Stalling for Time is my first book by Christy Hayes. I was excited to see the series was all available on netgalley, that way I could read them back to back!

I thought this book was adorable. It's light and fun, full of emotion with understated humor. Emily and Dylan are perfect for each other—after years of friendship, they know what the other needs and take care of each other.

I couldn't wait to start book 2!

Ah, the friends-to-lovers trope. It is so hard to walk away and not feel the satisfaction of the tried and true romance plot.

Yet, here I am, immensely disappointed.

Let's review our two friends/lovers in question.

Emily: beautiful, blonde, sorority sister, interior design student. Has be dating college football star Zach Chamberlain since high school.

Dylan: engineer student who has been friends (and also in love) with Emily since they were kids. He is Zach's brother.

Having the extra twist in this love triangle being that both men are brothers was really enticing. However, I could tell the trajectory of Emily and Dylan's relationship was going to fall flat pretty early on. We are told that they are friends, but this friendship actually isn't developed very much beyond Dylan coming over to help Emily with her curtains. Otherwise, their friendship seems rather surface-level except for the fact we're told they talk way more than Emily and Zach. Honestly, I probably know more about Emily than Zach did too.

Also, Emily may just be the worst protagonist I have ever followed. She discovers that Dylan has an engagement ring and presumes it's for the girl he is seeing and instead of just ASKING him she tries and gets her friends to seduce him to prove he's not ready for marriage!! And also, why would these girls even attempt this, even if it was just to show Emily she has feelings for Dylan? The fact that they were underage and then sexualizing their bodies simply to comply to Emily's wishes was a bit off-putting.

Dylan did seem like a pretty decent dude and has his head on straight. I was slightly disappointed that he and Emily kissed before she broke up with her brother but I kind of anticipated that to happen. Dylan is clearly his parents least favourite child which made me quite sad. I know he messed up his relationship with his brother but the mom's standoffishness was uncalled for.

I'm quite surprised I finished this novel. My biggest takeaway is that the characters need to be far more developed beyond the superficial level they are now. They in no way represent how University students act or have to deal with.

Dylan is in love with his brother's girlfriend Emily. When his brother buys an engagement ring, Dylan realizes he's got to let Emily go. But she's heartbroken at losing Dylan's friendship. Is she dating the wrong brother?

This book is adorable. It's light and fun, full of emotion with understated humor. Emily and Dylan are perfect for each other—after years of friendship, they know what the other needs and take care of each other. I also enjoyed the relationship between Emily and her college roommates. If you're looking for a romance to make you smile, this one is a good choice.

Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC I received. This is my honest and voluntary review.

A young adult story about love and friendship . We meet Emily and Dylan who’s been the best of friends since elementary school. They have the ideal friendship, the only problem is that Dylan is madly in love with Emily and she’s dating his wildly popular and charismatic brother .
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Dylan has made peace with his role in Emily’s life but when there’s talk of engagement , both parties have to face their feelings before it’s too late.
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This was a quick read, with a not quite likeable main character ( looking at you Emily ). The love triangle situation made me cringe and I wouldn’t want to be at Dylan’s house for thanksgiving 😩. If Dylan thought me anything , it’s to speak up before a it too late .

I'm a little over 50% through, and I c a n n o t finish this book. If I would describe this book in one sentence I would say "when white college students can't get over their white people problems and create even more white people problems." I suppose it's partially my fault for knowing that I've started leaning towards more diversity reads and still picking up this book even though I knew it would be pretty homogenous. The one good thing I will say about this book is that I think Christy Hayes is realllyy good at writing steamy scenes. I was really into the one ~spicy scene, but it just could not overcome the plot for me.

I know this book is a republished, edited version of "A Kiss by Design" which Christy published in 2013. Because I normally LOVE friends-to-lovers, I thought I would really enjoy the book because I assumed that this new version would have all the parts that did not age well edited out. Well.... it turned out that I just find the entire premise of the book unappealing. I really hate books that center around relationships of miscommunication, deception, and cheating, and this book very much revolves around it.

If you enjoyed My Best Friend's Wedding, I think you would enjoy this book. Alas, I find people who try to break up their friend's relationships through complicated and devious plans to be very immature, but that's just me 🤷‍♀️. And people may try to justify Emily's behavior because she's still young and naive, but girl, I'm in college now and I find this behavior to be soooo childish. I know I can't expect everyone to be super mature, but I feel like a lot of this could have been resolved by a simple conversation.

Here is a brief description of the plot as I saw it:
Blonde white girl wants to break up with her long-time white boyfriend because he plays too much football. Tall white guy is absolutely in love with the tall blonde who also happens to be his bff but can't pursue her because she's dating his older brother. White girl thinks her bff is going to propose to his other white girlfriend (even though they're all college sophomores) and proposes a plan with all her white sorority bffs to break them up by attempting to seduce him at frat parties.

The most diverse character in this book was her bombshell roommate with "olive" skin and still she was basically the sex object who hates being seen as a sex object. Sooooo I guess all I can say is maybbeeee if there wasn't cheating in this book I might have liked it more. Or if all their problems just didn't sound like a pile of white people mess. And I suppose all these problems could have happened to people of any race, but idk I just can't imagine myself relating to any of this in anyway even though (or maybe especially because??) I'm currently in college in a similar environment myself??? Idk I just found all the characters to be super unlikeable and irrational, and PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, JUST SIT DOWN AND HAVE A CONVERSATION WITH EACH OTHER!!!!

No great plot twists in this romance and unfortunately it read like a novella with no real depth of characters or romantic build up but it was drawn out as if to fill pages so a bit disappointing

I found this to be a cite predictable read, but it was very drawn out. I typically struggle with books such as this where simple conversations could be had.

I know that this was intended this way to see that the love story aspect can carry on...but it really was just meh.

This book was just okay for me. A friends-to-lovers trope, but the twist of a love triangle including brothers. That was not my favorite. Especially both partners being unfaithful.
I found the characters ages to not be believable based on the way they acted. I would think they would need to both be in their early 20s, not 19 year olds. Especially 19 year olds who are supposedly both involved in Greek Life. What was even the point of mentioning that, since neither of them lived in the houses? It just seemed unnecessary. Kind of like the random mentions of praying and God towards the end of the book- why?!
Overall, Emily just did not strike me as likeable enough to have two brothers fighting over each other. And I can't believe that Zach ends up getting a book of his own after being such a worthless jerk through this whole story.
This is not a series I plan on completing.

*A big thank you to netgalley for giving me this adorable swoon worthy novel in exchange for a review*

Ahhh where do I start? Okay. So overall, this book is pure fluff. The angst is calm enough to enjoy and the romance just makes your heart jump up and down. I loved the pacing of Emily and Dylan’s romance. I loved how realistic the consequences were but I loved that they worked together through it. They did pull away and silent treatment each other a lot but like grown adults they came back and had healthy conversation after. I loved Emily! Sometimes the romantic interest is kind of 2 dimensional and bland but Emily was smart and independent and real and I loved that. Dylan was also just *swoon*. I loved that he was a healthy romantic interest, he respected Emily and her boundaries and he really did care about his brother and his family even when he was the one who messed up. This was so entertaining and so simple but still a story you were excited to see tie together in the end. Lastly I loved that we got a couple happy ever after chapters at the end. So many authors end with a kiss and we don’t get any calm non angst dates but we got a few “as a couple” chapters and I loved them! I will 100% be reading more from this author and I recommend this to anyone who loves fluffy romance!

Thank you NetGalley, author Christy Hayes, and CAH LLC for giving me a free Arc of this book in exchange for an honest review! All thoughts and opinions are my own.
4.5 stars
This book has one of my favorite troupes friends-to-lovers. Emily is Dylan's brother's Zach's long time girlfriend. Emily and Dylan has been best friends for a long time, but those are not the only feelings Dylan has. Secretly, he has been in love with his brother's girl for almost two decades. One weekend, Zach gives Dylan Emily's engagement ring to hold until the perfect time comes to ask Emily to marry him. Dylan, willing to do anything for his brother, even if it means watching the girl he loves marry someone else, he holds onto the ring. Emily finds the engagement ring in Dylan's bag. Thinking he is going to ask his recent girlfriend to marry him, she sets out to stop Dylan from choosing the wrong woman to marry! She enlists the help of her best girlfriends to flirt and derail his plans. Dylan has a choice to make will he act on his feelings for Emily and risk everything or will he bury his feelings for ever?
This book was so sweet! I loved Dylan. He wanted to do the right thing for everyone involved even if it meant giving up the love of his life to his brother. Emily has so much love to give, but seems to take her for grated! Zach is very driven toward becoming a successful football player, but seems to lack the time it takes to take care of the woman he loves. I really respected Dylan and Emily in wanting to do the right thing even though it was going to hurt those they hold closest to them. Their chemistry and growth from a friendship to a romantic relationship was so well written and full of angst! I would have liked to see a lot less secrets being kept from all of the more important people involved, but it was one of the driving forces that moved the story. Overall, the ending was so satisfying! I am excited to read Zach's story in the next installment! I highly recommend this book to those who love a great friends-to-lovers story!

This best friends to lovers college story is sweet and wholesome. Dylan’s been in love with Emily forever, Emily has had no clue. Over the course of this book friends help them navigate their feelings and the complications with being together.

The story was a bit predictable, but cute anyway.

This contemporary romance of two college students who go from best friends to lovers, is predictable but endearing. Dylan and Emily have great chemistry and need to overcome obstacles. I received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.