This one was a lovely read. I really enjoyed reading this one. I just love this kind of books.
4 stars read for me

The Heart of the Deal had an enticing premise: fall in love now <at the age of 25> to be married by 30 and having kids. Rae's got high standards and her best friends, the Sparkettes, are vowed to keep her to them. Will Rae be able to find a true love and have magical love with an online source? Or is the heart of the deal right in front of her?

MacMillian had a promising idea and touching characters. However; I was unable to click with her characters and follow the author's writing style.

As a woman who's currently trudging through her twenties without a clue as to what I'm actually doing, MacMillan's THE HEART OF THE DEAL really resonated with me. It's an excellent commentary on modern romance and the importance of female friendships!

I received this book as an ARC from NetGalley.

Rae is a Wall Street banker who is single in NYC and at age 25, trying to meet two goals - professional and personal. She wants to climb the corporate ladder in a male dominated world where there were no women of power in her office. She also wants love, marriage, and kids. At her 25th birthday party, she maps out at what age to meet those romantic goals. On a whim, or let's face it, forced onto her by her 3 BFF's, Rae enters the dating scene via an online app.

The app brings several one-time only dates into Rae's life, then there is Dustin. He is also in finance and when she talks to him in her banker terms, he can keep up. Rae falls for Dustin, but he comes and goes out of her life and it really confuses her. Eventually he is honest with her - he struggles with depression. Through the years they come and go together, Rae sticks by his side until she can no longer and makes a major life change.

The Heart of the Deal is a great read - the characters are easy to identify with. I had trouble putting down this book as I needed to see what happened at each birthday - I HAD to know.

This book was great! The characters, writing were lovely. I struggled putting this book down cause thats how good it was. The platonic love has my heart, this book is everything!

This isn't a romance novel, although it does have romance. It is a novel of adult life. A story of a woman, Rae, working in a job that she's good at, but doesn't love. She's also looking for love, someone to connect with in a deeper way. The book covers five years of Rae's life from 25 to 30, and we see her grow, learn, and make difficult choices.
She's old school and doesn't have a lot of faith in online dating apps, but her friends convince her to give it a go for a while, and help her write a profile. Her roommate Ellen found her boyfriend this way and believes that she can too.
Rae is a data analyst in an investment firm, and her work is good as she truly understands the numbers she works with, but this isn't what she thought her life would be. She wants to be a poet, but doesn't know how to do that and still make a living. She also wants to start a family by her early thirties, but the lack of a man in her life doesn't make that look likely soon.
So, as she tries dating with some of the men she meets online, she eventually meets Dustin, a man in the same industry who also has a poetical interest in life and who she can really talk to. It becomes clear early in their relationship that Dustin has struggles with depression, and this aspect to the novel takes it to another level. As Rae navigates her inner feelings and dreams and tries to make them real, she also sees Dustin as he really is, a flawed human being like herself, with his own issues.
This book had a depth that I really appreciated and that made it impossible not to care about these characters.
A great read.

tried to love it but it's really not a rom-com and i found the writing style really dense and overly descriptive that slowed down my reading and over all enjoyment of the book.

I didn't enjoy how Dustin took advantage of Rae and took her from granted even with his depression.

The ending felt flat and underwhelming after forcing myself to finish the book.

Overall, just wasn't the book for me i wanted to read a witty rom com like the blurb promised and instead got a contemporary (dramaish) fiction.

Thank you to Netgalley for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

THE HEART OF THE DEAL
BY
LINDSAY MACMILLAN.

The story begins as Rae turns 25 and follows her journey to her 30th birthday.
Rae has a blossoming career, but can she find a way to have it all? She wants to find love and she can’t ignore the very loud ticking of her biological clock.
When Rae meets Dustin through a dating app, he seems like her perfect match. However he has his own demons to battle.
Where will Rae be by her 30th birthday?

This book is by no means a light read. There are some heavy subjects dealt with. As a reader I did feel like i’d been through an emotional spin cycle by the end of the book.

The story is very well written and has great depth. There are some complex and endearing characters.
Overall, this is an enjoyable and emotional read.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Out now in all formats.

With thanks to Netgalley and Alcove Press for a digital arc of this title.

This was such a beautiful and winding story. As a person in their mid-20s such a hopeful and beautiful yet realistic outlook on life. The main character is so perfectly realistic and relatable and I loved how her relationships/friendships were described. Going through life is hard, but stories like this help us to remember how beautiful it all is.

TW: depression, self-harm, and toxic relationship

First, may I say that this book may not be for everyone, and it could be triggering for someone, especially since this book has a self-harm scene in it.

I really want to enjoy this book mostly because of the cover and it is labeled as ‘chick-lit romance’ but it is much more than that. So, these are some things that I don’t like in this book:

- I don’t know what the author trying to make with Rae constantly switching between Stu and Dustin. It’s frustrating for me.
- The whole Dustin and Rae relationship is toxic. I wish we could see more of why Rae kept trying to ‘fix’ Dustin. Like it’s impossible if he doesn’t want to be fixed! He is the only person who can help himself. Dustin keeps pushing her and her happiness away, and I think that’s definitely not good for a relationship.
- The ending? I know that it’s an open ending, but God why Dustin…

I feel like if The Heart of the Deal was labeled not as Romance and Chick-lit I would understand it and not expect more sweet and fluffy romance. But anyway, for a debut novel that brings up a hard topic (depression) I think the author did a good job! I really enjoy the whole finance topic in this book.

I really enjoyed the message that Lindsay MacMillan and the relationship between Rae and Dustin. MacMillan did a great job and I will be reading more in the future.

I read in the blurb on Amazon that this book was "moving, funny, and timely". This is not funny at all and, at times, quite a heavy read.
Rae is in love with love and has a plan for her life. On her 25th birthday, her plan is at the point where it has to be initiated in order for her life to go where she has dreamed it to be. Meeting "the one" is imperative. A dating app algorithm puts Dustin in her sights and it seems like her destiny is unfolding.
Lindsay's writing is heartbreakingly sad. Its relatability for me was unanticipated and I was not in the right headspace without the balance of humor I thought I would be getting. It put me more in mind of The Moment I Met You or Always in December - both books I loved - but going into both, I was better prepared for the levity. So, I would recommend to other readers in that vein.
Thank you to Alcove Press and NetGalley for the advanced copy. All thoughts in this review are my own.

This isn’t your typical light and fluffy romance, it’s about mental health and finding what you want out of life. Rae just turned 25. She’s single, lives in NYC with her best friends and works on Wall Street. She has a timeline that by thirty she wants to be married. She starts using a dating app and finds Dustin. She thinks Dustin could be the one but he struggles with depression. Rae isn’t sure she can be the person Dustin needs. Will Rae be able to meet her goal of being married by thirty?

This is a slow burn book with every little romance. It’s more about Rae learning that she can’t “fix” Dustin and his mental illness and that she needs to let things happen more organically and not worry about her timeline. I actually didn’t like Rae and Dustin’s relationship. I thought it was very unhealthy (both for Rae and Dustin) and I wasn’t rooting for them to be together. I did think that the author did a great job portraying someone with depression, it was very realistic. I also loved Rae’s group of friends and how supportive they were. Overall it was an ok read.

A huge thank you to the publiser and NetGalley for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

This book was so amazing. It was so real. There was some very dark parts, but it was so so real. This is not your average rom com… at all. And I absolutely adored it.
The growth we see in the characters is so fun to read about. They are very relatable.
I didn’t see the ending coming, and I’m so happy with how Rae turned out and the hard decisions she chose, even if it meant not having her marriage and love goals met by 30.
I do wish her relationship with Dustin had more detail in the beginning because it was hard for me to see how she liked him so much, but maybe that was the point??
Overall, great story.

I really wanted to love this one, but unfortunately it fell flat for me. I didn't love the MCs relationship, and didn't find this story gives me the type of escape I crave from romance books.

This is a new to me author and I just loved the cover. When I read the blurb I just had to send a request to read it.

It ticked all my boxes what I was wanting and I'll definitely be reading more from this author in the future

This was a great book to show everyone that life isn't a fairytale and success can look differently in everyone's lives.

I honestly thought this is gonna be another boring, cringey, OA bickering, romance that we have in here. But I’m definitely wrong. 🥹 Reading this is like a little bit of rollercoaster ride in my emotions, Ahhh, I cant put my emotions into words. But I suggest you read this book without reading the synopsis first! Also, additional points for the cute pink cover!

This book wasn't a romance book I enjoyed. When I read romance I look for an escape, not something that bogs me down with heavy topics one after another. Unfortunately this book wasn't for me.

All that glitters...
Not your typical fuzzy rom com but I can appreciate the honesty it leaves in it's path.
Being an adult is harder than it looks at times and with this story we get a glimpse of Rae's life - the good along with the bad. Not always fun, but not a downer either. A thoughtful and honest look into what is and what will or could be.
Thanks Netgalley for the copy in exchange for my honest opinion.