🦇 Borrow My Heart Book Review 🦇

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐

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🦇 When a cute boy walks into her neighborhood coffee shop, obviously waiting for a girl he met online who possibly stood him up, Wren steps in before the boy's friend can tease him--on camera--for getting catfished. In her effort to save Asher from embarrassment, Wren continues the charade, waiting for the perfect opportunity to tell him the truth. When he arrives at the animal shelter where Wren works, her boss unites them with the task of getting the shelter's longest-staying guest, Bean, adopted. Will Wren tell Asher who she is, or fall in love with him before she gets the chance?

💜 Kasie West's Borrow My Heart is a heart-warming, cozy read. After her mother left her, Wren created a list of rules to ensure her heart never got broken again; rules that shattered one by one after she met Asher. Each time they interact, another wall falls, making Asher the first person to get through her defenses in some time. There are plenty of puppy-love shenanigans, both between the young couple and in their attempts to get Bean adopted. This is a cute, quick read full of warm-and-fuzzy feelings; ideal as a palette cleaner between larger texts.

🦇 As sweet as Wren and Asher's story is, it's also a little predictable. The source of conflict between Wren and Asher doesn't last very long, either. Forgiving him wraps the story up in a little bow before tensions can rise. I do wish we'd gotten more from this story; more cute moments between Wren and Asher, more character development between Wren and her mother, more funny moments with Bean. All in all, this is an entertaining, adorable read, but readers of Kasie West's previous works know she's capable of far more.

🦇 Recommended to anyone looking for a quick, cute book between longer, more complex tales.

💜 Read If You Love:
🐶 Grumpy vs Sunshine
🐶 Coming-of-Age Stories
🐶 Fake-Dating
🐶 YA Rom-Coms

🦇 Major thanks to the author and publisher for providing an ARC of this book via Netgalley. 🥰 This does not affect my opinion regarding the book. #BorrowMyHeart #Netgalley @delacortepress @randomhousechildrens

I have read several of Kasie West's books, and they are always a delight.

Thanks to a mother who is flighty and downright selfish, Wren has put together a list of rules to protect her heart. When Asher is about to be humiliated by his friend Dale, Wren does something completely out of character to save the day. Her intention was for this new relationship to be temporary, but there was something about Asher that had her breaking all her rules.

Borrow My Heart was very sweet and charming. I enjoyed this twist on a fake dating relationship. It was also a bit of a reverse grumpy/sunshine. It was nice to have a happy-go-lucky guy for once in a book.

Borrow My Heart

By: Kasie West

Publish Date 13 June 2023

Publishers: Random House Childrens, Delacorte Press

Romance/ Teens & YA

#BorrowMyHeart#NetGalley

100 Book ReviewsProfessional Reader

I would like to thank both NetGalley and random House for allowing me to read and review this book.

Good Reads Synopsis:

When a girl overhears a guy getting verbally destroyed by his friends for being catfished, she jumps in to save the day—and pretends to be his online crush. A young adult romance from the critically acclaimed author of Places We’ve Never Been.

Wren is used to being called a control freak. She doesn’t care; sticking to the list of rules she created for herself helps her navigate life. But when a cute guy named Asher walks through the door of her neighborhood coffee shop, the rulebook goes out the window.

Asher is cute, charming . . . and being catfished by his online crush. So Wren makes an uncharacteristically impulsive decision—she pretends to be the girl he’s waiting for to save him from embarrassment. Suddenly she’s fake-dating a boy she knows nothing about. And it’s . . . amazing.

It’s not long before Asher has her breaking even more of her own rules. But will he forgive her when he finds out she’s not who she says she is? Wren’s not so sure. . . . After all, rules exist for a reason.

Book Review:

I really enjoyed this book. I gave it 4 stars. It is a refreshing book to read and quick.

I love the friendship between Wren and Kamala her best friend who supports her no matter what. I also love the family dynamic between her siter and Dad. Too bad the mother isn’t around. There is a reason for that.

The friendship between Asher and Dale is one of a kind and pretty typical for guys. Dale is hard on Wren because of his friend and doesn’t want him to get hurt just like Kamala doesn’t want Wren to get hurt.

I also enjoyed in the idea of Wren working in pet shelter with a funny name. I love how she became attached to a dog, Bean, that had a hard trusting anyone just like her.

I like how Asher and Wren worked together to find Bean a home.

This was such a great book minus the fact of the lies that were told or omitted.

I highly recommend this book for anyone to read even middle graders. There isn’t anything in this book that would harm them but maybe cry a little like I did.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t come out until June.

Kasie West is one of those authors who writes YA romances that warm your heart. Most of her stories include valuable lessons and cover serious topics alongside sweet, honest young love stories.

Asher and Wren are adorable. Wren is a bit uptight and strict in her plans but when she witnesses the negative side of social media in person, she finds her life taking a detour that teaches her that even the best laid plans need some flexibility.

Asher gets catfished by a girl he meets online and his so-called friend are laughing and videoing his failure. All of a sudden, a girl he’s never seen steps in and saves the day. When he shows up to volunteer with shelter animals, he runs into her again and the two begin a sweet little romance despite both of them trying to overcome personal obstacles.

You really can’t go wrong with Kasie West. Her books are the perfect mixture of fluff, life, and young love.

I am and always will be a Kasie West fan. I love her writing, I love the stories she chooses to tell and I love that her books are never simply just about the romance. We get to see characters grow and learn and this book had dogs which made my heart happy. I laughed and cried and thoroughly enjoyed this book (and no, the dog doesn't die.)

An adorable YA love story. My only frustration is that the ARC was not made available for kindle download, making it extremely difficult to read

This was a very fun YA book. I loved how Kasie West can pull you into the story. The characters have so much depth to them which makes reading the book more compelling. This was a quick read and very enjoyable.

I didn’t love this book. I didn’t hate this book. It was very average.

I’ve read a lot of books by Kasie West, and although the plots are different, they are essentially just a standard ya romance. I’ve also read a lot of ya romances, so for something to get a very good rating, there needs to be something extra special or memorable about it.

I liked the plot a lot. I liked the characters (except Dale for obvious reasons). But will I remember it in a month? A year? Probably not.

The main character, Wren, has a list of rules that any person she dates has to follow. I honestly feel like this whole plot would have been the exact same even if she didn’t have the list, so I don’t see why it was necessary.

My favorite part of this plot was the animal shelter. I liked the games they set up so Bean could get adopted, and felt like that was one of the more interesting parts of the book.

The part I didn’t like was Dale and Kamala. Kamala is Wren’s best friend, and she STILL managed to like Dale even at the end of the book after the big plot twist (which I guessed really early on in the story). Asher also stayed friends with Dale?? He even wanted to undo the thing he did at the end of the book, and they just laughed? Like Dale would have totally done it without permission (he pretty much did earlier in the book).

If you want a cute ya romcom, I would recommend giving this author a try. She is very consistent and you know what you’re getting when you read her books. This is not my favorite of hers, but I’ve liked her books in the past!

Thank you to Netgalley for providing a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review!

Wren is a rule follower especially when it comes to her to heart which has had it fair share of heartbreak starting with her mom leaving her.

She has a soft spot for those in need so when she hears a guy getting made fun of for being catfished by his friend she pretends to be the girls he's meeting up with. Lines get crossed and he helps try and find a home for her favorite shelter dog.

Borrow my heart was a cute read! I love how West gives such great details on the interactions. Asher was a sweetheart and Wren had a great group people surrounding her.

I would definitely recommend! Can't wait for read more from Kasie West! I love all her books!

Since her mother abandoned her, Wren has set a very comprehensive set of rules in her life, especially for the boys she would date. She even has one at her part-time job who is very close to filling all the requisites, she just needs a little more time—another rule. But that's when she meets Asher, a cute boy who is waiting for a girl he met online while his best friend films his embarrassment of the girl not showing. Wren decides then to pretend she is that girl. She had no idea someone so out of her rules could make her not care about breaking them.

Disclaimer? I'm a fan of Kasie West. But I didn't enjoy that much the last book I read by her. This one seems like a safer bet, so it's probably the reason why I enjoyed it so much. Plus dogs. Wren needs to find a way to have one of the dogs at her work adopted, but the dog in question isn't cooperative at all. The scenes with him were so precious, I loved them. And as I read, this book made me feel something I think it's been long since I last felt it—Asher is a great book boyfriend. I don't mean the romances I've been reading didn't have a good romantic interest, but Asher made me feel safe that wherever things would go wrong, he'd never truly disappoint me. (Perhaps, that's why I was so surprised when the climax did arrive.) I love Kasie West's book boyfriends, it was another recurrent thought as I kept reading.

It's a comfort read, the place you can get into a bubble and just enjoy the silly and the simple. Highly recommended to everyone looking for a distraction from the world.


Honest review based on an ARC provided by Netgalley. Many thanks to the publisher for this opportunity.

This is such an adorable read. A perfect cute summer romance read. I love that it surprised me and wasn't a predictable as I thought it was gonna be. Asher and Wren were perfectly written in my opinion I loved the way they were together and their storyline plus their family portrayals. 10/10 recommend for the summer

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Katie West has consistently written the cutest YA rom-coms, and Borrow My Heart is no exception. Sometimes you just want to read something light to read as an escape. I really liked the dynamic between Wren and Kamala and I honestly wish more YA books portrayed female friendship like this. My favorite character by far, though, was Bean. I'd read an entire book about him and the Bean Games.

An absolute delight. I truly love this author, even as an adult reader of YA!

Catfishing remains a thing, even though we have shows and books to show us that we need to be wary. Teens, however, are more trusting.

This YA novel involves a catfishing incident as well as an adorable story of first love.

Love, love, love!

I'd like to thank Net Galley and Delacorte Press for approving my request to read this. I'm a new reviewer on this platform and I appreciate the opportunity of spreading the word about this book.

Publication Date: June 13, 2023

This is the first Kasie West book I have read. This book is under 200 paged and it is perfect book for teens or even adults getting back into reading. Books with more pages can be intimidating for people who don't read a lot.

I liked this book. It had a light-hearted, cute vibe that a good YA should have. Wren and Asher were a perfect match, even though their relationship started off with a huge lie. I liked that her friend Kamala was also having a good time with Asher's best friend, Dale. This leads into some moments i was not crazy about, there were a few meet ups, specifically when they go to a beach where it would of been a great scene if Dale and Kamala were not there. Their presence in some scenes doesn't add anything to the plot at all.
I liked Wren's character progression a lot. She start off very closed off to other people, aside from Kamala. Each chapter has a rule she made up to keep her heart safe from possible boyfriends.

Did I tell you there are cute animals too? Because there is.

Kasie West has always been an instant read with all her books and most I have really enjoyed. However, I'm a little disappointed that I didn't really care for this one. I like Wren enough but honestly I didn't like Ashers (or his friend Dale) at all. I actually found myself hoping something would happen between Chad. However, Bean (the dog), was my far my favorite character.

Thank you netgalley and the publisher for a copy of this book in exchange for a honest review.

Kasie West consistently delivers pitch-perfect YA romcoms. A highlight of Borrow My Heart is the relationship between Wren and her sister Zoey. Asher seemed cute, but without giving away spoilers, I will just say I felt like the *big offense* was forgiven much too easily.

Thanks to Netgalley, the author, and Penguin for the eARC in exchange for my review.

This is such a modern day romance. I just wish people didn’t have to go through being catfished; but it was thoroughly enjoyable.

ABSOLUTELY LOVED THIS BOOK!

First of all, this author is an auto-buy for me, and I've read nearly every one of her books as an adult. Her books are YA "no stress" reads for me, in that they always end happily and are just so endearing.

I loved the catfish element as well as the TikTok addition.

Thank you to Random House Children's, Delacorte Press and NetGalley who provided me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All the thoughts and opinions are my own.

this is a YA book with a target audience of 12 to 17 year olds, which i am not. i did not realize that until i was a few pages in but i decided to give it my best and i read it.

this is a short story compared to what i usually read so i finished it in 1 day. it was funny, entertaining and at times i did get me a bit emotional.

we have Wren who has her own reservations about dating and a set of rules her future BF must meet.
one day in a cafe, while waiting for her friends shift to be over she sees a guy being made fun of since he was catfished, she decides to step in an save the day. she pretends to be the guys date. now they are fake dating, expect that the guy has no idea its fake.

Asher was with his friend Dale waiting to meet Gemma, his online friend. his friend was recording the whole thing since he was sure that the girl was made up. a girl shows up and our story picks up from there.

the story is well written, funny due to all of the shenanigans they go through while trying to come clean with whats going on and getting deeper and deeper in to the whole thing. we even have some cute moments with dogs, since they work in a dog shelter and they are trying to get an old grumpy dog adopted.

my issue with the book comes with the fact that i am not the target audience, for me, it felt childish. while it was explained why Wren felt the need to jump in and get in Asher's business to me it felt like she had some kind of Saviour complex. or mommy issues to be honest.

also we find out that while Wren is feeling guilty about lying to him and expecting him to hate her, he knew the whole time. and he was ok with it. he was actually trying to tell her too. which is nice i guess. they start dating and then we get swap into a reunion with the mom, who left her when she was 10 and that takes a good chunk of the book.

This sweet and funny book by Kasie West had me shedding tears from ¾ of the way through the story. I’m so happy I didn’t grow up in the era of social media. Still, Borrow My Heart was a joy to read and Bean, the unloved Pit, was the cherry on top of this cute YA romance.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Children’s for this complimentary ARC. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.