I really enjoyed this spicy book! The characters are memorable and the chemistry between them was fantastic!

A beautiful and sinfully steamy romcom full of moments worth fanning yourself just a lil while you're reading, plus a believable character arc for both leads and a heaping helping of family, sass, and utter perfection.

Cute read but didn’t really keep my attention. I did like the saucy/grumpy heroine! I think I’m just falling out of love with the contemporary romance genre.

After Hours on Milagro Street is a romance following Alejandra (Alex), a bold Mexican American woman moving back home to Kansas to help run her grandmother's bar. Alex is considered the "best bitch in bartending" in Chicago, but when she gets fired, she goes back to Kansas with a dream to turn her grandmother's bar into a thriving business. When Alex gets to Kansas, she meets Jeremiah, a professor at the elite university in town who is living above the bar. Alex is instantly weary of this stranger, but when Alex's old enemy threatens to take Alex's grandmother's bar and a majority of the neighborhood on top of that, Alex and Jeremiah must dive into the history of the community and its secrets to save the neighborhood.

After Hours on Milagro Street is about identity, family, and history. I loved these aspects of the novel. Alex's family is complicated, but it shows the real dynamics of a big community of people who care for one another. As Alex and Jeremiah uncover the history of Milagro street, they uncover the real history of Mexican American families and how they come to populate places like the setting of the novel. Alex and Jeremiah's romance was alright. Overall, this was a novel that was romantic and that explored important ideas, but it took me a while to get through. You start to understand Alex and her approach to people and ideas as the novel goes on, but she is characterized in a way that made her a little hard to like at first. This is especially the case when it came to how she treated her family, but also how she chose to help and protect them. She is quite stubborn and domineering. As I said, you start to understand her more as the novel goes on, but I spent a lot of the novel not knowing how I felt about her.

I would recommend this to anyone who likes romance. If a strong-willed, confident heroine and a soft, sweet hero sounds like your kind of romance couple, you will really enjoy this! I would also recommend this to people who like books that heavily incorporate family and history.

Fantastic contemporary romance that dishes out Mexican-American history & culture with some light paranormal elements. Plus some scorching hot sex scenes. The book literally starts with a bang! It also edges on a grumpy/sunshine dynamic, but it might be more accurate to say it's a badass strong woman/exuberant puppy (yet still sexy) vibe. I can't believe I waited so long to read this. It's truly fab!

Saved this one for an emergency and boy am I glad I did - 4.5 stars rounded up! High heat. high emotions, ghosts, an attempt to found a museum, labor history, a cinnamon roll hero who's just so into the heroine, That Scene Through The Wall -- this book was made for me. Incredible, cannot wait for the next one.

One of my favorite contemporary novels of this year. I have gone through a pat of not enjoying romance (I love the warm fuzzy feeling they give me!) but After Hours on Milagro Street really got me out of that slump! I loved Alex and Jeremiah's relationship and the book gave me some really laugh-out-loud moments (sorry to the strangers I scared on the train by randomly snort laughing!).

Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for granting me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book.

This book was fun and readable. I appreciated the main character's strengths and the face that she wasn't just another blonde waif. It was pretty spicy right from the jump, which is good to know before recommending it to others. I think that it balanced the fun and spiciness with an interesting cast of characters and problems that felt genuinely important within the novel. I would recommend this to lovers of spicy contemporary romance, comparable to Jasmine Guillroy.

A charming, sweet contemporary. I liked it a lot. I read it so long ago that I don't actually remember anything about it though.

I loved the family, the history, the two leads had good chemistry and some real discussion around gentrification was appreciated!

I really struggled with this book at the beginning, and I think that if I hadn’t switched to the audiobook, I likely would have DNF’ed. However, I am incredibly glad I didn’t! After Hours on Milagro Street is full of emotion, sexy as hell, and I loved how steeped in family and Mexican culture it was.

I really struggled to connect with Alex, but as she started to open up and I began to understand the motive behind her actions, I was able to appreciate her character a lot more. She loves fiercely and I especially loved how she sank into her feelings for Jeremiah.

Jeremiah is a star. I loved how open he was with Alex, and the harder, more honest conversations between the two of them were such a highlight.

Another highlight has to be the steamy scenes. Whooo boy, Professor Jeremiah has a mouth on him and I was all for it. He WORSHIPS Alex and it was sexy as hell.

The audiobook narration wasn’t my favourite (I would have loved two narrators here!), but it definitely helped me get into the story!

I wish I would have known this was an Insta lust/love type of book. Those just aren’t my favorite. Really interesting plot so if that trope doesn’t bother a reader might be worth checking out.

This was cute, but not one of my fav romances. I liked the MC enough but the romance fell a little flat for me. Enjoyable, but ultimately not super memorable.

This book broke me down and built me back up, really looking forward to more from Lopez in the future.

This book has it all: simmering, sparks-flying tension, enemies competing to buy a beloved-but-dilapidated family bar, a fresh, much-needed take on Midwestern history that looks at small towns and their Mexican American heritage, and a steal-the-Declaration-of-Independence type plot with all the historical snooping and scheming but aimed at beating a racist good-for-nothing to a mysterious, missing deed. IT IS AS AMAZING AS IT SOUNDS.

Let me be honest, this book sets the bar WAY too high for all other books I'll read in 2023, and I'm not mad at it. In this contemporary romance that manages to pack in emotions and personal growth alongside an exciting plot that raises a glass to family and community, Alex moves home after quitting her bartending job in Chicago in a towering fury. She didn't want to come home to Freedom, Kansas after 13 years, not after the way she left, but her best path forward is to team up with her sisters and rescue the family's bar. A community hub for the tightly-bonded Mexican Americans in town, Loretta's is in danger of being lost forever. The eponymous Loretta is recovering from a fall, deep in debt, and considering selling the family property. But Alex is determined to show everyone that her sweeping plans for the bar can keep it alive. Unfortunately, the attractive, mild-mannered professor living as a tenant above the bar has other ideas. Dr. Jeremiah Post has teamed up with Alex's cousin, Joe, to propose turning the bar into a museum celebrating the east side's traquero heritage. Shots are fired between Alex and Jeremiah as they compete for their opposing plans... right up until a third contender reveals himself as their worst enemy. It becomes a race against the clock as Alex and Jeremiah pursue an unlikely alliance to put a stop to the development company's underhanded attempt to track down a secretive second deed to the bar. In the process, they'll uncover local history, crawl through a hidden bootlegger's lair, and discover hidden treasure (and not something corny like love but like actual, real treasure... though they definitely find love, too because THEY DESERVE IT).

Humans, I am obsessed with this book. The romance pacing is sublime. There's the perfect balance between fights and apologies, talking dirty and seeking consent, making big declarations and savoring little moments (who knew helping someone remove their earrings could be so ~swoony~). There's amazing forced proximity and an inconvenient pact to keep their hands off each other while they focus on their crucial mission together. I was in Alex and Jeremiah's corner the entire time, even when they weren't. When the big emotions come out to play, the tender care they offer one another when they need it most is to die for. And their mutual excitement about tracking down dusty documents and uncovering an obscured part of real history adds a texture and depth that elevates their story to a whole new level.

Speaking of which, I LOVED learning about the Midwest in a new light, looking past the vision of white small towns portrayed in history classes and in an entire genre of romance novels. Through Alex, the book confronts racism head-on, and her unapologetic brand of fighting for what's right is freaking powerful. You can also catch her slam-dunking on sexism, unionizing to protect a co-worker, and calling out anti-abortion worms at various points. So be prepared to love her with your whole being. Meanwhile, Jeremiah is the king of gooey cinnamon rolls. And also unrepentant about who he is (a common theme). Some of his more romantic lines had me squealing with delight, and his bedroom talk is incendiary. He gets a rare book boyfriend 10/10 rating from me, and Alex deserves nothing less.

If I haven't yet managed to convince you to pick this up (how??? Why????), know there is also a ghost. I give this book a million and five stars. Thank you to Carina Press for my copy to read and review! I will head back to Freedom at the nearest opportunity.

This was a great enemies to lovers read, mixed with paranormal activity and we have a fun read. Though Alex and Jeremiah have different ideas of Loretta's, her grandmother's bar, they agree that they did not want Loretta in the wrong hands, someone who would tear it down for fancy buildings. So they work together to save it from the wrong hands.

Alex and Jeremiah were so different, that I can't believe how great the chemistry was on paper. Alex is passionate about her history and her community and you can't help but root for her.

I loved everything. I want more small town in Kansas romances with interesting history lessons and ghosts and huge annoying but loving families and all of it!

I started this book July 25th and didn’t finish it until November 30th. I have never kept reading a book for four months but I just wasn’t willing to DNF this one. I wanted to know how it ended and so many people seemed to love it that I felt like I was missing something. I thought, maybe now wasn’t the right time but 4 months later and I guess this books just wasn’t for me.

In theory the romance, learning about a large family and their history, going on a journey with the MC as she navigates trauma within her family and a history of racism in her town, and solving a mystery with supernatural like elements is a recipe for an intriguing story. It did have its moments and the last few chapters really hit me in my feelings, especially with her family. I appreciated Alex’s strong will and commitment to protecting herself from the things that have harmed her but it was really tough reading through some of her interactions and cruel comments. She really knew how to deliver an emotional punch to people.

There was a lot going on inside the characters, among the family and within the town to unpack and as much as I wanted to I just found it really hard to stay present and everything somehow still felt too slow for me. As I finished the book I could see why people may love it so. I’m glad I stuck it through as I really needed those final chapters to tie up my feelings about it all but in the end it wasn’t the book for me.

Opposites attract, small town romance featuring an unlikeable heroine (at first) and an affection-starved academic. These two characters both feel so much, and have both been rejected, resulting in some strong defenses. Watching them learn to see each other, and be vulnerable, is wonderful.

Throw in some mystery and light paranormal action, add in a ton of light being cast on injustice, particularly of the systemic racism variety. You get a compelling, emotional (I cried a lot in third act), and super 🥵 romance.

Thanks to Bonkers Romance and the publisher for an eARC.