Chasing Your Tail is a second-chance romance full of cats, coffee, and will-they or won't-they hijinks.

Lindsay is a journalist and reviewer for Eat Out New York, a fancy magazine detailing all the hottest places to eat in New York City. When her boss gives her an assignment that pushes her right back into the orbit of her ex - a baker now working at a successful cat cafe, Lindsay can't ignore the old feelings coming to the surface.

Unfortunately, this book had a lot of issues from the start. I had trouble reading it as my preferred reading method is with Adobe Digital Editions, but it was only available via Kindle or the NetGalley shelf app. Once I realized I had to read the entire book on my phone, I found it hard to pick up, and then even more difficult to get into as it's the third in a series. I had no idea this book was a part of a series (The Whitman Street Series by Kate McMurray) and I feel like that really impacted my ability to connect to the characters. I didn't like Lindsay as a main character at all, I found her hard to relate to and very childish in some of her actions. Around chapter three was when I realized this book wasn't for me when the line, "it seemed like the review was starting to go viral" popped up. I can't stand the trope of unknowing virality with no understanding of social media.

I ended up not finishing this book. Had I known it was part of a series, I would have been deterred from requesting it. But as it stands I didn't connect to the writing or the characters and couldn't finish it.

Thank you to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Casablanca for providing me with a copy for an honest review.

So cute! I was in the market for something light and easier to get into and this gave me just that. Would definitely recommend if you’re in the market for a sweet romance!

Chasing Your Tail follows Lindsay and Brad, exes that have been pushed back together by a cat cafe.

I loved the premise, how couldn't you when it's about a cat cafe! Unfortunately, the story itself is very repetitive, filled with 'will they, won't they' over and over again.

Lindsay's trust issues were next level, to the point of overdone. Brad stopped only just short of licking Lindsay's shoes and begging to get her back. Again, I loved the idea of the book but I do think it could've cut out a lot of the repetitive conversations about trust, history and whether they'll work again in the future.

Two exes reunite years later when he is hired to work at the Whitman Street Cat Cafe that her friend owns, can they clear up the misunderstandings and give each other a second chance at romance or will the old hurts ruin it all. Lindsay Somers broke up with her boyfriend Brad Marks when they were in culinary school when she walked in on him kissing another girl. Lindsay has extreme trust issues so when she catches him its over, she cuts him out of her life without so much as another word and now he is back in her life. Brad Marks is a famous chef now and when he lands the job opportunity of a lifetime he takes it up... and it just so happens to be connected to the girl that got away and he takes it as a sign that he should win her back or at least let him explain to her what actually happened the day they broke up. Brad loved, is still in love with Lindsay, but when his friend kisses him out of nowhere and Lindsay just dumps him he is at a lost, now he wants to explain to her that he still loves her, except she absolutely loathes him. Even when he explains what happened the true issue is that Lindsay doesn’t trust him, she reasons that if they didn’t work out the first time why should they give it a second chance? Brad wants her back in his life but he can only bend over back for so long and he can’t do anything about her trust issues especially since no matter what he says or tells her, it won’t change the fact that she has to want to open herself up to him again. I’ll say this, Lindsay’s trust issues were extreme and so was her jealousy, I absolutely understand her anger, I would be angry too but the fact that neither she nor Brad really grew or changed made the romance unlikable. Lindsay is extremely jealous when Brad flirts with other people, but he isn’t really flirting and just being nice and talking to people... and honestly I was hoping they didn’t end up together but rather, Lindsay just worked on her trust issues and grew. I just didn’t enjoy this “second chance” romance despite it having all the markers of being a story I would like: cats, pastries, fun friend group, etc... Overall it just didn’t work for me but if you enjoy slow SLOW burn romance then give it a go.

*Thanks Netgalley and SOURCEBOOKS Casablanca, Sourcebooks Casablanca for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

"Chasing Your Tail" is a novel with a terribly annoying main character. Lindsay, a few years after breaking up with Brad, learns that he is going to work at a coffee shop owned by her friends. Brad tries to convince her to give him a second chance, but Lindsay can't make up her mind.

I was hoping that I would like this book. There are cats and food in it, which is all that is good. Unfortunately, I couldn't enjoy the book because Lindsay was terribly annoying. I cannot count the number of times I have wanted to quit this book.

I do not recommend this story to you. Unless you like annoying heroines 😂😂 Take the time to read something better.

I almost DNF'ed this book, but felt like I needed to finish it. I wish I had just stopped reading it because it did not get any better for me

I was a dummy and didn’t realize that this book was the 3rd one, and I haven’t read the other 2. But that did not take away from this story. I LOVED this book 🥰
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It was witty and adorable. I mean come on. Cats? Baked goods? Throw a baby in there every once in a while, and what more can you ask for?
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The writing and characters were fantastic and you better believe I’m going to back track and go read the first 2 books now!

Thank you to Kate McMurray, SOURCEBOOKS Casablanca, and NetGalley for an eARC in exchange for an honest review. Chasing Your Tail comes out December 6, 2022.

Chasing Your Tail is a second chance romance novel, about two people who dated in college and due to a misunderstanding broke up. The misunderstanding centered around the FMC, Lindsey, believing that MMC, Brad, cheated on her with a fellow culinary student. They are reunited five years later, and both struggle to determine if they want to get back together. Honestly that was one of my biggest hang ups about this book, the back and forth that the characters went through was just frustrating. I felt like they were having the same conversation over and over again. Even at the end I truly did not feel comfortable that they were actually together. I was hoping that in the middle we would get a clear decision about them wanting to be together and unfortunately that didn't happen. I thought this was a very cute concept, and it was an easy read.

The beginning was promising with the history between the characters and the world of cuisine, not to mention the cozy coffee atmosphere.
Unfortunately, the trust issue between the two characters is too repetitive and constantly questioned, which is not a good basis for a relationship in real or fictitious.

When pastry chef extraordinaire Brad decides to take a job at the Whitman Street Cat Cafe, he is thrilled to be able to have complete control over what he created. He's also secretly hoping for several glimpses of his ex, Lindsey-- since he's still not over how things ended between them. Lindsey on the other hand wants nothing to do with Brad, at least that's what she is telling herself. Until Lindsey is handed her latest assignment to get an in-depth interview with Whitman's amazing new chef. Through a series of second chances (relationship and career) Brad and Lindsey wonder if they can rekindle friendship or if their feelings past and present were enough for a happily ever after.

This book had a lot of things that called to me when I pick up a rom-com, second chances, forced proximity, quirky setting, and of course, food. Unfortunately, it fell flat. I felt like the characters were whiny and there wasn't enough character development to warrant a happy ending. At times, I thought Lindsey was annoying and dramatic for no reason or that Brad built up to these big relationship things and they just deflated. They also dip into some of the career goals of the characters and once again, I thought there wasn't enough work there either. That these things were just being handed out.

This wasn't something for me but I'm sure others would enjoy it.

Thank you to Sourcebooks Casablanca and Net Galley for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This story was fine, but unfortunately it wasn’t anything special. I tend to struggle with second chance love stories like this one where SO MUCH time has passed before they reconnect. I struggled believing the chemistry between the two MCs, and they spent so much time going in circles and talking around each other, I struggled with the relationship.

Like I said, it was generally fine. Well written and relatively cute. I just wasn’t really for me.


I was given an ARC by NetGalley and SOURCEBOOKS Casablanca. All opinions are my own.

While the premise of the book being a second chance romance was intriguing, the story became repetitive and struggled to develop. Understanding now that this is part of a series may explain the lack of character development, but that said, more time could have been spent developing the two main characters. The conversations between Lindsay and Brad about her reluctance to trust him and move forward with reconciling felt repetitive throughout with Lindsay talking in circles without any conclusion.

I wanted to like this book given the description and premise, but was overall it was just okay.

This is a difficult one to review! Because there's so much that I genuinely enjoyed and wanted more of:

♡ I loved the dialogue between friends, I love the whole community around the main characters, and the cat cafe was everything I wanted it to be!
♡ The pacing is really fun because all their friends already know they didn't get closure on their relationship and suggest that they meet, and actively make that happen, so it doesn't all have to be up to fate.
♡ Brad is charming and sweet and mature and wonderful —almost immediately one of my favourite book boyfriends. I wish I could have read more just because he's so lovely, and I wanted to much more for him.

As in... I wanted more for him than Lindsay. She is super frustrating and deeply annoying, even more so once you learn about why they broke up in college. ("You chose to believe the worst in me instead of letting me try to explain it myself," he tells her. And then she just KEEPS doing that. She held onto that nonsense for so long that it's who she is and she refuses to budge, even with this great man right in front of her, showing her the truth, and offering pure love. And it's wildly irritating because HE handles it so well. And her friends can see it, too. But she just won't. He's the one who shouldn't consider forgiving HER, and yet he's patient and open and willing to start again.

By the time I couldn't take it any more at 35% the whole second-chance why-did-they-break-up-can-it-be-fixed miscommunication is sorted out, And they've had sex. He's clarified twice and it's clear this was all on her. It's surprising (in terms of typical Romance novel pacing) that it's all happened by then —but it happens because he's mature and amazing. If she wasn't the worst, they could begin dating for real and it would feel magical, like a new wonderful relationship to spend time together and enjoy who they each became since college. But NO. Lindsay is somehow still stuck on this thing that he didn't even do???? It's soooo weird.

And here's the thing: I am so sure this is realistic representation. And I don't think this is gonna be a problem for everyone, because I'm sure a bunch of people will recognise in Lindsay their own friends (or they are the friends) who would still not forgive him for THEIR own mistake. But I simply could not be friends with her, or be around her at all for any longer. I wanted more for this lovely guy, and I genuinely would have wanted to spend more time with their friends and at the cat cafe but... no.

So if that kind of unnecessary angst (or a strange sense that the only reason she hasn't forgiven him is because it's too soon in the book to have Everything resolved) doesn't irritate you, or: If this is exactly the kind of narrative you need to feel seen by... go ahead. I do hope to come back to this sometime, because I liked him so much. I want to see if he brings the cat home! I want to see him put up art in his apartment! I want to know all about the new recipes he tries out! but... we'll have to see if I can push through the Lindsay of it all.

(Sidenotes: I also found it weird that she felt it would be "dramatic" to say tell her boss she used to date the chef he's assigned her to profile, instead of a necessary professional disclosure. She's a professional food critic??? And: This is probably an arc-formatting issue that will be resolved in the final copy, but it was difficult at times for me to follow when a flashback to college ended and when we were back in their present, because memories of their past conversations often happened in the middle of their present-tense conversations.)

Oh, here's a lovely moment to show how sweet and open-hearted he is: "See? This is what I miss. We used to just sit around for hours, talking about food and making each other laugh. And I knew you were the one when you laughed at my dumb jokes." Lindsay balked. The One? He shrugged, as if to say, you heard me."

Content warnings (which only cover the 35% I read) include: mention of terrible dad who bullies his baker son with rude, homophobic and transphobic comments about gender roles.

Unfortunately, I really didn’t love this book. I got about halfway through before I decided to quit. There really wasn’t anything spectacular about this book that I noticed. It seemed to be the same as any other romance book.

From what I read, it was just Brad trying to get Lindsay to forgive her and get her back. After he cheated on her. And she won’t forgive him. Which makes sense because I don’t think I would. She doesn’t want to hear him out but I also think that she was exaggerating.

And I was surprised about how much the book was about cats. I assumed there would be some mention of cats because of the whole premise of the book, in but almost every chapter there were pages of Brad deciding if he wanted to get a cat. And how he would pet the cat. It was odd.

In the end, I didn't finish it because it was boring and nothing stood out to me.

Thanks to NetGalley for providing an eAdvance Reader Copy in exchange for an honest review.

Let me start off saying I wanted to enjoy this book. I was hoping for a fun, light, palette-cleanse.

The cover alone, I was ready for RomCom central. That was not the case. I struggled through this. I had a different expectation. Some parts felt clunky and just didn't know how to continue so they different POV would happen. It was also weird how one of the many reasons the FMC told the MMC why she didn't want to be with him and her frustrations of them being together in the past was that he wouldn't talk to her about their future etc and then by the end of the book, they sorta discussed their future but ended up with (before the epilogue and finally chapter) that they just wanted to be happy, whatever that meant to them. Out of a 24 chapter book, they're still being frustrating in Chapter 23 and saying "i thought we'd gotten past that....not answering questions...etc." The couple was frustrating to read from the beginning.

Spice wise, it wasn't consistent. The first hookup between the FMC and MMC (Lindsey and Brad) was fine spice wise (may 1 chili pepper, but I acknowledge everyone's spice levels are different) and the rest are pretty much fade to black. I don't mind. Not every book needs to have spice. But typically books work up to the sizzle, not down to fizzle.

The book read young and is written young. I did go back to check the genre, which is romance, so I guess age range could be any indicator. Maybe 13+. but what do I know, Fanfics exist out there so age doesn't mean anything anymore.

I didn't realize this book was part of a series until I opened the ARC. That being said, I don't feel like I needed to read the other books to read this one.

Despite my own personal opinions I will say this. If you like slow burn (and by that I mean, you aren't getting really anything until 94% through), love the foodie/culinary experience, cats, and enjoy second-chance romance, this book is for you.

There are conversations about pertaining to toxic masculinity and homophobia/transphobia based on Brad recounting his father, but then it doesn't really seemed addressed, but said in passing. Just that "that's how his dad was."

GRAMMAR (these did not take me out of the reading completely, but I did have to go back and read a couple time.):
-I know this is an ARC, so grammar didn't through me off completely. There was one flashback that could've been helpful if italicized. The location on my iPad says 1465.
-Chapter 8: There's a part where Brad says: "I have good ideas occasionally." Lauren's head spun -- i think this is supposed to say Lindsay
-Chapter 11: There's a part where it says: or you can continue avoid him -- sentence missing "to"
-Chapter 24: There's a line that says: Lauren nodded. "I'm glad you could talk to me." -- I think this is supposed to say Lindsey

ARC REVIEW

⭐️⭐️

A cat cafe brings about a second chance at love.

🐈 Lindsay and Brad met and fell in love in culinary school. Their relationship didn’t end well at all but now, five years later Brad is the pastry chef at Lindsay’s best friend’s cat cafe.

🐈 This was a hard one for me!! I really enjoyed about 50% of this book. Lindsay was a great character who struggled with her feelings for Brad. He was also a great character who tried so hard to make things work with her. But after a while, the plot got repetitive and predictable. It left me wanting more.
However, if you are looking for a cute and quick romcom that has a few good 🔥🔥 scenes (even as early as 32%), then give it a try!

Thank you to the publisher and author for the ARC book in exchange for an honest review.

Lindsey and Brad had a serious relationship while they were both in culinary school, but catching him in a lip lock with Phoebe, another student, made Lindsey drop him like a hot scone. Now, he’s working as the pastry chef at the cat cafe she frequents. Brad swears Phoebe initiated the kiss and his heart always belonged to Lindsey. While she still loves Brad, she’s not sure she can trust him again.

The cats and the cat cafe backdrop make this series a must read for me. Second Chance isn’t my favorite romance trope, but Brad is shown to have changed. He is more future-focused and is ready to commit to Lindsey again. Lindsey, however, was problematic to me because despite Brad bending over backwards to win her back, including getting her a cool opportunity at the Food Network, she keeps pushing him away even though she never again suspects him of cheating.

The thing keeping them apart is only Lindsey’s internal conflict, and the scars of her father’s infidelity. With the exception of one instance, Brad always seemed on board with a reunion with Lindsey. Lindsey lacked agency in the plot in that every opportunity came to her without her having to actively pursue them, which diffused tension.

Brad’s internal conflict revolved around his father’s outdated thoughts about gender, thinking becoming a pastry chef and owning a cat made his son less masculine. This conflict never seemed fully addressed.

Owen, my favorite of the friend group, totally deserved to be the hero of his own book rather than having his romantic arc be a small subplot.

I really liked the scenes which included Lindsey’s friend group. The singular reference to the television show FRIENDS in this book and the multitude of references in the previous installment makes me wonder if the show may have been part of the inspiration for the series. The scenes that revolved around the Food Network opportunity and at the cat cafe were among my favorites in the book. I’d love to see more books in this cat-centric world.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Thanks to Sourcebooks Casablanca, an imprint of Sourcebooks, for providing an Advance Reader Copy via NetGalley.

I loved this book. As a self proclaimed foodie, this book entertained on several levels. I loved reading about the culinary journeys of the characters. I also loved their friendship and second chance romance. I've never been to a cat cafe but have read other books about them and think it would be fun. Hmm, maybe having a cat cafe in a book store would combine many of my interests.

This is the 3rd book in the series. I'm not a fan of it. I've tried reading each book and dislike all of them. DNF



******************I received an ARC for my honest opinion from NetGalley***********************************

I liked a lot of things about this book, but ultimately had trouble connecting with the central conflict about why they’d originally split. Even with her trust issues and history, I just didn’t buy that she wouldn’t have given him a chance to explain if they were truly in love. I felt that all along, and when I got to this line I found it really frustrating.
“I spent years convincing myself that you cheated on me with Phoebe even when I knew deep down that wasn’t really true.”

I just wanted them both to have tried harder and couldn’t quite get past that.