recognize the changes they've made as they've gotten older. As someone who has established a friendship with my ex-husband, this book really kind of hit home to me.

I really enjoyed the fact that they are in their 40s and we don't get a lot of characters that are in that age range without it being stale or talking about the end of their youth. They have aches and pains, but they're still only in their 40s, and they still have a lot of life ahead of them. Their problems are real, their pains are real, and those are huge reasons I really enjoyed this novel.

If you want diverse reads with older characters that talk about real life, do yourself a favor and read this. If you can get an ARC, do it. I highly recommend all of Ruby Lang's books.

A wonderful end to Ruby Lang's series of novellas that double as love letters to New York City while also discussing problems that the city exacerbates: gentrification, capitalism, soaring real estate prices, and the pressures these and other things put on the people living there. And her characters feel like real people struggling and living and loving despite these problems.

The second-chance romance between long-divorced Simon and Lana starts off careful and wary to start, with memories and expectations of each other helping and hindering that process. And there are outside forces acting on them too: the desire for financial security and health insurance, aging bodies, desire and fear of change, etc. There is a really great push-pull between Simon and Lana between what they each want for themselves and how they can make it work for them together. One of Ruby Lang's hallmarks is the observational insights of the characters into their own states of mind, which is definitely on display in this book -- they are both so aware of what the other is doing, and the effect that it has on them deepens their emotional arc and connection.

Thanks to NetGalley and Carina Press for providing this ARC.

I had a great chance to receive this ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. It’s the first time I’m giving a 5 star review to an ARC. Therefore reporting my thoughts is easy to write. First, even if I loved the first 2 books of Ruby Lang Uptown series, this one is my favorite. I have to point out that this series contains only stand-alone. They only have in common that they start in a visit to a Harlem apartment. The story is very different than the usual romance. First, the protagonists are in their early forties, but moreover, they were previously married to each other. I absolutely don’t want to spoil the story, and I will only say that you’ll follow them as they found their way back to each other. As usual in Ruby Lang’s books, Simon, the hero, is not an alpha male, just a man that could exist in real life, not only in our dreams. Probably also because of my personal history, I connected immediately with Lana. I could feel her determination, the courage to reach back to Simon while convincing herself that she should not be attracted to him. As usual with this author, the sharp point is the writing. It seems that every word, each sentence were well sorted out. For instance, I relished how the love scenes were balanced. Just what was needed to feel the passion without too much technicality. I also noticed that this Miss Lang is very skilled at describing food. I wish I could try Lana’s noodles.
This book arrived in my life at the perfect moment, I needed to believe in second chances, to see that with time, we all change and get wiser. We can see what is good for us.

Ruby Lang is one of the authors I started reading and fell in love with in 2019. I have enjoyed every one of her books, but I think House Rules is my favorite. It is a second chance at love romance between a long divorced middle aged couple who become roommates because real estate costs in New York City are awful. I received an arc from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Many years ago, Lana Kau and Simon Mizrahi were married. They were in the same music education program and living in the tiny rent stabilized apartment in Manhattan that Simon had inherited from his father. They were in love, but Simon was happy with how his life was going and Lana was not. They couldn't figure out how to stay married and happy, so they divorced. In the present, Lana has returned to New York City for a job and is looking for a place to live. Simon is still in the same tiny rent controlled apartment and looking at other apartments half-heartedly.  He doesn't want to change, though staying where he is has become uncomfortable. Simon, in particular reminded me of the Anais Nin quote, "Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage."

I don't need or expect to identify with the protagonists in a book in order to empathize with them. I love reading about characters very different from me. But sometimes I read a book with characters that articulates a part of myself that I rarely see reflected and I just fall in love. In House Rules, Lang has set her protagonists, Lana and Simon, in their early to mid 40's with that combination of regret, confidence, and awareness of the limits of the future that comes with middle age. It's not so much a sense of getting old as it is feeling the weight of the consequences (good and bad) of your past choices and understanding that your future choices are not limitless. Simon's life has gone on mostly as planned with financial and professional stability. Lana has traveled, studied and left being a musician for being a chef. She has acquired specialized skills, but lacks financial and professional stability. I love so much that Lang shows that there are virtues and drawbacks to the choices they have each made and both are worthy of respect.

For me, the star of this book is Lana. She is a middle aged woman with a dark sarcastic heart. She is both sure of who she is and uncertain of how she will be received. More than Simon, she is aware of the weight and damage of other people's expectations and has developed the courage to disappoint people and to ask for what she wants, when she knows she may be rejected.

Then Lana said, “I told myself after—after we separated I would always ask for what I needed, no matter how hard it was, no matter how long it took to work up to it, no matter how afraid I was of the answer. I’m still trying to do that.”

I partly love Simon because he loves Lana. I recognize that I judge him a little more harshly because my first response to change is also a resounding no. Simon has the biggest growth arc in the book, but he needs it the most. He has been comfortable and comfort doesn't always encourage growth.

I always knew you were amazing,” he continued softly. “I think young, arrogant me congratulated myself a lot for seeing so much in you. But I feel foolish now, because I realize I didn’t see half of it. I didn’t see how much you work, how dedicated you can be. How, given half the chance, you can make something ordinary—flour, salt, water—make it move for you, transform it into something else entirely. I didn’t see half of anything in you. It came out of left field. And I guess the thing I feel now is strange, because I feel like I don’t know this whole part of you. I’m ashamed for how little I realized about you."

Simon and Lana rediscover each other and eventually start sleeping together again, including some steamy couch sex. Lang allows her characters to be complicated. She allows the realities of the world we live in to shape her character's lives. Apartments in New York City are expensive, restaurant jobs are physically demanding, change is hard and scary, and it's ok not to get it right the first time.

I hope Ruby Lang has a long romance writing career ahead of her because I love her books. I feel like this is her most confident book. You don't have to have read the first two Uptown books, Playing House and Open House to appreciate House Rules, but you should anyway.

House Rules is out February 10th and you should definitely pre-order it.

i requested this as soon as i saw it, because i had enjoyed the other 2 (i enjoyed the 1st the most, but the 2nd was cute too). i requested this without reading the synopsis, and i'm kinda glad, because if i'd known they were divorced, i'll be honest, i would have nope'd right out (way, way, way too close to home for me right now). there's a content warning before the book starts (endo and infertility).

anywho. at first, it was.... kind of painful to read about. second chance isn't super my jam anyway, but oy vey, a divorced couple? no thank you. but it was just so adorable i couldn't stop myself from reading. and you know what? i think it's my favourite so far. have i mentioned it was adorable? so so freaking cute. i adored simon. absolutely loved him, want to put him in my pocket. loved lana too. and of course, muffin was the real star of the show. it was super cute and adorable and funny and adorable, did i mention? it was also steamy as all get out. really, really, really enjoyed this. i think it was well written, paced perfectly, funny, sexy, sweet and.... totes adorbs.

HOUSE RULES is the third in Ruby Lang’s series of novellas about finding love in the New York City real estate market (possibly a less hospitable terrain than the surface of the moon). Every one I read is my new favorite and this one is no exception. An over-40 couple, previously married and living together to be able to afford the city, it’s got the same heart, humor, and insight that Ruby’s work always has. Incorporating both music and food? Hello, two things that make for a powerful Adele-magnet. The way these two cautious, careful people navigate their history and their future is so, so good. Highly recommended.

I was given an Advance Reader’s Copy in exchange for an honest review.