My Summary
A feel good read! I really enjoyed this book. My first arc and it felt awesome because I'm a big fan of Jayci Lee. The story if two best friends falling in love. Lizzy and Jack two bestfriends had no idea her taking vacation is his home town would lead to them falling in love. What makes this book even better was the fact that most of the scenes took place in a bookstore. This book is a must read! A steamy, spicy, fall hopelessly in love rom com.

⚜Likes/Dislikes

📚I love books about books and a love story of two bestfriends never gets old.

⚜Dislikes

📚None

⚜Favorite/Least Favorite Part

📚My Favorite part was when Lizzy decided that her and Jack had something deeper that they should explore. I also loved her purchasing the bookstore because that's a dream of mines someday.

📚My Least Favorite part was when they both acted like they weren't in love yet.

⚜Can everyone read this book?

📚Yes!

⚜Would I recommend?

📚Absolutely! A must read!

Just Read Stars
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Thank you NetGalley, St. Martin’s Press, and Jayci Lee for an arc of this book in exchange for an honest review! When I requested it I didn’t know that it was the third book in a series, but I’m glad that it can be read as a standalone. It follows Jack and Lizzy, childhood best friends, as they reunite. This was such a cute concept and I love the cover, but the actual story was hard for me to get into, which could just be a personal issue! I think there could have been a few things done differently, such as including more backstory, but it’s still a cute read. I’m rating it three stars because while it was fun, it wasn’t my favorite.

thank you St Martin's Press and netgalley for the eARC.

<i>booked on a feeling</i> follows a classic friends-to-lovers romance plotline between lizzy, a burnt-out attorney at law, and her long time best friend, jack. she gets panicky after one of the biggest events of her career, and turns back to jack's town for a three week break. cue them falling in love.

i don't quite know how to go about this review, so let me just start by saying i <i>desperately</i> wanted to dnf this book at about 30% in, and that's for a few reasons.

for starters, both characters lack depth. the author sets up this concept of each of them having their own struggles, but they're not fleshed out the way you want them to be, especially when its the focal point of their characterizations. lizzy's whole career path, which is a key part of this book, doesn't get concluded until the last 5% of the book. and even though you EXPECT that to be the conclusion, its written in a way that to me doesn't quite work. like yes she was happy working on the bookstore and that's talked about endlessly, but there were better ways to write that conclusion. jack's plotline is also so oddly written, it just seemed like the author was just looking for something to divide them and settled on giving him that career plot, especially seeing as his argument with his family & lizzy isn't even wrapped up. they just say they're happy for him and move on.

next, the romance. i don't even understand how jack and lizzy became friends. its alluded to that their families were friends, but her parents also moved away? and she somehow stayed there despite being a child? and yet the town jack's family lives in isn't her childhood town????? they NEVER touch on their childhoods or even their past friendship, its just pointed out that its SO important and that he LOVES her desperately and we're meant to believe it, which is an absolute fail to me considering the trope here is in fact friends to lovers--its needed to be far more established for that work, and that's what disappoints me most.

also in terms of the romance, the pacing just completely fell off for me. from the start it's established jack loves her, which is a trope i adore, but then lizzy's sort of interest in him wasn't well written. it starts off between them as physical interest but when it develops into actual emotions its just done in a way that misses the mark completely, at least to me. it feels rushed despite the book also feeling very long, but i chalk that up to the amount of unnecessary description we get.

even the i love you scene just felt flat to me, and that's disappointing. i was so excited for this book, but i finished it and just felt disappointment.

Went into this one with really high hopes but it was just okay for me. It did not immediately catch my attention so I didn't find myself wanting to pick it back up.

Booked on a Feeling is third in a series but can be read as a standalone. I was very excited to read this book and was really hoping I would enjoy it but it was just okay for me. It is a very sweet best-friends-to-lovers romance, but felt quite superficial to me. Jack and Lizzy already know everything about each other, we find out Jack is in love with Lizzy in the first chapters, and Lizzy basically the same. There isn’t really if any relationship development between the two of them other than avoiding and then exploring the sexual nature of their relationship. The major conflict between them is very clear from the beginning and is sort of just avoided until the end, which also just left a general feeling that there wasn’t quite enough here. I’m sure others will love this one but it left me wanting more. I enjoy Jaycee Lee’s writing and have enjoyed her other books but this one just wasn’t my favorite.

Lizzie Chung is a successful attorney on her way to make partner. Unfortunately the tough life of a lawyer on the partner track causes her to have a panic attack during her first trial appearance. She decides to take a leave of absence and visit her childhood friend Jack Park in the small town of Weldon.
Jack has secretly been in love with Lizzie for years and he's hoping that something might spark between them. Jack & Lizzie team up to help a struggling bookstore and it brings them closer together but will their inner anxieties and insecurities doom their relationship?
This was a really sweet romance that dealt with some serious topics. Lizzie has serious anxiety and both Lizzie and Jack struggle with what they truly want out of life. I enjoyed the bookstore aspects and the love of books that is woven throughout the story.
I haven't read the first two books but I'm definitely going back and reading those.

DNF. I loved all the representation of Korean culture and the voice of the two MCs, but I couldn't get past Jack's mopey pining over Lizzy and second guessing everything he was doing. The overall plot should have worked for me but I just wasn't a fan of the execution. It could be that I just don't like the friends-to-lovers trope but I suspect the corny situations worked against my immersion into the story.

Jack and Lizzy are childhood best friends who are reunited in adulthood - destined to become more.

The storyline was an adorable, bookish themed concept. I was so excited to read this one! I was given an ARC from NetGallery, and St. Martin's Press to review for them.

Lizzy is a burnt out lawyer who finds herself in the middle of a bookstore revamp in her hometown. During the time she is able to rekindle her friendship with Jack - who is a bookkeeper for his family's brewery. Slowly things turn into more. He has harbored a crush on her for many years, and wants to turn their friendship into a relationship.

This honestly was not for me. It felt a bit juvenile in the writing aspect. I feel this would be a good read for the pre-teen demographic. The angst didn't hit the mark for me, and there were childish things like over "giggling" at things the MMC did/said. I gave this a 3 star because the premise the story was based on truly drew me in. In the future I look forward to seeing the growth of this author!

Ahh I absolutely loved this. Lizzy and Jacka are both delightful with charming romantic tension is so charming. It gave me such happy feels, and was such a fun read. The story was fast-paced and it is never boring.Definitely a great recommended rom-com!

ARC kindly provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you NetGalley and St Martin's press for an advance copy of Booked on a Feeling to read and review.

I really wanted to love everything this book. It had such a cute premise, and I love a good friends to lovers trope.

I loved the main premise of a burned out corporate lawyer taking a vacation and helping to fix up a bookstore with her best friend. However, the characters of Lizzy and Jack simply fell flat. I didn't feel that they had much chemistry, and the romance seemed a bit juvenile. Lizzy giggles and Jack growls a lot. Also, the internal dialog for each of them sound more akin to a teenager's inner dialog than young, professional adults.

I also would have loved to understand more of Lizzy and Jack's backstory. Maybe if I we actually got to read more of how they got to know each other, the chemistry would have been better.

That all said, the book was still an enjoyable and quick read. The plot was cute, and the secondary characters were fun. Overall, I enjoyed the book and I would give the author another try.

A book about BOOKS!!!
Review to come, but this book was 500/5 stars.
Quite frankly, I would read Jayci Lee's grocery list after this masterpiece.

DNF at 32%

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review. The premise and copy drew me into this read but sadly I could not get through it. This reads as a YA & I felt like Lizzy seemed more like a teenager.

I think pre-teen readers will have an easier time enjoying this!

Jack and Lizzy are childhood best friends who are destined to be together. This is a story of how that happens.

What I enjoyed:
-The storyline of them fixing up the bookstore! I wish the book was 100% about this.
-The family relationships and friendships surrounding them. I was more interested in those relational dynamics than in the romantic relationship between Jack and Lizzy.

What I didn't enjoy:
-If Lizzy "giggled" at something one more time...
-There was no relational tension? I didn't love how we all knew from page one that they were both into each other? So it didn't feel like anything was on the line when they got together.

It's a classic friends-to-lovers, but it was just missing anything that made me feel invested in what happened to them.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the e-arc in exchange for my honest review.

I DNFed at 20%. I felt there wasn’t enough backstory to go with Jack’s “years of pining” and Lizzy’s anxiety read like it was from a psychology textbook, with coping strategies pulled directly from self help books and sounding just as stilted. The dialogue wasn’t how actual people speak, and internal monologue wasn’t how actual people think.

Booked on a Feeling is a feel-good romance that leaves the reader satisfied. This story deals with anxiety, parental pressure, and love. I loved that the love interest was LIzzie's best friend. One thing that I did wish this story had more of was tension. I think that it is good for the reader to want the main character to get with her love interest but don't get that satisfaction right away. I felt like Lizzie and Jack got together very fast and very early on in the story. I also wished that the reader felt the passage of time. One chapter began saying that it was months later, but it didn't feel like it was months later to the reader. One specific scene where I think symbolism would have been great was the dinner scene where Jack makes dinner with the Instapot. I think that would have been a great symbol for the pressure that has built up in both of the characters.I rated this book two stars and here is my scale on how I rate book:

1 star= good story
2 stars= good character development/arc
3 stars= social/political/religious commentary
4 stars= good world/setting building
5 stars= good writing (sentence structure and word usage)

Based on my scale, I felt that Booked on a Feeling was a good story and had a good commentary on parental pressure/anxiety. I think that this book was a good book and any reader who enjoys feel-good romances will be satisfied with this read.

Take a shot every time one of the characters "growls like a feral animal". You will be drunk by page 10.
Of course they are married and pregnant in the epilogue, is it not possible for a romance book to have any other ending? They have only been dating for a year but add a baby.
Here is the thing, for the first 50% of the book, it didn't seem Lizzie liked Jack as more than a friend at all. Even when she started lusting after him, it is always about how she wants to bone him and not about how she has feelings for her best friend.
Also lady, your parents live in Korea, you don't have to tell them you are taking 3 weeks off of work. Just saying.
And Jack...you are 30 years old...not 15 so maybe grow up a little?
Every interaction the two many characters had felt so forced and clunky and awkward. For people who are best friends, they sure act like they have just met.
If you can't tell, this was a hard no for me.

A cute romance novel with a happy ending (of course). Lily, a 30-year old attorney in Los Angeles at a prestigious, high-pressure firm, has just won her first lawsuit at trial, but doesn't feel the elation that she expected to feel. Her helicopter-mom had pressured her into a career in the law, and she's starting to question whether it's really what she wants. She decides to take 3 weeks off and return to the small town 4 hours away in the Sierras where she was raised and her best friend, Jack, still lives. Jack works in the family business, a popular and successful brewpub, with his brother and sister-in-law but feels unfulfilled. He and Lily have been best friends since they were 9 years old, but have remained safely in the "friend zone" - until she shows up and they spend more time together and sparks start to fly. In the typical romantic novel narrative arc, miscommunications and misunderstandings drive them apart and neither knows how they'll breach this gap, but they know they have to because they can't stop thinking about each other.

Booked on a Feeling is an absolutely adorable continuation of this series. It was a heartfelt and fun read! Super lighthearted with minimal drama and an overall feel good story. I genuinely enjoyed Jack and Lizzy's love story. I appreciated the dual POV that allowed readers to get a peek into both characters' minds. Jack was swoon worthy :)

Can't wait to see where the series continues!

I could not stop thinking about this book. While I was at work I counting down the hours until I could be reunited with it to find out what happened next. This book is the classic friends to lovers tale, mixed in with one of my favorite things- an independent bookstore. I loved the Korean culture/pride mixed into the book. Many of the meal descriptions left me researching them because they sounded so intriguing. If you are ready for a new romance read, pick this one up!

Childhood best friends, Lizzy Chung and Jack Park are finally about to take the next step. Throw in a failing bookstore, a family brewery, checklists, delicious food, and most of all, learning how to take the next step and following your dreams. Lizzy Chung is an overachiever, she is aiming to get partner at her law firm and is well on her way to doing so, only she’s not happy, her anxiety attacks are getting worse and her job makes her feel lonely and suffocated. The only solace she has is her best friend Jack who lives far away who visits her and a cute bookstore she visits. When she passes out from a panic attack during a pivotal moment in her career she ends up driving to Weldon for three weeks to recover, Weldon the home of her best friend Jack. Jack Park is a bookkeeper at his family’s brewery and has been in love with Lizzy since he was 10 years old. They have been friends since forever and he feels like he wants to not only take the next step in his relationship with Lizzy but he wants to make a change in his career and branch out, but that means telling his family he wants to leave his job with him. Jack is in for a surprise when Lizzy suddenly shows up and now he can’t keep his feelings in check, especially when he now gets to spend three weeks with his dream girl. Jack and Lizzy have to now deal with the first steps of going from best friends to lovers but can they make it work or is their friendship too precious? Lizzy wants nothing more to take the next step but Jack is afraid that they’ll ruin their friendship and wants to take a slower steadier pace, yet the more time they spend together the less they can resist. Lizzy ends up taking up residence in a living space on top of a failing bookstore and ends up helping it get back in business, and discovers that maybe there is something else she wants to do. Both Jack and Lizzy are working to not only find their career paths but their place in each other lives as they take the next step. This was a cute read and the romance between them was really sweet.

*Thanks Netgalley and St. Martin's Press, St. Martin's Griffin for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*