What a cute little second chance romance!

Lana and Seth were the absolute definition of soulmates, and I loved that they worked through the hurt and issues of the past before committing to each other once again. I also loved that Lana in particular went through so much personal growth as she learned how to take care of herself again post-breakup. It was amazing to see how she began to prioritize herself and take charge of her mental and physical health before allowing herself to try to find love again. The competition aspect of this book was so interesting, and I loved Lana's co-workers too - they added some much needed comedy and support!

Read this book if you like:
- second-chance romance
- competition between MCs
- workplace romance
- a hilarious cast of side characters
- a fellow book nerd FMC
- tons of character growth

This was such a cute read, and I recommend checking it out if you are looking for some new romance recs for February! Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group Putnam for the ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Ok, so here’s the thing. I read this synopsis like 500 times before reading the story and for some reason every time I read that it was focused on a second chance romance, it went over my head. I don’t usually like second chance romances but the way this author pulled me into the story, I couldn’t help enjoying it so much. One of my favorite aspects of the writing, is how much it genuinely feels like a 90s-early 2000’s rom com. I grew up obsessed with rom coms and to this day it’s so hard to find a book that plays out like a rom com movie.

If you love Legally Blonde, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, or Clueless, you need to read Just My Type!

We found Just My Type to be exceedingly witty and an overall quick read, we had some things we both liked and some we didn't.

The Pros:
We love books about the writing/publishing industry - give us journalists, editors, ghostwriters, publishers, etc. and we eat those stories up!
The pop culture references were on point - Star Wars, Ted Lasso, Schitts Creek... excellent.
The inclusion of lines from each of their columns.
The witty Slack channel that appears a number of times throughout the book.
Seth. Just...omg, Seth.

The Cons:
Lana. We didn't get the hard sell on her. She's really hard to like.
The nicknames - no human has ever used these nicknames.
There are a lot of loose threads or missing plot points that don't quite work.

Overall, it was a recommend, however, with caveats. Please see our podcast for a longer review and other insights: www.chicklitbookclubpodcast.com.

DNF @ 62% (after chapter 18)

i was honestly liking this book and the story quite a lot within the first 20%. it reminded me a lot of how to lose a guy in 10 days (which i love) with the journalism aspect. but as i kept reading, i was getting more and more frustrated.

i wish we would have found out what had happened at the reunion between lana and seth wayyy sooner (from lana’s perspective at least, and then seth’s later on) so that we could see why she dislikes seth so much. since we didn’t get that information sooner, i really liked seth and i found it annoying when lana would get upset when seth looked hurt by what she said to him and how he didn’t deserve to feel that way when he was the one who broke her heart (i was especially annoyed with this after we find out what actually happened at the reunion). at times it felt like lana was being straight up mean to seth.

i typically don’t like second chance romances either, but i thought this might be an exception to that until i started to become frustrated.

i did like seth though, and i enjoyed some of the nerdy pop culture references (especially drag race and marvel).

OMG what an absolutely adorable/perfect romcom?! I wasn't expecting to love this book as much as I did, but, wow, I am blown away.

Lana and Seth were high school sweethearts who broke up over a decade ago and are now reunited when Seth gets a job at the company Lana writes for and they're pitted against each other in a relationship competition. Lana's goal is to stop being a serial monogamist and learn how to live on her own, and Seth's goal is to start a long-term relationship.

I love the enemies-to-lovers, second-chance-romance tropes and they both totally shine in this novel. I love Lana and Seth and all the minor characters. Everyone seems so thought out. Unlike many other romcoms, this wasn't cheesy at all. Very realistic and not too dramatic for my taste.

Spice factor gets a solid 3.5 out of 5. There are really only a couple of spicy scenes, but lots of sexual tension leading up to those.

Also, the epilogue?!?!?! I literally swooned.

Just My Type is a second chance romance between childhood sweethearts turned bitter exes, as they now have to partake in a little bit of workplace competition to have a shot at a coveted columnist position.

I really enjoyed the premise of both mc's having to complete a list of things that are actually their opposite. A serial dater learning how to be single and a commitment-phobe learning how to settle down. I'm a sucker for a hurt/comfort situation, and I knew Seth was going to have to work hard to win over Lana again.

It did take me a bit to get into the story, but it's still a very enjoyable and fun read :)

*𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘬 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘳, 𝘕𝘦𝘵𝘨𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘺 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘗𝘶𝘵𝘯𝘢𝘮, 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘷𝘪𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘮𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘢𝘯 𝘢𝘳𝘤 𝘪𝘯-𝘦𝘹𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘨𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘢𝘯 𝘩𝘰𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘵 𝘳𝘦𝘷𝘪𝘦𝘸*

Just My Type by Falon Ballard is a great second-chance romance with so much more added to the storyline. Lana Parker is a serial dater bounding around relationships. She writes about her dating life and looking for "the one". (Aren't we all...) She decides to give single a chance but as she does her first boyfriend Seth Carson is back in town and so begins our story. This is such a fun read with past heartbreak and hopeful future.

Overall this was a fun and quick read! It read exactly like a 2000’s rom com movie and gave me “How to Lose a Guy 10 Days” vibes. I really enjoyed the friend group in this one and all the text message exchanges. I did like Seth and Lana as a couple but was needing a little more chemistry wise. With this being a second chance romance story, I really think it could have benefited from a past/present timeline set up. I didn’t feel like we got to really know the whole story between them until the end.

I did appreciate the growth between Seth and Lana as individuals and how they made sure they were whole as people before they entered into a relationship.

I also needed way more spice! That’s just a personal preference for me, I want to feel the physical connection just as much as the emotional. The story was sweet and very predictable, but overall it just left me wanting more!

Thank you to @netgalley and @putnambooks for this eARC in exchange for an honest review!

What to expect:
✨ Second chance romance
✨ Workplace romance
✨ High school sweethearts
✨ Enemies-ish to lovers
✨ Emphasis on self love

This book sways between a 4-star and 4.5-star review. There were some parts I absolutely adored, and other parts I was on the fence about.

Lana Parker has bounced around from relationship to relationship trying to find “the one” but in the end being let down by every man she meets. She is an expert when it comes to love and even writes about it for a living. After one too many breakups, Lana is ready to try out being single once and for all.

Seth Carson is new to town, but not new to Lana. Her first-ever boyfriend, the one who crushed her heart, is coming in hot and ready to take her job. Seth also writes for a living but has been living a more free-flowing lifestyle, hopping from place to place learning about people, and sharing the stories he has collected.

Now this book hit close to home. As someone who is with their high school sweetheart, it was very real to read about the decisions Lana and Seth made and the options they had to weigh out at such a young age. As the story goes on, you watched both main characters evolve and completely change. Their big split caused Lana and Seth to react in very different ways. Throughout the book, Lana learns so much about herself and how her childhood has affected her adult relationships and life choices. You can tell how much she underestimated herself and needed to be shown how great she could be. Luckily there were some pretty awesome side characters written in to support her and then some other characters you really grew to dislike.

This story was very well blended between seeing how the characters used to be, how they turned out as adults, and what they grow into by the end. This was a great second-chance romance with so much more added to the storyline. Highly encourage others to check it out, especially if you have read and liked Falon Ballards other novel Lease On Love.

Summary
Lana Parker moved out to LA for college. She was supposed to move out there with her high school boyfriend, Seth, but he backed out then broke things off with her. Since then, Lana has been in girlfriend mode, never lasting long between relationships. When the website Lana works for gets acquired by a larger publication, suddenly Seth shows up and they are in competition for a column after the merger. Lana needs to stay single and complete a bunch of tasks assigned by Seth to learn to be on her own. Seth needs to complete tasks decided by Lana to make him 'relationship ready'. Only the chemistry between the two is still smoking and Lana realizes she may have never stopped loving Seth, despite the heartbreak he caused her.

Review
No sophomore slump for Falon Ballard! Just My Type was even better than Lease on Love (in my humble opinion!) I loved how this isn't just a romance, this is truly women's fiction. The personal growth Lana goes through is so relatable. I Her journaling on her vacation about all she learned was so inspiring. She had such a growth mindset and ways to look at her experiences and find the lessons in them. There's some miscommunication, which isn't my favorite. If Seth and Lana just talked to each other, they could have gotten things figured out much sooner, but where's the fun in that!
4.5 stars

Okay, Falon did it again! I absolutely need a physical copy of this swoon-worthy rom com to annotate ASAP! I got sucked into this story almost immediately and read the majority of it in the span of 36 hours - I couldn’t put it down.

I love the second chance romance trope when there’s a good amount of angst and pining - and Just My Type had it. I’ve really been enjoying the workplace romance trope too and this solidified that!

The tension between Lana and Seth throughout the book was well balanced and realistic. And the banter in and amongst all of the characters was incredible. There were many laugh out loud moments and several scenes that got the butterflies moving in my stomach🥰 I found myself emotionally invested in both Lana and Seth’s journeys and their development along the way.

Falon is wonderful at creating friend groups/found family you’d love to be a part of. The side characters in this book made the story that much better! The messaging threads between Lana and her work friends gave me life.

What you’ll find in this book:
↠ high school sweethearts turned enemies/rivals turned lovers
↠ second chance romance
↠ workplace romance
↠ tension
↠ great banter
↠ amazing found family/friend group
↠ open door romance

Definitely recommend this to all the rom com lovers!! Thank you to NetGalley and Putnam Books for the advanced copy in exchange for my honest thoughts!

𝓜𝔂 𝓓𝓮𝓪𝓻𝓮𝓼𝓽 𝓡𝓮𝓪𝓭𝓮𝓻,

“𝐼𝑡 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑒 𝑖𝑛 𝑌𝑜𝑢'𝑣𝑒 𝐺𝑜𝑡 𝑀𝑎𝑖𝑙. ~ "𝐴𝑙𝑙 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑛𝑜𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑎𝑠 𝑚𝑒𝑎𝑛𝑡 𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑚𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑛 𝑠𝑜 𝑚𝑎𝑛𝑦 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑠.”

Seth Carson & Lana Parker - He doesn't do serious. She doesn't do anything but serious, but their chemistry is undeniable. So when these two ex- highschool sweethearts find themselves going for the same opportunity for a highly desired columnist position in LA, they are pitted against each other by their boss for a "friendly" competition. 10 Weeks 10 Tasks: The winner gets their own column for the Chronicle. Seth's task - How to be ready for a committed relationship. Lana's task - How to be comfortable alone.

Just My Type is a second-chance romance that is oh-so-good! It was the perfect mixture of funny moments & swooning moments that steal your heart away! I adored watching the relationship between Seth and Lana rekindle and bloom into something beautiful.

“𝐻𝑒 𝑠𝑤𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑑 𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛, ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑟𝑜𝑎𝑡 𝑚𝑜𝑣𝑖𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑎𝑟𝑑 𝑏𝑒𝑓𝑜𝑟𝑒 ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑎𝑖𝑑, "𝐼 𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒 𝑦𝑜𝑢. 𝐼 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤 𝐼 𝑠𝑐𝑟𝑒𝑤𝑒𝑑 𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑦𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑢𝑝 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝐼 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤 𝑤𝑒 𝑤𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑔𝑜𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡𝑜 𝑘𝑒𝑒𝑝 𝑖𝑡 𝑐𝑎𝑠𝑢𝑎𝑙, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝐼 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑓𝑒𝑙𝑙 𝑖𝑛 𝑙𝑜𝑣𝑒 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑦𝑜𝑢. 𝐼 𝑐𝑎𝑛'𝑡 𝑏𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑒𝑣𝑒 𝑖𝑡 𝑚𝑦𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑓, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑖𝑛 𝑠𝑝𝑖𝑡𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑙𝑖𝑓𝑒𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑒 𝑜𝑓 ℎ𝑎𝑡𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑒𝑎𝑐ℎ 𝑜𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟, 𝐼 𝑎𝑚 𝑐𝑜𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑒𝑡𝑒𝑙𝑦 𝑙𝑜𝑠𝑡 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑖𝑛 𝑚𝑦 𝑙𝑖𝑓𝑒.”

More importantly, I loved Lana's growth throughout this story. 🫶 Throughout the 10 tasks, Lana learns a lot about herself, her past, and how it affects her today. She learns how to be comfortable alone. "𝑖𝑓 𝑎 𝑟𝑒𝑙𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑠ℎ𝑖𝑝 𝑐𝑜𝑚𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑔 𝑤ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑦𝑜𝑢'𝑟𝑒 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑡𝑟𝑢𝑙𝑦 𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑦 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑖𝑡, 𝑖𝑠 𝑖𝑡 𝑎𝑐𝑡𝑢𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑏𝑒𝑠𝑡 𝑟𝑒𝑙𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑠ℎ𝑖𝑝 𝑓𝑜𝑟 𝑦𝑜𝑢?"

🍿 If you are a fan of How To Loss A Guy in 10 Days, you're going to love this one!

✨This was my first Falcon Ballards sophomore novel, and I will defiantly be picking up Lease on Love.

𝓐𝓵𝔀𝓪𝔂𝓼 ~
𝓜𝔂 𝓗𝓮𝓪𝓻𝓽 𝓡𝓮𝓪𝓭𝓼 𝓯𝓸𝓻 𝓨𝓸𝓾

Read if you like:
Second Chance Romance
High School Sweethearts
Sunflowers & Backwards hats
Enemies to lovers
How to Lose A Guy in Ten Days
The Hating Game
Work Romance
Forced Competition
Witty Banter - Top Notch group text banter
Plant love - "the most diva of plants that there ever was"
Great character growth
Therapy Rep
Kickboxing is therapeutic

Oh. My. Goodness.
I just kept turning the pages, totally sucked into the storyline. Will Lana get the job of her dreams? Will Seth stay or move away if she does? Do they end up together again? This was a one sitting read for me, and I will be adding this author to my list of favorites!

Right from the start, when we first meet Lana being dumped when she thought she was going to be proposed to, this second chance, enemies to lovers romance absolutely hooked me. Great characters (supporting as well as starring) , wonderful humor, and a charming storyline all work together to make this a fantastic rom-com. I’d like to thank PENGUIN GROUP Putnam and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review an eARC of Just My Type.

https://www.amazon.com/review/R3MGPJ0QPQREQ/ref=pe_1098610_137716200_cm_rv_eml_rv0_rv

I am really bummed I didn’t love this. I loved Lease On Love. While I didn’t always like this one, there were aspects that I really enjoyed.

I loved Falon’s writing, especially with friend groups & found families. While Lana & I didn’t click at first, I really loved her character’s growth. There also was this normalization of therapy that I really appreciated. Outside of the competition itself being grossly unethical, the idea of a forced proximity in the workplace with your once high school sweetheart was promising.

But, I think second chance romances are really hard to write with a single POV and no flash backs. The pacing here is very slow, romance wise. I didn’t feel any chemistry or tension between Lana & Seth until the last 25% of the book, giving it more women’s fiction vibes than a romance. It left me not caring about them as a couple. The book ended with some top grand gestures & the sweetest epilogue, but I was still left looking for more.

This is might be a me thing, but I can’t stand when the reason for the breakup & animosity is not disclosed until later in a book, which happened here. I’d rather have it out in the open so the MC’s can grow from what didn’t work the first time. It felt like a miscommunication between the author & the reader.

For full disclosure, I listened to the first 60% of this on audio before switching to reading via my eARC. I wasn’t a fan of the narrator. A part of me wonders if I read over listened, if my views would be different 🤷🏻‍♀️

The challenge: Lana needs to prove she can be happy being single, and Seth needs to prove he’s ready to commit and settle down. The prize: a coveted newspaper column they both want to further their careers. The problem? They’re high school sweethearts who haven’t been in the same city, let alone the same office, in twelve years.

I really liked Lana as our narrator and heroine. She’s believably flawed, but in a way that it’s still easy to root for her. Fandom-obsessed, her cultural references are possibly the most entertaining little quips in the novel. Did I spend, like, sixty percent of this book wanting to reach into the pages and shake her by the shoulders because her perception of Seth is so clearly misguided by her teenage broken heart? Hell yes. But she needed the time and space to grow into herself before she was ready to recognize that, and I could appreciate that journey.

Lana and her mother are not close, but they have a really pivotal moment later in the book that I have mixed feelings about. On the one hand, I loved it, specifically how it helped Lana. But I also kind of hated that this big moment belonged to someone who wasn’t a huge presence in the book. But I suppose it’s a testament to the fact that people don’t always have to be present to have a big impact on us.

I like to pretend I don’t need a dual POV in every romance, but there were moments in this book that I would have loved to see from Seth’s POV. It was so clear throughout that he wasn’t the jerk that Lana thought, and I would have loved to see how the challenged changed him and helped him grow as well.

Overall, super fun book, great chemistry, fantastic supporting characters, and I’d absolutely recommend!

This is an adorable second chance workplace romance between two journalists.

Lana, a serial monogamist going all in on relationships that she knew (usually from the start) just weren’t it. After breaking up with her high school sweetheart over 12 years ago she just never quite felt the same.

And then one day Seth walks into her office and she quite literally puked.

If you, like me, wanna know about the spice- I would call this a slow burn, there is a spice and hand grazes and all the blushing rom com moments. I gave it a 1.5 spice stars because it’s there.. but it’s definitely not the focus.
(I would put this in an emily henry- would give to my mom category. Which we love..).

There were some ethics issues i had questions about early on but they were talked about and handled so well (lots of therapy had in this book so A++ on that).

Overall this was a sweet little romance i absolutely adored and it even had my black heart a little teary by the epilogue! As always, i reallllly wanted this to be dual POV, but that’s a me problem. This def made my lil romance heart happy!

Just My Type is a slow burn, swoon worthy, exes reuniting, enemies-to-lovers masterpiece.

Lana wants one thing in life: to get out of writing romance columns for ATF, where she's worked since college. Okay, maybe there's more than one thing she wants. She also wants to find her happily ever after, and it's loading as we speak with Evan, her boyfriend of four years. Thinking she's going off to her engagement dinner, Lana is shocked when Evan ends things instead. Facing the harsh reality that she's not been single since her first boyfriend, Seth Carson, at 14, Lana realizes maybe she needs to work on herself, and stay single for a while.

That is, until Seth Carson shows up during her work meeting. Her ex and first love has just walked back into her life after twelve years, well ten if you count the disastrous reunion two years ago which Lana certainly does NOT want to think about, set to bring everything down. He's known to flit from one relationship to another, while Lana keeps settling long term for Mr. Wrong and now they're in a competition to see who can achieve a higher purpose better. Pitted against each other for a coveted spot at The Chronicle, the pair must work through ten challenges that helps Seth find "the one" and helps Lana "find herself" but what if those challenges ultimately lead them back into each other's arms?

This book was a clutch-your-chest, laugh behind covered eyes, "Oh my GOD will you just KISS ALREADY?!" top read of the year. Definitely put it on your TBR list but don't let it sit too long there.

ARC REVIEW FOR JUST MY TYPE

5 stars

Thank you to @netgalley @putnambooks and Falon Ballard for the gifted copy!

Okay there is no sugarcoating this… I f*$&ing loved this book! The wittiness, the friends love, the heat…it was perfect. I couldn’t put this book down if I tried. It was a joy to read from start to finish.

𝕎ℍ𝔸𝕋 𝕀 𝕃𝕀𝕂𝔼𝔻:
• the chemistry in this book was incredible between Seth and Lana. Made me feel like I was 18 again so you really got the effect of a second- chance romance
• the wit was perfect
• while not a trueee workplace romance, I still kind of count it because I want to 😂
• the growth that you see with Lana is one of the best arcs I’ve seen in a while

𝕎ℍ𝔸𝕋 𝕎𝔸𝕊ℕ’𝕋 𝕄𝕐 ℂ𝕌ℙ 𝕆𝔽 𝕋𝔼𝔸:
• I mean if I had to be picky, I hated their boss and her mom, but they were essential to the story to be crappy characters

𝕆𝕍𝔼ℝ𝔸𝕃𝕃 𝕋ℍ𝕆𝕌𝔾ℍ𝕋𝕊:
I feel like a loser with how much I’m gushing over this book, but I just loved it so much. Good news is, today is it’s #pubday so you can order it asap and read it so you can swoon with me as well 😻

I love Falon's romcoms and think she's an author not to miss! I believe for every book she writes, I'll be there to pick it up! She's always up to date with pop culture references and the banter between the couples is top-notch.

This was an enemies-to-lovers workplace romance, but also an ex for the MC. I found it a little unrealistic at times yet I still tried to support the couple, even though they were SO frustrating sometimes??? This was just a second chance romance that lacked for me. I wasn't feeling the chemistry like I did in Lease on Love.

But I loved the touch on setting personal boundaries and the independence of learning to be on your own! For a contemporary romance, it's perfect if you're in the mood for it.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher.