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.

This book gave me the same vibes of watching a Hallmark movie with a glass of wine. With that being said, it unfortunately missed the mark for me. I did not like the main characters or their relationship. It seemed like every chapter alternated between a date and Rae talking about the date with her friends. I think if there was more depth to the characters or the plot, I may have enjoyed it more.

Thank you so much to Alcove Press and NetGalley for this arc in exchange for my honest review!

The Heart of the Deal by Lindsay MacMillan is a sweet romance with some light humor and finding yourself. A well-written story with intriguing characters.

This was so cute. It almost reminded me of gossip girl kind of, I am not sure exactly why but probably because it was in new york city. I give this one a 4.5 stars!

With Rae's Wall Street banking job consuming so much of her time, it seems she's put dating on the back burner. But no longer. She's aware she's on a deadline and plans to be married by the age of thirty in order to have children before she's "too old". Signing up on dating apps, Rae finds herself meeting Dustin. But is Dustin her happy ever after? And when Dustin confides in her that he struggles with depression, Rae's life plan suddenly does not look as set as she had hoped.

Have you ever felt conflicted about a book? That's me with this one. I really enjoyed the story and while the depression angle was incredibly well written, I did not particularly like either of the main characters. The ending was unexpected for me and it felt a little too abrupt. The writing style was amazing though and I am genuinely looking forward to reading more by this author.

This book was read thanks to NetGalley.


It's a romance book, but that's not what i want to highlight, i want to highlight the conversation that we are starting to have about how many of our identities as women is linked to roles society expects from us, being mothers, and the author in a way, takes us in this journey of our protagonist in her 30s feeling the pressure to get married and have children.

The journey our protagonist goes is one that is worth discover on its own without any spoilers, so if you want to please, give this book a chance, is definitely one of a kind.

Wow! There's so much to unpack here. This author is definitely something special as is this book.

First of all, I'm in my mid fifties. I know it doesn't sound like the book would resonate with me but it does. I clearly remember my twenties and working crazy hours in corporate America as an accountant for a large retailer. Even though I was married, finding time to prioritize my own life outside of work was challenging. Much more so than for my male counterparts. This book was such an accurate depiction of feeling forced to schedule everything in your life....including relationships. I can remember often thinking how unfair it was that men never had to worry about their fertility clock ticking the way women did.. So when that comes up in the book, I all but stood up and cheered.

Rae is the main character and she's real and relatable. She's a woman turning twenty five when we first meet her. She has a time table in her head for how she wants everything to go down. She knows she wants three kids, so she's done the math and figured out when she needs to meet her future husband so that she can squeeze everything in. Rae uses her financial and practical mind to apply a rational approach to love. It just makes sense until she starts using the dating apps and finds that men in the dating pool aren't the greatest. Eventually she meets Dustin who initially seems wonderful. As time progresses, you discover he suffers from severe depression. Even though I completely empathize with his character for what he was experiencing, there are a lot of things that infuriated me too. Unfortunately for Rae, she's completely head over heels for Dustin and convinced that she can help him recover and believes they'll still make it down the aisle and to her dream of a happy family.

I see a lot of myself in Rae. She's a fixer like many women. We see a problem and immediately start looking for solutions. We research it and come up with new approaches to tackle the old problem. Rae takes Dustin's depression on this way. She tackles it like she would a project at work. The problem is that Dustin isn't always receptive to being "fixed." Eventually, Rae will have to acknowledge that she only has so much power over him.

Meanwhile, her best friend, Ellen is madly in love and moving forward with her life. Even though Rae is happy for her, it's hard not to be a little saddened that everything seems to be going her way when it isn't for Rae. In addition, Rae busts her tail at work to get phenomenal reviews but isn't always rewarded the way she should be....mostly because of the good old boys system. In her heart of hearts, Rae wants to write poetry but she's found that her struggles in life are draining her of her creative juices.

As the story progresses, you also discover that Rae has a very dysfunctional relationship with her father. He left her mother when she was twelve and remarried. He and his new wife have twin girls that he showers all of his attention on now. Rae resents that he seems to have moved on from her and replaced her. It's a wound that impacts many facets of her life.

This is just an outstanding book. I'm not sure what else I can say. Oh....I can say that the prose is amazing. Ms. MacMillan's descriptive abilities are wonderful. It makes reading the book an experience for the senses.

I will admit that at times it is a difficult read because you are emotionally tired for Rae. You can see her making decisions that you know she'll regret, but that's life isn't it? We've all been there and done things we later regretted. That's how you learn. If you are subject to triggers, then please be cautious, there is mental illness and some discussion of suicide in this book.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC. I voluntarily chose to read and review it and the opinions contained within are my own.