I really wanted to like this book a lot more than I did, but it fell a little flat to me.
It's marketed as a rom-com, and I was really excited about it. I really love women's fiction, and I wouldn't normally have an issue with this, but I think other parts of the book also fell a bit flat for me.
There were several inconsistencies throughout the book that I hope get resolved, for example, Gia claiming she is not an alcoholic and then asking Ben how being sober is because she can't go a couple of days without alcohol. These were just funny, odd moments that left me scratching my head a little bit.
I liked the story itself, but the characters felt really young to me, and not their real ages.
I would love to read more by this author but I was hoping for more with this book.

"Love on the Menu" by Mimi Deb is an absolute delight to read! The characters are well-developed and their journeys are both heartwarming and relatable. The story is well-paced, with just the right balance of humor, romance, and drama. The descriptions of the food and the restaurant scenes are so vivid that I could almost taste the dishes being cooked. I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves romance novels and foodie fiction. Five stars!

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest feedback.

Unfortunately I had to DNF this at about halfway through. I couldn't connect with the characters, and there were just so many side characters that it became confusing. The story was hard to follow and I just didn't enjoy it, I'm sorry to say.

I opted not to review on Goodreads since I didn't finish the book in its entirety.

In my years of reading romance, I've gotten pretty good at telling what I do and don't like from the genre. A big "don't" for me is anything that relies too heavily on the "com" part of rom-com, generally because I find myself eye-rolling more than I do laughing. I don't like when a book starts out with hijinks or excessively silliness because I find it grating. Sadly, this was my experience of Love on the Menu. I feel confident this book has an audience ready and waiting for it, I'm just not in that group.

This one started well, but then it just didn’t do it for me! I started to struggle with the story and the characters, unfortunately this one wasn’t for me

3.5/5 stars! This opposites-attract contemporary romance hit all the right marks. It was like "The Lake House" brought to life in a takeout food adventure. I enjoyed this book. I did struggle with the pacing and thought the book could have benefited from cutting 50 pages. But overall it was an enjoyable and sweet read.

I received an advance review copy for free through NetGalley, and I am leaving this review voluntarily

I think the best what I can describe the experience of reading this book is to say I developed a love-hate relationship with it.

I was instantly drawn in by the cover and the description and I was so excited to dive into this.
I figured it would be more of a slower pace so I had to prepare myself as slow burn is usually not my style. However, the pace didn’t end up being the negative point for me.
I found the story a bit hard to follow - I originally thought the MMC, Ben, was the delivery driver. So finding out he wasn’t had me second guessing everything I had just read and also wondering who the character I had read about even was.
The supporting characters also got confusing, as there are just so many, I sometimes found myself forgetting who was who.
As for the dual POV, I typically love it, but this dual POV didn’t flow for me. The jumps back and forth each chapter sometimes became too much and I wasn’t feeling fully invested in the story.

I did love the way the author wrote and the idea behind the story. I loved that the FMC, Gia, felt real and relatable. I appreciated that these two main characters were created to be imperfect, rather than having a seemingly perfect life.

There were definitely parts I enjoyed, but unfortunately more that I just could not get into. Overall I would give this 2.5 stars.


Thank you to NetGalley and Avon Books for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I really try not to DNF arcs, but I just couldn’t finish this one. It felt like a video game with too many side quests that I lost interest in the main story. I loved the premise, I just wish it would have executed it more like I assumed it would have.

Thank you NetGalley!

This is such a well done story that has beautiful writing and an intriguing story that tugs at your heart strings.
Everyone has their own regrets, problems, issues and pasts. And this book dealt with that perfectly.
It was so much more than I expected, I expected a fluffy light romance which was not it.
It had angsty parts, sweet parts, emotional parts, beautiful writing, relatable situations and it was put together in this great novel.
I highly recommend it.

I loved the description of this book, and the cover is playingful and fun. I just didnt find that in this book. I couldn't really connect to the characters, and there were a few too many side stories that I was having a hard time keeping track of. I would like to see more from this author though.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC.

The characters are realistic and believable, and you can certainly feel yourself sharing in their emotions throughout. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

DNF at 50%.

Five years ago, Gia left her hometown in India and went to London to pursue her dreams. But a combination of alcohol and a giant faux pas during her company’s Christmas party leaves her dreams hanging by a thread. After ordering takeout, her list of new year’s resolutions mistakenly gets stuck to the bottom of the food delivery bag and ends up in the hands of Ben, who works in the takeout. Ben replies to the list of new year’s resolutions and encloses it with Gia’s next order, marking the beginning of their correspondence via food delivery.

I was very attracted by the story’s premise, which I felt had very good potential. I thought it was such an interesting way for two people to become friends through notes delivered with food takeout. However, the execution of the story was not quite there. I found the pacing of the story to be slow, and the events that occurred throughout the first half of the book to be not particularly engaging.

At the halfway mark, rather than a romance, this story reads more like a fiction book about 2 people struggling to get their lives together. The characters are not superbly likable and I didn’t feel very invested in their story.

There were also too many side characters and it took some effort to keep track of who’s who - on Gia’s side, we have her coworkers, her boss and her mother; on Ben’s side, we have his large family of 4 siblings, his coworker and boss, as well as the football kids he coaches.

The flow of the story did not feel very smooth and the scenes jumped from chapter to chapter and I had to re-orientate myself sometimes.

I appreciated the dual POV that gave us insights from both Gia and Ben, but unfortunately, this story was not quite for me. 2.5 rounded up to 3 stars.

Thank you Avon and NetGalley for the e-ARC.

Thoroughly enjoyed this story and what it offered, it is more that just a romcom offering insight into cultures and unconscious bias at the same time

This has a very cute rom-com premise -- a women's new year's resolutions get stuck to her food delivery person's mags and leads to her starting a series of notes with a worker at a local restaurant. I wish I could say I liked it more. But too many side stories that didn't really add to the story or the character development (especially on Gia's side of the story; Ben's side stories were better done), slowed down the book and kept it from being as engrossing or fun as it could have been.

NOTE: Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a free advance reader copt in exchange for an honest review.

Thanks Netgalley and the Publisher. This was a nice feel good read, with a good storyline and good characters. I enjoyed it.

This was a DNF for me. I found there were too many minor characters who didn’t really add anything to the story and just devolve into a confusion of names, and the main characters are unlikeable to the point I genuinely didn’t care what happened to them. Overall I didn’t like any of the characters, and felt there were too many characters which made it hard to keep track of

I presumed this would be a sweet ‘meet cute’ type story but was disappointed. I found it hard to get into, there seemed to be so many characters introduced so quickly that I found it hard to keep up. I have up about quarter of the way though, many apologies, just not for me x

I really was drawn to this book by the blurb, with a very clever book of a "meet cute" in happenstance circumstances, two people both struggling with various challenges and realities that are drawn together. The story did deliver this but I never truly felt like I was reading a romcom, and I did struggle to often follow what was happening with the duel perspective shifts as well as quite a large cast of characters which I just got lost amongst at times. Some parts did really seem to be written in a way that I had to go back a few pages to try and follow what had happened again, which felt jarring. Having said that, it was a warm and comforting story of two young people whose lives came together and ultimately there was a resolution for both.

Not an average romantic meet cute by any means but a book packed full of wonderful characters (the crazy mimosa drinking Ma, the bitchy one minute and sweet the next work gaggle) not least the leads who are quirky, misunderstood and desperate to plough their own way in the world.
Gia is a colour explosion on a page and Ben is the very essence of he misunderstood man and together the story woven around them and dotted with curry stain and naan bread crumbs is beautiful!
A great read with more depth then you might expect from the pretty pink cover!

An extremely compelling five-star read. This isn’t the light and fluffy romcom I was expecting, but it had such a good story that I didn’t mind, but if you are just after a romance then this isn’t for you. This has a great reflection of self-element to it, it dipped into how we see ourselves through others eyes and that’s not something that you see often, so I adored that aspect. I really liked how not everyone was jolly and they had pasts, it gave them real depth, and really allowed you to care for each and every one of the characters and allows you to really open your eyes and understand the challenges that they faced. My emotional reaction to Ben was like an ocean wave, up and down and never settling until it arrived on the sand. Gia however I couldn’t get enough of, even when she annoyed, there was something about her. Gia’s determination and sheer will could light a fire under many, if only she could give herself the confidence her outer self-portrays, they she would be one of the most confident people amongst us. If you are looking for some women’s fiction with a touch of romance then this is the story for you.