This book was so so good!! It has been getting a lot of buzz recently for a very good reason. This book is about Charlie who becomes the star of reality dating show so that he can fix his image and get another job in tech. He thinks he will never find love, but then he finds love with his producer Dev.

I really liked this story and I loved these characters so much. I loved hearing the behind the scenes of the TV show and I loved all the different side characters. The mental health representation in this book is really great and was talked about in great detail which I appreciated and I think will really speak to a lot of readers. I really loved this book and would highly highly recommend!

Delightful! Charlie is probably the absolute wrong man to be on the reality dating show Ever After. He's got social anxiety and, even more important, well he's not really into women. Or anyone for that matter. So why do it? He needs to rehabilitate himself publicly and boost his tech company. Dev, the producer of the show, has recently broken with his long time love. He takes Charlie in hand at first because he needs his work to work and the show to entice viewers. It quickly becomes apparent, to Dev if not to Charlie, what should happen. This has a wonderful cast of diverse characters, a great sense of humor and a happy ending. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. It's a very good light read about learning to love yourself.

If you’ve been around my page for a minute, you know I love The Bachelor and all things Bachelor adjacent - especially Bachelor inspired books. When I was offered a copy of The Charm Offensive, I was thrilled - it was a new kind of Bachelor inspired book - an LGBTQ+ story focusing on the lead of the show falling for his producer.

I loved, loved, loved the dual POV in this book - having both Dev and Charlie’s POV really helped to inform the state of their love story. Where Dev was a confidently out gay man, a lot of the book followed Charlie questioning his identity and slowly coming to terms with it. I think without his POV, it would have been more difficult to understand his emotional journey and his side of their love story. With that being said, Charlie’s journey to figuring out and accepting his identity felt like one of the most honest and realistic coming out stories I’ve ever read. I loved that the awkward and the questioning moments weren’t omitted - they helped fully realize the story.

Charlie and Dev together were the cutest couple - even before they started falling for each other and they were just star and producer, they were cute. When they slowly started getting interested in each other (despite their own individual hesitations), it took no time for their sparks to start flying. I also appreciated that they started from a deep sense of friendship - they connected deeply on an emotional level long before they connected on a physical level.

I also really appreciated the discussion of LGBTQ+ folks in Hollywood - specifically that Hollywood big wigs are willing to profit off the ideas and labor of queer people but not willing to tell their stories. This line of discourse was fascinating and very, very relevant in today's climate. I also appreciated the honest discussions about mental health - Dev’s depression wasn’t rug swept - though his journey to taking his own mental health seriously was a long one.

The Charm Offensive was definitely one of my favorite romance reads of the summer - and definitely one of my favorite Bachelor inspired books. Between the excellent coming out story, the story about the treatment and abuse of LGBTQ+ in Hollywood, and the super cute romance, this book has it all. What an excellent debut by Alison Cochrun - I can’t wait to read more of her books in the future! 5/5

This might be the perfect book. Honestly. I laughed out loud, fell in love, felt my heart ache, wanted to throw the book across the room and immediately pick it back up to pet the spine and whisper apologies...it was everything. From page one I was hooked - the characters leap off the page and are so dynamic and real, and the immediate action into this plot that is already such a wonderful set up...it hit the gas running and never let up. It was zany and interesting with a sprinkle of travel and a dash of the greatest, most ridiculous best friends, and I felt like I was on set with them taping every episode. It's so impressive how distinct each character is and how each one makes you feel so much - even the ones who are meant to be the villains, or even those who only have a handful of lines. Somehow, each one evokes something in the reader and is relatable in some way.

Most importantly though, the way this book portrays mental illness, gender identity, and sexual identity in so many forms was brilliant and seamless. It somehow found that perfect line of representation without feeling gimmicky or overdone. It felt like a real world, where all kinds of people and humans exist and struggle and experience life.

Read this book. Read it to know what reality TV is like, read it to know love in all its forms, read it to witness discovering self and identity and how it can be acceptable and morphing all at once.

Thank you to the publisher @atriabooks for my gifted copy!

This is an absolutely adorable, quick, fun, light hearted read that I devoured in a few days (very unlike me!) This is a queer romance that definitely is an amazingly well written book with adorably likable characters!

For fans of the bachelor/bachelorette-this is definitely for you as it is about a single bachelor, Charlie, who goes on a reality dating show, Ever After, much like the bachelor, to find the love of his life. Except-he doesn’t make connections with any of the ladies, but ends up falling for someone behind the scenes—-this someone being Dev, his set assistant!

Charlie struggles internally with the realization that he is gay, is scared to admit it to himself as well as anyone else, but his feelings for Dev are undeniable-and everyone can see that! I absolutely fell in love with Charlie & Dev and the connection they built and the chemistry between them!

I think the author did an amazing job with developing the bachelor-like show-definitely nailed it here. The plot and the characters are all so well developed and really grab your attention from the get-go. Another thing that I really liked that the author did was intertwine mental health throughout the book. Both the main characters struggle with mental issues such as depression and anxiety, and it was really refreshing to see this played out throughout the book and the author bringing awareness to such an important issue. I really liked that the characters are all so open, honest, and accepting of sexual identity and mental health issues.

I was really looking forward to reading this one and was so thrilled when I was emailed an eARC from the publisher! Thank you so much this is one I will definitely keep recommending to everyone for all the reasons listed above!

I adored this book so much! A solid 4 stars! Dev is a producer for a show that sounds a lot like the Bachelor. Charlie is the latest contestant. The only thing is instead of finding true love on the show Charlie falls for Dev!

This is such a sweet romance. Your heart would have to be made of stone to dislike this story. The representation is amazing. And the discussions about mental health really were handled so well. It tackles so many things while still being a feel good romance. I loved how goofy Dev was and how innocent Charlie was about life in general. It was hard to put down this story and I finished it in a few hours of reading.

If you love a good romance with lovable characters be sure to check out The Charm Offensive. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the eARC!

This is such a charming and heartfelt novel! There is so much wrapped up in this package that I'm almost at a loss of where to start. Dev and Charlie have wonderful depth and character creativity that has you rooting for their ship hardcore. The mentions of different aspects of mental health, OCD, coming out, workplace discrimination and different sexual representations fit so well together.

My favorite part of the whole novel is the underlying message of healing yourself and that love will not heal someone fighting a personal battle. Self acceptance of mental health issues and seeking out assistance and healthy resolutions to ease the internal storm. It truly makes you think about how much you put before yourself - work, school, relationships, etc. Cochrun truly put soul into this novel and you feel it shinning through the characters.

Though this is listed as a romcom I found myself getting misty-eyed more than lauging out loud. Not necessarily a bad thing considering the depth Cochrun put into this. However, I was hoping for more on the humorous side overall. Slightly longer than I expected and the pace does slow in a lot of areas. Overall though, I was hands-down smitten with Charlie and Dev. I adored this novel.

I would recommend this to readers looking for a wonderful LGBTQ love story that brings mental health awareness to the table and tugs at your heart strings in the best way possible. Thank you Atria Books and Simon & Schuster for the gifted digital copy in exchange for an honest review!

Calling all fans of The Bachelor and romance—The Charm Offensive is the book for you! This book takes place on a fictional dating show called Ever After. Our two main characters are the Prince (the Bachelor character) and one of the show’s producers!

Charlie, the lead for Ever After, is the most precious cinnamon roll. I fell for him as soon as he appeared on the page. To the outside world, Charlie seems extremely intelligent and standoffish. But, in actuality, he’s shy and anxious.

Dev, one of the producers on Ever After, is a hopeless romantic. He believes in the show’s mission of people finding true love-- even though no one else on the staff shares that belief. When Dev meets Charlie, he’s determined to help Charlie fall in love.

Little do they know, Charlie does find love...with Dev.

Read this book if you like:

Friends to lovers
Books that make you laugh out loud
Cinnamon roll characters
The sweetest romance
Amazing representation and conversations discussing the importance of representation in the media

The Charm Offensive is an endearing tale of giving yourself permission to be loved. I absolutely enjoyed Dev and Charlies blossoming affections throughout the pages. Two men, both making a name for themselves in their careers, will steal your heart with one chance meeting where sparks fly.

This book does not shy away from exploring mental health, OCD, depression and the LGBTQA community. It is packed with so much depth and emotion while still being funny and lovable. The Charm Offensive, all in all, is a fantastic entry in LGBTQA+ romance novels.

Thank you NetGalley and Atria Books for the complimentary copy.

The Charm Offensive by Alison Cochrun is a romance novel about Dev Deshpande, who works on the reality dating show Ever After. Charlie Winshaw is the newest bachelor for the new season of Ever After, He is not sure that there is such a thing as true love, and he has anxiety about many things. Dev's job is to coach Charlie through all his "dates" for the show, and they end up becoming very close. This book was an absolute joy to read as the story and characters were very well done, and the author covered some important issues in a sensitive and positive manner. Thanks to NetGalley for the free digital review copy. All opinions are my own.

For fans of a dating show storyline, look no further! It reads just like a script from a show and it was a really enjoyable read. Filled with some steam and some true laugh out loud moments. I found that all the characters felt like real people and it definitely got me hooked even more. Charlie is so precious and gave me all the heart eyes. It explores staying true to one’s self and mental health.

If you liked Red, White, & Royal Blue and One to Watch definitely check this one out!

Thank you so much to Netgalley and Atria for allowing me an opportunity to understand the beauty that is this book.

This is the prime example of a ‘hug book.’ (Some if you may know what I mean.) I just want to sit and hug this book for a few hours, and then read it all over again.

I want my own Charlie. I want to hug him (with permission, for three seconds) and thank him for being him. I want to sit and tell him he’s not alone, and he is perfect just the way he is. Dev is also wonderful, with his devotion to true love, fairytales, and seeing the best in people.

The secondary characters in this story also helped to bring this book to the top! Parisa, Jules, Angie, Daphne- I would personally read any spin off of any of these characters.

I have already recommended this book to countless friends and family members, and imagine gifting it to many others!

The title and cover don’t do this book justice. I loved this story from start to finish and wish that The Bachelor were more like Ever After. I am so happy to have characters like Dev and Charlie to root for and for most of the “angst” to be so real. The discussions of mental health and homophobia were done well. I wish there were more romances like this.

Thank you so much to Atria for my advance copy of The Charm Offensive! I can't express how much I loved this book. I melted into a puddle of emotional goo. I read it along with my book club and we were so fortunate to be able to have a Zoom chat with Alison Cochrun! I was blown away when she told us that she wrote the first draft of the book in SIX days! 

I am not a huge Bachelor fan, but I definitely appreciated that part of the story line. Charlie becomes the next Prince on Ever After, a popular dating television show. He is not the ideal person for this position, but he has his reasons for leaping out of his comfort zone. When filming starts, he realizes he may not be able to pull this off after all. Dev has devoted himself to the production of the show for the last six years and after a turn of events, finds himself taking over the role of Charlie's handler/coach. What comes next is a story full of great banter, flirtation, discovery, and the best mental health representation that I have ever read in a book. I applaud the rawness and openness on the topics of depression, anxiety, and OCD. 

I flew through the chapters... I had so many emotions in the short time that it took me to read the book. My heart broke and swelled for Charlie and for Dev. I could not get enough. I was swept up in this not-so-fairytale story of two perfectly imperfect people. I felt like I had a front row seat to this show and the characters were so real. And that includes all the side characters!

I would definitely recommend this book for fans of the Bachelor looking for a fun beach read. Cute rom-com with likeable characters.

<i>Charlie takes a deep breath and tries to remember the rewards of being brave enough to ask for what you want. "But what if I wanted to try something else?" </i>

The Charm Offensive by Alison Cochrun is everything I never knew I needed. This book is smart, it's funny, it's emotional, it's beautiful, and it's incredibly incredibly important. I highlighted over 24 passages in this story, and I honestly probably could have highlighted more. Life affirming and absolutely splendid passages about self acceptance, about loving who you are and who you can be, and about just life and romance and dreams. I honestly don't think I'll ever be able to adequately describe how important and perfect this book is to me, so maybe I shouldn't even try, but Charlie and Dev and the rest of the cast were an absolute joy and I will be thinking about them for years to come. The growth we see in all of these characters, and their own emotional journeys, were just moving, and authentic, and so very very real and relatable, that it squeezed my heart.

The Charm Offensive is practically perfect in every way, and I cannot thank Alison Cochrun enough for pouring it out of her brain.

I also am developing a plan to kidnap Charlie, wrap him in bubble wrap, and hide him from the world forever to protect him from everything bad. I love him so so so so so much.

Have I gushed enough? Should I keep going? Look, everyone needs to read this story and maybe I should make it my mission to force it on everyone, because the lessons this sweet queer little romcom about the Bachelor teaches you are innumerable and invaluable and I think everyone could use a big warm hug like this one.

Thank you to Atria Books and Netgalley for my review copy. It was an absolute joy and privilege to read.

Mostly I just want to tell you to read this book because it’s hard to put into words how amazing it is. Allison Cochran has written something really important here. It’s a romance that we really need in the world today.

Charlie is someone who has struggled with OCD, severe anxiety and panic disorder his whole life. After a crushing blow with work, he decides to make a PR move and go on the show Ever After which is modeled after The Bachelor. As the star of the show he has a handler named Dev who has struggles of his own but buries them so most people don’t really see what’s going on in the background. Part of Dev’s job as Charlie’s handler is to help him navigate dating 12 different women who are the contestants on this bachelor-style show. When he realizes that Charlie is having a tough time with social interactions he decides to take a more personal approach with Charlie and spends more time with him directly coaching him through the process. These two become super close and watching their friendship grow while at the same time realizing things about themselves is really something amazing to see on the page.

Cochran does a better job than any other author I’ve seen in dealing with neurodiversity, sexuality and gender preferences and racial inequalities in such a way that there is acknowledgment of the real struggle these characters do face in society and at the same time the struggle they have with themselves and the acceptance of who they are. This is not just a romance between Charlie and Dev, which by the way is sweet and steamy and fun, but it’s also a book where both Charlie and Dev learn to accept themselves as who they are and even more important to love themselves as who they are and that self-love doesn’t come from another person. Charlie's journey of learning about intimacy is beautifully written. I love that she included discussions of medication and therapy and being brave enough to open yourself up to someone. And while she is dealing with some of these very real and very big issues, this book is so funny. I laughed so many times. The interactions, the contestants, the silly games that they do to compete for Charlie’s love and the trips are all super entertaining and had the pages turning until the very end. I could not put it down.

All in all, this is a super gorgeous book written with wit, honesty and humor. It’s easily one of the best books of the year. I highly highly recommend you read it.

This was indeed charming! It gives the romcom vibes with a lot of laugh out loud moments. The characters are uniquely written, they’re complex. They’re imperfect. There’s miscommunication, overthinking and a lot of heart.
What I didn’t expect from this book was it delves into some deep and serious topics like mental health struggles. It was written with grace though.
I love the representation in sexuality and romantic aspects in this book.
It’s perfect for those who enjoy RWRB and Boyfriend Material. But it’s uniquely charming on its own. 5/5 would recommend and read again.

This story challenges the status quo of reality television.
It challenges the misconceptions, stereotypes, and prejudices the neurotypical cast join the neurodivergent, or those struggle with mental illness of all types.
It challenges what love is, how we find it, and what we d once we have it.

Dev and Charlie are endgame from the first time they meet. Both are a mess but holding themselves together with duct tape and a prayer. They struggle through the entire season of <i>Ever After</i> while coping with their own mental illness and misconceptions about love and their life trajectory.

Dev and Charlie's relationships isn't pretty. It's riddled with miscommunication, missteps of massive proportion, and heartbreak. And while they do eventually find their own happily ever after, the mess in the middle is reminiscent of real life. Yes, reality TV tends to be the furthest thing from reality. And their story shows that the script never measures up.

I love the difficult, painful portrayal of mental illness. There's a tendency in media to paint it as something pseudo-positive, like all the "benefits" of a mental illness (intense periods of focus, awareness of situations, etc.) outweigh the crippling negatives. Most media don't bother combining the two to show an accurate, real life depiction. Not this story. This story goes into the dark, painful parts of depression, anxiety, and OCD. Nearly every character has a therapist; many are on meds. They don't shy away, though they do share their struggles at consistent therapy. Positive coping strategies are stressed, even if the characters struggle to follow their own advice.

But we also NEED to talk about the vast array of sexualities present! Yes, the "big ones" are covered: gay, pan, lesbian. But we also have a BIROMANTIC character! And Charlie comes to realize that he may fall somewhere on the asexual spectrum, though he struggles with which one best fits him. Having exposure is important. It's gives us a mirror, offers us the language to help define ourselves. Several characters have multiple conversations about sexuality (including more than one about asexuality). As someone who identifies as asexual and so very rarely sees myself mirrored accurately or at all in literature, I found myself amazed. The "coming out" conversation between Dev and Charlie? Incredible. Coming out anytime is fine; never coming out is fine. Age doesn't matter because sexuality is a spectrum. I hope someone somewhere finds this book, reads it, and discovers the language they need to identify themselves.

I will say it took me a while to get into this book based solely on my prejudice for love-themed reality shows. Other books have left me disappointed in the past; I'm also not a fan of The Bachelor(ette). So why did I pick this up? Because I hoped it would flip the script and rewrite my appreciation for love stories.

And man did it deliver.

The Charm Offensive, by Alison Cochrun, is exactly what it says -- charming. This book is fun and flirty, making me laugh out loud and audibly "aww" on more than one occasion. It also tackles some very heavy issues, including OCD, anxiety, depression, and other mental health issues with grace and deftness. The characters are fully fleshed out, even down to the smallest side characters, and to say there is great representation is way underselling it -- this book is full of queer people of color living full and entirely realized lives.

If you loved Boyfriend Material and Red, White & Royal Blue, then The Charm Offensive is sure to be your next favorite.

Thanks to NetGalley and Atria Books for giving me an ARC in exchange for an honest review!