A perfect rom com to start beach reading! The twist on Romeo and Juliet: Roman and Jules, The Montbeau. and Capelthorne families have been warring for years, and now they have a battle of bookshops. Who will win? Is there a nefarious plan or will the Capelthornes finally win? After Jules’ aunt falls and needs help, Jules leaves her London publishing job to go back home and help her aunt with her beloved bookshop, where Jules often spent the night. A few weeks later, Roman opens a new bookshop across the street! How will these lifelong enemies cope with this new affront? Just delightful, with a plausible HEA!

This was a cute, fast read for me.
Battle of the Bookshops is a modern Enemies to Lovers á la Romeo and Juliet. If you like small towns, great banter, and rivals falling for each other, this is for you.

I overall enjoyed it and read it quite quickly, which was nice. My only issue with it was that some moments felt quite dragged out and the leaning on Romeo and Juliet a little too heavily got old after a while. I did still enjoy the characters and their chemistry though!

Thank you to the publisher for this advanced copy.

This is a cosy small town love story. That sees Jules and Roman from two warring families (think modern day Romeo and Juliet) in forced proximity as they both return to their childhood home town and battle it out for their bookshops and love. I enjoyed the story overall, the idea was certainly different from other romances I've read before. There were some really sweet moments and the ending was nice. It just lacked somethings for me. At points I found both Jules and Roman we're annoyingly and unnecessarily rude and stubborn. Other moments felt rushed and others felt unnecessary to the story. I feel more of Romans POV would've been nice as well as exploring their relationship more.

The Battle of the Bookshops is a take on Romeo and Juliet, but modern day and involving rival bookshop families. Jules is summoned home after her Great Aunt Flo is injured and just as she gets back to town, her nemesis Roman moves home as well. Jules decides to stay and help Aunt Flo with the bookshop when suddenly, a brand new bookshop opens directly across the street by none other than Roman and his family.
Obviously the book is fairly predictable from the start and so I generally didn’t mind that. It’s fine. But so many things were just… unlikely. Here they are in a small town, it’s clear a new business is opening and yet NOBODY knows what it is? That’s beyond far-fetched. Also, it’s clear that at some point Jules and Roman will start dating but they go from sworn enemies to casually dating to in love in the blink of an eye. The relationship has such little development. And the ending… everything just suddenly ties up and it’s over.
Again, as a whole the book was ok. But it was just ok. Three stars.
Thanks to NetGalley, the author and the publisher for access to this ARC.

I’m a sucker for a book about books, whether it has a MC who is a writer, the publishing industry, or in this case, it’s about rival bookshops. I love the rivals to lovers trope.

Overall it was a cute read. My biggest complaint was the way the bookshop part of the storyline was pushed to the side at the very end. If you’re going to title the book Battle of Bookshops, I want the conclusion of the bookshop battle to be in the book and not thrown into the epilogue.

3.25 stars

In a cozy twist on Romeo and Juliet, Jules returns to home to her aunt's bookstore only to find that her family's worst rival, Roman Montbeau, has opened a bigger, grander bookshop across the street. Jules is furious, but she's not about to back down. No, she'll push back, and maybe fall into Roman's arms along the way.
I loved the concept and the homey little town. I absolutely adored the Capelthorne's dusty bookshop, and my favorite character was by far Charlie, the antique specialist who popped in and decided he belonged. The found/refound family was really sweet.
However, I just found the pacing a little bit odd. Jules and Roman have history, which we're somewhat told about, and Roman's POV is quite sporadic. I didn't find the romance super investing, but overall, I really loved the small-town atmosphere.
Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC! All opinions are my own.

DNF at 12%!

Thank you Avonbooks and NetGalley for an ARC of this book, and I am deeply sorry to have to not finish it.

On the first page, the FMC compares an interaction with her boss as bad as a genocide. I just… it didn’t even add anything to the plot, nor is it ever okay to compare anything to genocide? All for what, to chalk it up to a quirky character? I did try to push on and move past it but the author’s writing style is not something I enjoy. She has run-on sentences and chunky paragraphs that make it difficult to follow. I am unable to move forward to reading this book, unfortunately.

Family enemies for generations. And things aren't looking to get better when Roman opens a new bookstore across the street from Jules' family bookstore that has been open for generations.

But for years both have been pining for each other. Things start looking up when Roman starts bringing Jules coffee and secret care packages when she's sick. And they decide to give things a try. But will they be able to have the fairy tale ending???

This book was fun and I love ANYTHING British set in a bookshop. I was much more interested in Charlie as a character and the antiquarian drama/witchcraft piece than the Roman/Jules relationship, which was sweet. I love the backstories.

Read: May 14th - May 19th
Format: E-Book
Rating: No rating, DNF-ed @ 16%

I just couldn't get into this book for the life of me, and I think it's because of the writing. There's soooo many huge, clunky paragraphs that take up almost the entirety of my Kindle screen with relatively small font. The one that took up the entire page (plus some on the page before) was TWENTY-FIVE LINES. And these huge paragraphs weren't uncommon, proving a strain on my eyes. I also have to start and stop relatively frequently because I read while at work, and that's soooo hard to do with those huge paragraphs, struggling to re-find my spot each time.

The writing is also just extremely dry, in my opinion. There was no real character voice, making the long paragraphs even harder to get through. The author also sprinkled in a lot of unusual words that just really stood out compared to the rest of the writing, and not in a good way.

Okay enough plot, and the writing isn't horrible, just not gripping (to me), so hopefully others can find joy in this book where it lacked for me.

A modern, less tragic, retelling of Romeo and Juliet centered on the owners of rival bookshops whose families have a long and loveless history.

I wanted to like this so much but I struggled with the pacing and found it hard to connect with the MCs. Though it didn’t quite work for me it’s a light, quick read and will make a good poolside or beach day book.

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher and author for granting my request to read this e-ARC and provide my honest opinions.

Rival families. Rival bookshops. A love story just waiting to happen. But sadly, this one missed the mark for me.

There were too many plot points pulling the story in different directions—rival businesses & families, a forgotten ancestor with little relevance, and a strained mother-daughter relationship. It all felt scattered and unfocused.

I honestly thought that the author should have stuck to one plot point and followed through with it! I came for the enemies-to-lovers but I got none of that 😮‍💨.

Overall,I didn’t enjoy this as much as I’d hoped. A tighter focus on a single storyline could have made a big difference. Thank you once again for the e-ARC.

Thank you to NetGalley and Avon and Harper Voyager for this eARC. All opinions are my own and this review is written voluntarily.

The Battle of the Bookshops is a fun and lighthearted story surrounding Roman and Jules and their longtime family feud that have put them both at odds with each other. Sound familiar? I enjoyed the little nod to the classic Romeo and Juliet tale, and I am glad this story had a happier ending. This plot centers around two bookshops, one old and one new, and the competition sparks some conflicting romantic feelings between our two main characters. This book is full of banter while also diving into the inner struggle of maintaining family loyalty while also wanting to follow your heart.

Overall, I give this book 3 stars. It was an easy and fun read that most rom-com readers will enjoy. This book is written in third person, but did jump between characters' perspectives quite often. I think I would have liked it better if each chapter switched between Roman and Jules POV versus randomly. The pacing was also a little jumbled, and the MMC was conflicting up until the very end for me. I did enjoy the enemies to lovers plot as a whole and thought it was an endearing romantic story.

Going to keep this one short and sweet, because while this book wasn't my cup of tea personally, I'm sure there are some out there who would enjoy it. I really struggled overall with the pacing and flow of the writing - I had a lot of trouble keeping track of what was happening in the story. I also really struggled with Jules and Roman (a nod, yes, to Romeo and Juliet), and we really just didn't click. Jules' off the bat rubbed me the wrong way, and Roman - I did not see a single redeeming quality in that man until the end. I think his "redemption" needed to be moved up; you need to give the reader time to actually like him in order to sell the romance between Jules and Roman.

I set out to read this with the best intentions, but I found the writing style to be confusing and a bit juvenile from the start. It leaned really heavily into some tropes I'm not a fan of (especially "not like other girls" and "thinks she's and ugly duckling but is really a swan"). Unfortunately, I couldn't finish this book.

On the very first page the FMC compares her boss denying her vacation time as equivalent to genocide and that just seems very tone deaf and gross. There are so many other ways the author could’ve described that for dramatic effect but that was just not it for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and Harper Collin’s for the advance read on this one.

I read it in maybe 2 couch rots but it was a slog toward the end.

This one was not for me. To be fair, I did not realize it was a Romeo and Juliet remake until I’d already started, so that’s on me.

That being said, it just didn’t have enough character dev for me and the plot progressions seemed to be really slow and then quick out of nowhere. Like they’d had 2-3 interactions and then bam they’re in love. There was proclaiming of feelings and events that happened but not enough groundwork to back them up and make them feel real. Felt disjointed and it was definitely too long.

If you’re into classic updates and/or insta love this may be for you but not my bag.

First, a big thank you to NetGalley for the ARC of Poppy Alexander’s novel “The Battle of the Bookshops" – “A charming literary-themed novel about a young woman determined to save her great-aunt’s beloved bookshop from extinction by the shiny new competition—which also happens to be run by the handsome son of her family’s rivals.”

This was a super loose Romeo and Juliet retelling. So naturally the main character names are Roman and Jules.

The primary plot point was that they each owned a bookshop across the street from one another, their families were “enemies, which meant they were fighting each other business-wise. Which being right across from another bookstore seems like a really poor business decision. The competition was fun. I enjoyed reading of the ways Jules improved the shop with her aunt.

In terms of the characters, Jules and Roman, I found myself liking both of them individually, but I struggled to see them as a couple. The story leaned heavily on the tension between their families and the rivalry connected to the bookshop, which overshadowed the development of their relationship. To me, there was a noticeable lack of chemistry between Roman and Jules. Roman was a verbal ass most of the time. Roman would do sweet things but also I found him borderline abusive. We didn’t get nearly enough of his POV to understand what was happening in his head. And then he just admits to himself he loves her out of the blue? The romance went from nonexistent burn to head over heels for both of them with like no build up or history.

I would have loved for this story to dig deeper into each character, particularly Roman's. It felt as though a significant portion of their story was left unexplored, leaving me wanting more. Overall, while the plot and the characters had their charms, it ultimately didn’t resonate with me as much as I had hoped.

The chemistry issue was reflected by the pacing of everything was just off. Some events went by and gave me whiplash, then others dragged on and I found myself skimming ahead to get to the point.ne’s and just left the awkward enemies-to-lovers trope out. As far as Romeo and Juliet retellings, I think there are better options out there.

I received an ARC through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I thought this was a very cute book and I will recommend it to my book club. Perfect summer easy read.

This was a modern day Romeo and Juliet and it was a really cute and fun read. Jules and Roman both end up back in their hometown after years of being away to find the centuries old family feud is still going strong. They’re pitted head to head this time in the “battle of the bookshops”. Who will come out on top? I found this to be a pretty cute and quick read. I didn’t particularly connect with the characters but enjoyed the story anyhow.
Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC.