The most important thing I can say about this book is that you should be highly prepared to be super hungry whilel you're reading it. The setting is a food and wine tour across Europe and there is so much delicious food described that I wanted to be eating the whole time I was reading. Our two main characters, Theo and Kit, are exes who haven't seen each other at all since they broke up, rather dramatically, on the way to Europe for a food and wine tour several years before the start of this story. They had been in love since they were kids, and since the breakup they've both been focused on building their professional lives (Theo as an aspiring sommelier in Palm Springs and Kit as a pastry chef in Paris), but have each been serially hooking up with people rather than pursuing real romantic relationships. Because they never went on their original food and wine tour due to the breakup, they each have a voucher and, because this is a romance, they both decide to cash in on the very same tour. I had a lot of trouble connecting with them both for the first half of the novel or so, and I think this might be an age/generational thing. They spent like half of their tour competing to see who can hook up with more people (they both identify as bisexual, and they are happy to point out hook-up prospects for each other) as a way to avoid actually dealing with their unresolved feelings for each other. I make no moral judgments against hook-up culture, but I also have literally no experience with it so I find it hard to connect with. As a child of the 1980s and 1990s, I'm not only much older than Theo and Kit, I was also permanently impacted by the fear that existed around HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections in my youth. When they finally started talking to each other, I felt more invested in the story and their characters. This wasn't my favorite Casey McQuiston, but I did enjoy it overall and appreciated that it brought up topics related to sexuality and gender identity in what felt like a sensitive way. Also, so much delicious food!

The Pairing is a queer contemporary romance that follows two childhood friends who, after a deeply heartbreaking split 4 years earlier, reconnect on the European vacation they were supposed to take together. I think both characters had great growth through the story, and I enjoyed being able to hear from both of their POV's. There were certain things in the book that felt a little silly, but when you want someone around, you'll sometimes do ridiculous things to keep their attention and friendship.

Overall I really enjoyed this read. I have yet to read a Casey McQuiston book that I haven't enjoyed. It's witty, funny, and a great summer read.

Thank you to NetGalley for sending me the ARC of this book in exchange for review!

I love all Casey’s books they never disappoint. This one was so good. Such a perfect sexy summer read. Theo and Kit are just perfect. Thank you Netgallery and to the publisher for the opportunity.

The Pairing is a fabulously sexy summer romance full of heart, emotions and perfect pairings. First of I loved the pairings of food and drinks to go with each destination of the book, I thought it was such a unique and fun twist. It was also so well matched! As for the story itself well The Pairing is very steamy! Theo and Kit were grew up together, then they date, then they had a very messy break up and now they are doing very well on their own. Theo is has discovered their love for wine and bartending and is doing very well in the dating game. Kit is in Paris studying to be pastry chef and living the dream. They both decide to book a European food and wine tour and they happen to book the same tour. Stuck together on the tour they decided to stick it out and enjoy the trip together but old feelings they thought were gone start to resurface and they realize maybe they weren't better off on there own after all. I truly loved this story! I thought it was the perfect summer read!

This book is very well written—Casey McQuiston writes such beautiful prose. Theo and Kit were both so well developed as characters, and you really could see the depth of their feelings, both about their own lives and each other. I’m a sucker for a friends to lovers story, and this book had so much beautifully written yearning nostalgia.

That said, it felt long for a romance novel. The drawn out nature of the book is perhaps exacerbated by how apparent it is early on that the two main characters are still in love with each other. As a result, I felt like I was waiting for nearly four hundred pages for the inevitable to happen. This book was fun and unique, and I’m glad to have read it, but I don’t see myself pursuing a reread.

The Pairing is nothing short of an eternal summer read.

This read was the emotional equivalent of permashifting into a pastry shared by life-long lovers on the European vineyard. My synopsis of this novel starts and ends with that statement.

As an avid supporter of Casey McQuiston's work, I can wholeheartedly attest that The Pairing fundamentally differs from anything we've seen from them before. Where their previous novels have focused on a more character-centric approach to plot development, The Pairing deviates from this due to the sheer weight of the scenery and historical artifacts presented. This novel focuses heavily on all aspects of sensuality ranging from the pleasures of sex to the pleasures of food, wine, art, and history.

In other words, this is a Taurus and Libra's wet dream.

Theo and Kit are meant to be together. It's objective. It's a fact. It's a scientific law so powerful that it could put gravity to shame. Their magnetic forcefield is like no other, childhood best friends to young adult lovers. They were soulmates from the start, romance or no romance.

Establishing this so early on was an interesting, and unusual tactic. Most romances, including those we've seen from Casey, typically start, to some degree, with two strangers. In the case of The Pairing, this strategy works and is reinforced by the setup of the dual perspective and the way the relationship between the characters is painted.

I will add that while the scenery work and history were well-researched and thorough they did make my brain swim. The same goes for the in-depth food and wine talk. It was a vast ocean of information that, at some point, began to weigh me down like a ball and chain to the ankle.

All in all, the romance, the sex, the food, the wine, the history, and the places all tied together in a beautiful luxurious bow. This is best paired with hot sun, salt water, and the finest local wine.

I have loved everything that McQuiston has written. When I started The Pairing, though, I was confused. Until I wasn't. They have done such a magnificent job of laying the groundwork for a nuanced character study and a romance that made me yearn for them to just "be" together. When it flips POV midway through the story, I found myself welling up over and over again, and the last 10% was just tears streaming down my face. This is such a great story about living life outside the constraints of a society that seems intent on "othering". What a gorgeous, sumptuous book that I would love to read again for the first time. 🥹 And it also made me very hungry. Read it, and you'll understand. 😋

Yes yes and always YES!!! So excited for this to be out in the world! Casey did it again with a winner!

This was a great one to read during Pride month! McQuiston always strikes a good balance between romance and humor and this book is no exception!

Beautifully written, wonderful characters and a story that I never, ever wanted to put down. The pay off at the end is completely worth it and the characters are so engaging, you never really want it to end.

This book is exactly what you expect in all the best ways. From delicious descriptions of food and drink to the completely horny trek through Europe, CM takes you on a wild romp. Know what you're getting into before you start and you'll be delighted.

Can I please go to Europe now?? The food and wine descriptions were like art in this book and I feel like I was right alongside the characters on their incredible trip.
As I was reading The Pairing I kept thinking this romance is good and feels fresh and new compared to the massive amount of romance books I’ve read. I felt connected to the characters and was heavily rooting for them to communicate and resolve their issues. McQuiston has another winner here and I definitely recommend!

For context, from the back of the book- “In #1 New York Times bestselling author Casey McQuiston’s latest romantic comedy, two bisexual exes accidentally book the same European food and wine tour and challenge each other to an international hookup competition to prove they’re over each other. And they are over each other, right?”

I’m going to go ahead and start by laying it out there. This book is a gift to Casey McQuiston’s readers. I LOVED Red, White and Royal Blue so much that I was almost scared to read The Pairing.

I had nothing to be scared of though, this novel is SO BEAUTIFUL. I just finished it, and I can tell you now I will be reading it again very soon, because I read the story so voraciously that I’m pretty sure there are whole other levels of detail I missed. This is the kind of book that you can just devour. This story is a journey. Theo is into wine and spirits as a career and Kit is a pastry chef. And they are on a European tour together. The food, drink and sights and scents of the locales Theo and Kit get to explore are described in such vivid, sumptuous detail that you can almost taste the pastries, almost feel the soft breeze warm on the neck while reading. The European tour is such an amazing vehicle for this story, which for me, makes it the perfect summer read. I may be stuck in my windowless, stuffy office this summer, but Casey McQuiston’s writing style is like a portal to every place Theo and Kit are.

The supporting characters like Paloma, Sloane, Orla, and Fabrizio in the story are all fully drawn, beautiful and realistic people. The found family and friends themes are very real in the story and I wish I knew people like these. I pretty much fell in love with almost every character.

Let’s talk about Theo and Kit. This story is blessed with each of their points of view. The way these two describe each other is pure love and poetry. We know from the beginning that they are obviously soulmates, but they are both wonderfully real and beautiful messes. The characters are so realistic with their triumphs and failures and all we want while reading is for them to get it together and realize what we readers already know, they are PERFECT for each other.

Another thing that must be pointed out-this book is SPICY. Theo and Kit have a literal bet about who can rack up the most conquests. The sex in the book is hot and sweet, and oh, did I mention HOT?

Look, this is not so much a review as my thoughts on the book, so I am completely unapologetic for spending whole paragraphs gushing over it, because it is a WHOLE VIBE and reading it made me so happy. Thanks to Casey McQuiston and St. Martin’s Press for the digital ARC for review. I am going to have to preorder it so I have a hardcover copy as well. It’s that good.

The Pairing is a sumptuous, romantic story about Theo and Kit. Theo and Kit grew up together, were in love with each other for years, and at 22 years old finally declared their love for one another and dated for two years. When the book kicks off, they've been broken up for four years, and find themselves on the same European wine and food tour. It's a friends to lovers to enemies to friends to lovers story, with some fun additional tropes thrown in (close proximity, only one bed, road trip, the list goes on).

I loved a lot of this book -- the lavish descriptions of food and wine, the romance, the scenery -- and it made me want to go on a western European food and wine tour, open a bakery+bar, and commit to a professional passion. It gave me lots of feelings, too, and I ~devoured~ it in a very short amount of time. It's highly readable, even with a few food descriptions that run a bit long.

The Pairing didn't hit me quite as hard for me as the desperation, comedy, and forbidden love of Red, White & Royal Blue, though, and I didn't find it as tightly or compellingly plotted as I Kissed Shara Wheeler. I also had a hard time with the core conflicts being mis-/poor communication (and didn't feel like their communication struggles were resolved enough at the end to make me believe the epilogue).

But I still really enjoyed it, and would recommend it highly if you liked CMcQ's other books.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC!

After breaking up years ago on a flight to Europe, Kit and Theo find themselves on the Food and Wine Tour they both bailed on after their in-flight break-up. Once childhood best friends and later lovers, Theo and Kit have both grown and changed in the years since their break-up.

Theo is a stellar bartender owning a p0p0-up trailer for mixing drinks, and set to take the Sommelier test for the third and hopefully last time. Kit never returned to California after the break-up and has honed their baking skills. It's a pairing that's meant to be.

The biggest obstacle to Kit and Theo getting back together is Kit and Theo. As friendship and more sparks between them, they'll have to make peace with the past in order to create a future together.

Another stellar read from Casey McQuiston!

This is a book about childhood friends that then became lovers and broke up on the way to a good and wine tour, and then when they each finally redeem their separate credit for the tour, they end up on the same wine tour. So, this book combines second chance romance with childhood lovers which are two of my favorite tropes, and I was not disappointed. It was a great balance between heartfelt and hilarious, continuing with Casey McQuiston’s amazing streak of books.

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for the advanced copy.

I really enjoyed this book. I've been a Casey McQuiston fan since Red White and Royal Blue. That book is very near and dear to me. This book is just as fantastic. It is very different then their other books but it truly feels like they've grown as an author and shows in this book. The food, wine, people, and places are vibrant and vivid, having been carefully crafted to create a whole story. Kit and Theo have wonderful stories in the book but also they are so well developed separately and together. The book made me want to travel so badly and experience the places in it and the food. I want to be friends with Kit and Theo and a lot of the other characters in it, even the minor ones. I probably rate more books than I should 5-Stars but this would be 6 or 7 seven stars if I could. I already want to reread it.

i've been highly anticipating this release due to my love of one last stop (and i've read all of CMQ's books). the pairing follows a pair of bi exes who are stuck on a european food tour, their past feeling and competitive nature causes them to set up an international seduction competition. it fails to replicate my favorite thing about OLS, which is the rounded out cast of queer supporting characters. while The Pairing had fun side plots, those characters aren't fleshed out due to the main characters being out of their home environments. this book is a fun summer read (light and obvious plot) and spicier than previous CMQ novels

thanks netgalley and st martin's press for the eArc in exchange for an honest review.

I had a lot of fun reading this story, and while I can definitely picture the audience for this book, unfortunately, this one was not for me. And that's okay!

Across their social media platforms, Casey McQuiston has coined The Pairing as their "horniest book," and I definitely agree. This book was filled with passion and romance, and the European food and wine tour made for a fun summer backdrop, but I felt the story was lacking in plot and more focused on the hookups for Kit and Theo.

The romantic tension between Kit and Theo was excellent--the pining between them was strong, and I was rooting for them the entire time. But for their actual characterization, I didn't find myself connecting with either Kit or Theo the way I have with previous POV characters that McQuiston has written. Don't get me wrong--I enjoyed the cast of characters immensely; I just couldn't quite connect with them.

I couldn't help but notice the book was filled with summary as well; there was a lot of internal monologuing where the characters summarized events that had happened or conversations they were having, and I wanted more "show" and less "tell" throughout. I think the amount of summary contributed to my inability to connect with Kit and Theo as well.

Overall, this was a quick read and a fun story, but I'm not sure I can see myself rereading it; I'm more likely to pick up a book from McQuiston's back catalogue.

Thank you to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for providing me with an ARC in exchange for a review!

3.5

If you distill The Pairing down to one word, I think that word is “indulgence.” This book is an abundant feast for the senses, with lusciously described locales, food, wine, art, sex, history and more. The thing with indulgence, though, is it’s fairly easy to slip into overindulgence, which I do think this book ultimately suffers from. If you’ve read Casey’s other books, especially RWRB, you know their love of research and art and history is well-established, and I don’t begrudge them this opportunity to get to really dive deep into these subjects here. But with any good vacation, there comes a point where you’re just overstuffed, tired, and ready to go home, and unfortunately that’s how I felt by the halfway point of this book when it came to all the detailed descriptions.

All of the above would probably work for me just fine if the romance here did, but unfortunately I just didn’t fall for this pairing the way I wanted to. I love a second-chance romance, in large part because you often get to see the couple fall in love twice, both in the past and the present. But the reality is we get neither here. The book opens immediately with past Theo and Kit essentially declaring their love at the age of 22, but their love stretches back before even that. “Love took root in me before I even knew its name” is what Kit thinks when reflecting on their meeting at age 8. 8! Kit and Theo then break up and spend 4 years apart before they are reunited on a tour through Europe, and the thing is they’ve never really fallen out of love. And while this sentiment is lovely, and the book is filled beautiful passages about their love, my favorite part of reading a romance is watching the characters fall in love, and I felt deprived of that here.

As always with their books, The Pairing is beautifully written. The depiction of gender and sexuality is really thoughtful and clearly carefully done while also seeming effortless. I’ve seen Casey post a lot about their goal of celebrating sluts with this book, and I think that goal was successfully met in a way I’ve never seen before. To sum it up, there is a lot to love here, but maybe it’s all just too much of a good thing.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the e-arc. All opinions my own.