This was a wonderful novel by Lauren Layne. I enjoyed the characters and this held my interest through the entire book.
This was my first book by this author and I am excited for future books.

I was given a copy of this from NetGalley in exchange for fair and honest review.

A nod to the well-known romance classics The Shop Around the Corner, In the Good Old Summertime and You’ve Got Mail, Lauren Layne’s modern adaptation of this classic tale is fun, fresh and entertaining. Regardless of whether readers are familiar with the storyline, or whether they are experiencing the story for the first time, Layne’s adaptation will surely bring delight to many.

To Sir, with Love is filled with visual writing that easily captures the reader’s attention; and the quick, witty dialogue readily engages one’s interest. Besides the frequent sparing sessions between Gracie and Sebastian, Gracie’s friends, co-workers and family also add unique character and depth to this story.

Astute readers will be able to figure out when the moment of “recognition” occurs. However, this moment arguably enhances the reader’s attentiveness, i.e., wanting to see how the added drama of this sudden realization will be incorporated and used to help arrive at the outcome that readers want. The plays may be subtle, but they are well designed to support the relationship developing between these two main characters.

The book is truly well done, and potentially like other readers, would love to see it played out in film.

3.5 stars

I thought this was a cute twist on the classic romcom You've Got Mail. I struggled a bit with the pacing of the first half, but once things got going, I ended up enjoying the second half a lot more. My favorite part of the story was the banter and messages between Sir and Lady. The anonymity of the app allowed them to be open in a way that they couldn't in their real lives. I did wish that the enemies aspect had been played up more between Sebastian and Gracie though. The anger felt very one sided and though I liked Gracie and Sebastian, I didn't love them. I unfortunately didn't feel that spark that fairy tale loving Gracie was so desperate for and that coupled with Sebastian's initial relationship status* made me not fully invested in their romance. Honestly, that aspect about Sebastian didn't feel necessary to the story and I felt there was enough conflict without adding that (however briefly) to the mix.

I did love Gracie's family though and her neighbor/friend Keva. They were wonderful comic relief and I would love a book for Keva in the future. The ending felt a bit rushed and it annoyed me that even though Sebastian clearly knew that Gracie was Lady, he still made her take all the risks. That epilogue had me smiling ear to ear though and was a very sweet way to end the book.

CW: death of parent (cancer, automobile accident), discussions of infertility/IVF, emotional cheating (*main character is involved with OW for part of the book, but the history and explanation for that relationship felt reasonable even if I don't personally agree)

*I voluntarily read an advance review copy of this book*

Updated version of You Got Mail. Grace Cooper was all set to start art school in Italy when her dad died. She was the only sibling who could take over the family business. She didn't hate it but she didn't love it. In the mix is the Andrews Corp tying to buy them out of their lease. So starts this contentious relationship. In the background is this dialogue between Sir and Lady.. Both are content to stay in the background. Each afraid that if they meet, everything will change. Life is not lived in a vacuum, it is constantly changing. As the dreams of her parents die, her paintings take off. It is at the art gallery, with family and friends that all is revealed. The ending was perfect.

First of all, thank you for this eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I unfortunately struggled to get into this one. It felt a bit like a fairy tale. Between the MC having lost a family, literally feeding and singing to animals, love at first sight, and the cliche New York attitude, I just couldn't get behind it.

I'm sure this book is perfect for someone, just not up my alley!

Hands down the cutest book I’ve read this year!

I love You’ve Got Mail and this book is such a great modern take of the enemies to lovers theme. Get this for all your friends who LOVE romcoms!!

This book is listed as "'Love is Blind' meets 'You've Got Mail'" so I wasn't sure if it would be my thing. I'm not a fan of reality t.v. or that movie but I'm so glad I read this because I loved it!

I loved all the dating app interactions so much especially as they pop up in the book after in person interactions. It was just perfect. Of course I might be biased since I met my husband on a dating website!

I'll admit Gracie isn't my favorite character ever. I was frustrated at times that she wasn't living her life. But I adored Sebastian even when he was kind of a jerk. I tend to like my heroes that way.

What I really loved though was the SLOW burn. Lauren Layne really put these two through it and I loved every second. I also adored the ending and the epilogue.

Since the back cover description tells you everything this book isn't really about the secret but about the relationship building and Gracie learning who she is.

I also loved the setting of this book. I've never been to NYC, but I felt like I was there amidst the hustle and bustle and it was wonderful.

I received an advanced copy of this book through NetGalley. This is my honest review.

This is the fun, HEA story of a couple who falls in love on a dating app while annoying each other in real life, but I shed a surprising number of tears, too, over the deeper themes of disappointment when life doesn't turn out the way we think it will, familial obligation, and struggling with how long to hold on to an increasingly unlikely dream. I enjoyed the story and appreciated the depth!

I was given an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest opinion. My thanks to author Lauren Layne, publisher Gallery Books, and #NetGalley for the opportunity!

You've got mail + Love is Blind vibes?! I'm, in!

Gracie is living our her late father's wishes of keeping his champagne shop open. Sebastian is a corporate cog and is trying to buy out the rest of Gracie's lease. Gracie is struggling with giving up her father's dream and trying to pursue her own. Gracie's seeks advice on what to do from "Sir", who is someone she met on a blind dating app and have never met in person. Gracie starts to fall for Sir, but doesn't know that she's actually already met him in person and they don't get along.

I flew through this one. It was such a sweet and cute book. From the cute banter to and the family dynamic. I loved everything about this one.

Thank you NetGalley + Gallery books for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Pub date: June 29

This book had me squealing throughout its entirety. With You’ve Got Mail vibes, Layne really wrote a modern-day fairytale (with an actual fairytale aficionado) AND an enemies-to-friends-to-lovers story. Something I thought impossible. ⁠⁠
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Grace is an absolute utter queen, I love her so much, her life is in a messy place at the beginning, living with her middle child syndrome (which I apparently also have as an older child?) and pushing aside her goals and life in order to maintain her family’s business alive. ⁠⁠
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Sebastian is a corporate something or other that is trying to buy Grace out of her wine store’s lease in order to make a parking structure (bleh, am I right?). But then he gets to know her by attending events the shop hosts and providing her with the opportunities to pursue her dreams.⁠⁠
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And can I mention that Grace is part of an online dating app that matches people based on personality rather than looks, like penpals, and she ends up in love with both Sir and Sebastian? ⁠⁠
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Ugh, I’m smitten with this story. It’s a one-sit read and absolutely perfect for the summer. Give yourself a chance to fall in love with Grace and Seb’s story the same way I did.⁠⁠
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One thing to note though is the lack of diversity in the story which I would have loved a little more of outside of one or two side characters. But overall pretty good.⁠⁠
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8/10⁠⁠
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Thanks to NetGalley and Gallery Books for the ARC in exchange for an honest review and the opportunity to read this work of art.

I have to admit, I didn't really like the movie You've Got Mail and I was a little squicked by the "To Sir" aspect but I like Lauren Layne a lot and decided to trust the story. I'm glad I did. The romance was probably a three but Gracie's growth and character development were a five. She really grows from following someone else's dreams to figuring out her own. And it's not because she's forced to but because she makes that choice for herself. Sebastian is okay but ends up being the sort of bland Disney prince that Gracie has wanted for her whole life.
Gracie Cooper is running the family business, keeping her father's dream alive. But now she's getting letters from the V. Andrews corporation asking her to give up their rental agreement. But why would she agree to that when she might just start breaking even soon? Besides, it's not like she's got anything going on in her personal life. Except an intriguing guy on this new app that allows for conversation only, no pictures.
Because this book is first-person narration for one character (with some text messages), we really do miss a lot of what is going on in Sebastian's mind. If Gracie hadn't had such growth, I might have minded more but overall my love of character development weighed more in rating this book.

Four stars
This book comes out June 29th, 2021
ARC kindly provided by Gallery Books
Opinions are my own

To Sir, with Love is an adorable modern fairy-tale story mixed with enemies to lovers romance. I found myself relating to many aspects of the main character Gracie. She is dealing with the loss of her father, trying to find her "prince charming," but also maintain her independence and not settling for anything less than her prince standards. I appreciated Gracie's journey of discovering herself as she navigates the grief of losing her father. Yes, this book was predictable but I still found myself getting all the "feels". I also loved the fairy tale and Disney references.

Thank you for this gifted copy in exchange for my honest review.

I enjoyed this book more than I expected to. This book is loosely based on You've Got Mail which is not one of my favorites but I really liked Gracie and Sebastian. Having Gracie own a champagne shop and really trying to make a go of the family business to honor her late father's dream was a fresh occupational choice. I did like the text exchanges and there is something romantic about getting to know someone before you meet them.
The only thing I didn't like was I felt it could've been just a little bit quicker to get to the resolution but overall it was a worthwhile reading experience.

First, this was so cute, but there were a lot of typos. I really hope that they get fixed before the book is published.
I loved all of the characters and thought most of them were given great personalities. The only one that didn't seem as fleshed out was Rachel and Caleb's girlfriend Amanda/Michelle's name changed at the end. Other than small things like that I really liked this book. I've read books with the characters messaging before, but I like how this one took the approach of most of the messaging happening outside of the chapters, so we could get to know the characters outside of the app. I have read 2 or 3 other books with the You've Got Mail vibe and this just confirms that I will read anything with the You've Got Mail trope. That ending had my heart afluttering.


Thank You Netgalley and Gallery Books for this free arc in exchange for my honest feedback. ss
I will post a review on Instagram (see.girl.read) closer to the publish date.

I shouldn't say things like "this was a pleasant surprise!" when I read a Lauren Layne book at this point, but that was my immediate reaction. I adored the Central Park Pact series and have a feeling I'll go on to enjoy many of her other romances. I don't think I was expecting to love this one quite as much as I did though. The premise is essentially You've Got Mail, so you can't go wrong!

Gracie is a romantic, obsessed with fairy tales and finding her soulmate. She's got a pen pal she's falling for on a dating app who she's never met, but she can tell they're perfect for each other. She took over the family business, a sparkling wine store in NYC, after her father passed away. Her siblings bowed out a long time ago and she never wanted to disappoint her father, even after his death. Her brother moved to New Hampshire and her sister still lives in NYC with her high school sweetheart husband; they're not as close as they used to be.

Enter: Sebastian. His company owns the shop Gracie leases and they want to buy her out of their lease. As you can imagine, Gracie does NOT want to give up the family business and the two fight constantly whenever they see each other. Enemies-to-lovers, baby.

It's very obvious to the reader who Sir (the pen pal) is - she already knows him IRL. It was wild to watch them fall in love in person and through an app. She was constantly torn up about falling for both of them without realizing they were one in the same. 

The thing I love about Layne's romances is that you think - from the summary or book cover or wherever else you get your first impression - that they'll be very romance-heavy without much else developed. However, all of her books usually have strong friendship elements in addition to the romance. In this case, there were some amazing family feels (especially the three siblings reconnecting in a natural way) in addition to fun friendships. These books always make me think I should like NYC more than I do ;) I loved reading about Gracie's art and how she was trying to find her way, now that she started to second-guess her future.

All in all, such a well-rounded and enjoyable story! Sometimes I wanted to bang some characters' heads together to get them to see what was right in front of them, but I loved reading this book.

To Sir With Love is as bubbly and fun as a glass of champagne on a hot summer day! I loved this fresh take on You’ve Got Mail.

The story follows Gracie Cooper, who has taken over her family long-standing champagne shop in NYC instead of following her dream of becoming an artist. When the shop is in jeopardy, handsome businessman Sebastian Andrews proposes a buyout. Gracie doesn’t want to admit the shop is in danger so she finds comfort and camaraderie with a man she meets online, lovingly known as “Sir.” As time goes on, Gracie realizes what she really wants out of her life, and maybe even finds love not once but twice along the way.

This story was predictable in the best way, but I got so many vibes of Sex and the City while reading this. It was my first Lauren Layne book and it definitely won’t be my last! If you’re looking for a light and fluffy summer read, this is a great choice. 🥂

In her Author’s Note at the end of To Sir, With Love, Lauren Layne admits that the premise of her love story is not an original. She just spent a while figuring out how to create her own version. If you’ve seen Nora Ephron’s 1998 movie You’ve Got Mail, you’ll understand. You’ve Got Mail was an updated version of 1940’s The Shop Around the Corner, which was based on the 1937 play Parfumerie by Miklos Laszlo. The basic premise is a love (hate) story with two people who can’t stand each other in real life but fall in love as strangers. In The Shop Around the Corner (as well as the original play and a couple musicals), it was letters. Nora Ephron updated the medium to e-mails and instant messaging. In To Sir, With Love, it’s a dating app.

If you’ve read any of my reviews of love stories in the past, you will know my feeling about them. The story is the same: boy meets girl, boy and girl hate each other, boy and girl love each other, boy loses girl, boy wins girl back, and they live happily ever after. It’s a construct that works well in romantic comedy, and what makes a “new” story good and different is the execution of the story.

I’m not going to give anything away by telling you that SirNYC is Sebastian. We all know they’re one and the same. That’s the idea. Gracie falls in love with both of them, and while she’s torn because she thinks she has to choose between them, she’s thrilled when she discovers that Sir and Sebastian are both her Prince Charming.
There are a number of things I like about this particular version, with the main one being that Gracie is a great (dare I say, spunky) character. She loves the idea of a Cinderella story (to the point of signing her paintings with a glass slipper), she’s desperate to find her own Prince Charming, AND she’s a tough woman who isn’t going to get walked all over. She’s a smart business woman who understands her store’s niche, updates the brand to keep up with the times, AND is really only keeping the store open because it’s a family business and she doesn’t want to disappoint her siblings and her parents’ legacy even though her real passion is art.

I love the way Gracie and Sebastian developed into a couple. Sebastian is the type of character that would make my daughter say, “I don’t like him,” and my response would be, “You’re not supposed to.” Gracie doesn’t like him either. Over time, as Gracie defends her business and Sebastian continues to push to buy out the lease, we get to see Sebastian on a more personal level – the Sebastian who Gracie falls in love with.
Layne does a great job with her characters. The situations are believable, especially how Gracie really gets in her own way because she’s so focused on preserving her family’s legacy that she sees the subtle changes in Sebastian but she doesn’t let herself embrace them. I could totally see this as a movie, either on the big screen or the Hallmark channel. I would watch it either way.

The only thing that knocked this down to 4 stars for me is that we don’t get to see enough of the interactions with Sir. That’s kind of the best part of these types of stories is the development of both relationships. By the time we meet Gracie at the beginning of the book, she’s really already in love with Sir, but I would have liked to see more robust conversations between them, maybe some real-time messaging in the app.

All in all, a great new and clean romantic comedy that would make a fantastic beach read. This was my first read of Lauren Layne and likely won’t be my last. She has written a whole host of series and runs the gamut from PG- to R-rated, depending on your preference.

To Sir, with Love is such a cute unique meet cute read. I got a lot of those awe moments while reading this one. I love Gracie's spirit and spunk. Her family means everything and you will just love how she tries her hardest to hold onto it. You feel the love and passion throughout this one when it comes to Gracie and her fairytale love. Sebastian at first it was hard to get a feel on him. But as everything begin to unfold you are so drawn to him. You are pulled in every time Gracie and Sebastian have a run in. There are so many sweet moments that you are just going to fall in love with. I fell hard for Sebastian and Gracie. I could not get enough of this one. Go one click now.

You would think that I would be sick of reading You've Got Mail "type" books, but you would be wrong. Not only was this book exactly what I needed, it was so flawlessly done. Do you believe in fate? Do you believe in just knowing when you found the ONE? I do and I love reading books about it even more.
Gracie is a thirty something small business owner living in NYC. She believes in the fairy tale and won't settle for anything less. She has signed up for a dating service where you don't see a photo of the person you are talking to first, you just have conversations to see if you are compatible. She meets a man she calls "sir", but the only issue is, he has a girlfriend and his friends signed him up for this app as a joke at a bachelor party. She knows this man that she has become close friends with could be something more, but will just be happy as friends for now because she is not one to get in the way of someone else's happiness.
One day she meets a man at the farmer's market. He chases down her twenty as it blows away in the wind. When he hands it back to her, she is bowled over with just one look. "You." She just knows this man is her soulmate, until the pretty girl he is with comes over to greet her. If that isn't enough, it turns out he is the big developer, Sebastian Andrews, that is looking to buy her store to turn it into another skyscraper. This man is obviously not for her.
As she becomes closer with Sebastian though, she sees he actually cares about these owners and he is just looking to make her an offer to make her life better. They become friends, all the while she is talking to her "sir" relaying all of the issues she is going through. In true You've Got Mail fashion, she is last to realize that the two men are one in the same.
True to Lauren Layne fashion, she makes me swoon with just a kiss. Her style of writing had me devouring every word until these two found their happily ever after.
Thank you to Lauren Layne, Netgalley and Gallery Books for an early copy of this book.

To Sir, With Love is a charming modern take on You’ve Got Mail!!

Thank you Netgalley, Gallery Books and Simon and Schuster Audio for the complimentary digital galley and audiobook in exchange of my honest opinion!

Two people sharing their lives on two different level..understanding and hot chemistry online and arrogance and rivalry offline! Gracie and Sebastian’s relationship, banter, rivalry, understanding and hot chemistry is super enjoyable, laugh out loud, fun, adorable story!

This is a very fast paced book, that I read and listened to in one sitting which filled my my heart with love and happiness!! I will check out other books from Lauren as I really enjoyed this book!

Rachanee Lumayno and Shaun Taylor-Corbett were amazing narrator and they kept the story crisp, fun and entertaining! I highly recommend this book when it releases on June 29, 2021