I am a huge Disney nerd so I was excited when Hyperion offered the Meant to Be Series. These modern retellings of classic Disney stories are simply fantastic, and Worth Fighting For is no exception! It's a modern day retelling of Mulan's story from the gifted pen of Jesse Q. Sutanto, the author of Vera Wong's Unsolicited Advice for Murderers and the Dial A For Aunties series. A match made in heaven!

My expectations for this book were high, and I'm pleased to report that they were absolutely MET! The characters are all richly drawn and the nods to the original story are clear and lovely. I laughed, cringed, cheered, and swooned. Sutanto does a phenomenal job of balancing the comic nuance you'd expect from the original story, with closed door romance and the absolutely real struggles that women face in the workforce. Sutanto did not gloss over issues that deserve this spotlight and bold headlines.

It's tough to pick a favorite from this series, but if I was made to choose, Worth Fighting For would come out on top. I'm hoping this series continues and am looking forward to see what's next! Thank you to NetGalley and Hyperion Avenue for providing this advanced review copy prior to the book's publication in exchange for my honest review.

3.5⭐️

Thank you so much to NetGalley and the publisher for the arc to read and review. All opinions my own.

When I first saw that the next book in the Meant To Be collection was inspired by Mulan, I was incredibly excited as Mulan was one of my favorite Disney movies growing up. Worth Fighting For was a fun take, but I feel like there were so many elements missing from the story it’s based on. I think I may have enjoyed it more if it wasn’t apart of this series and was a story on its own with different character names. Shang was also conveniently too perfect and I felt like Mulan’s character lacked some consistency with being too bland and then towards the end making her so much more quirky than she was at the start of the book; it didn’t feel like it was natural or that character. There were some fun moments though, and I loved her relationship with her parents.

Worth Fighting For by Jesse Q. Sutanto is an absolute blast—funny, smart, and full of swoon-worthy moments. This modern Mulan-inspired rom-com follows Fa Mulan, a powerhouse in her father’s private equity firm who’s used to holding her own in a world dominated by finance bros. But when her father falls ill in the middle of a big business deal, she takes matters into her own hands—by pretending to be him.

The catch? The company she’s negotiating with is an ultra-masculine whiskey brand run by a tight-knit, old-school family that only trusts her father. And their head negotiator? The overworked but ridiculously attractive Shang. When an email exchange turns into an in-person meeting, Mulan suddenly finds herself at a weeklong ranch retreat, trying to prove she’s the high-powered CEO they think she is—all while wrangling cattle, throwing axes, and battling some very inconvenient feelings for Shang.

This book is packed with sharp humor, romantic tension, and plenty of hilarious fish-out-of-water moments. If you love strong heroines, mistaken identity shenanigans, and a slow-burn romance that will make you swoon, Worth Fighting For is a must-read!

What a great take on an updated version of the classic Mulan story! Jesse Q. Sutanto's vivid imagery pulls you into the story and the characters are well written. Mulan is smart, determined, strong, and caring, while working to break stereotypes and prove herself with every challenge she faces. Mushu steals the show with her humor - she's the perfect sidekick!

The story explores themes of tradition and stereotypes, but in true rom-com fashion there are plenty of laugh out loud moments and a touch of romance.

Thank you to NetGalley and Hyperion Avenue for providing me with an advanced reader's copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I loved this book so so much!!! It was so cute and so funny and I found myself laughing out loud multiple times at the shenanigans that Mulan finds herself into! I didn’t even realize it was a retelling of Mulan (I have yet to see the movie). I received this book as an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review. I absolutely loved the premise of a young woman making it in a male-dominated finance world and doing very well at it. Mulan should serve as a role model to young women that want to go into business and finance but are too intimated by men. I didn’t even know this book was a part of a series which can be read as stand-alones and which I will be adding all to my TBR if they aren’t there already!

Mulan is my favorite Disney character of all time - so to say that I was excited to read this book is an understatement! The characters were so fun and I loved the modern twist on this beloved story.

Mulan is a sophisticated, incredibly smart, financial analyst who is constantly looked down upon by her male peers.

Mushu is Mulan’s hilarious cousin, fashionable best friend, and accomplice in all sorts of business shenanigans.

Shang is a distractingly good looking CEO of Wutai Gold, a whiskey company that Hua Zhou (Mulan’s father) is trying to acquire.

While Sutanto’s modern retelling of this story is
undeniably humorous, it also offers a genuine portrayal of the challenges women face in the business world every day. Additionally, it serves as a poignant reminder of the many struggles that immigrants endure.

***Once you've finished the book, I highly encourage you to read the acknowledgements at the end, where she shares her own personal background.***

Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to to read this ARC! 5 stars⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Mulan was one of my favorite Disney movies growing up and I enjoyed this re-imagined version of it. I really enjoyed lyrics from the original songs making their way into the story. I did think the relationship between Mulan and Shang felt a little insta-love at times and Mushu got on my nerves at times. Overall, I think book is a fun one to pick up.

As a Disney girl, when I tell you I shrieked when I received an ARC for the next Meant to Be novel, I would be telling the truth.

Worth Fighting For is a modern day telling of Mulan, set amid finance bros in the San Francisco Bay Area. When Milan’s father suddenly falls ill, she must take over the contract of a very traditional Chinese family, and prove herself while doing it.

This was fun! I was a bit skeptical in the beginning, but as the novel went on and the plot developed, the more I enjoyed it. I already I knew I enjoyed Sutanto’s writing from her previous books (read Dial A for Aunties if you haven’t already) and this featured some laugh-out-loud moments. And I loved cousin Mushu!

Read if you like:
✔️Disney
✔️strong, smart women
✔️cultural representation and cultural food (this is a big win for me)

Thank you NetGalley and Hyperion Avenue for an advanced copy in exchange for my honest review. Worth Fighting For will be published on June 3.

Having watched Mulan countless times, I knew what to expect: Mulan trying to help her family by impersonating her father. But the book exceeded my expectations and was so much more than that. The romance between Mulan and Shang was so well written, the banter between them was so amazing, it literally had me kicking my feet. While this is a modern spin on the movie you can definitely feel the essence of the movie and the message of the troubles women have working in male dominated industries. This book was so amazing and I can't wait to read more books from this author.

Maybe if this were an original story, there would be more potential for it, but as someone who requested an arc specifically because it’s a Mulan retelling — the Disney film is one of my all-time favorites — absolutely none of this works for me. Even if the original story of Mulan (Disney movie or otherwise) were a rom-com in the traditional sense rather than a story of bravery, sense of self, and family, absolutely nothing about this book would reflect the story it’s supposedly a retelling of. The original tale isn’t really one that works when you remove the core war storyline — I’m sorry, replacing that with finance is just comical — and given that this is specifically a retelling of the Disney versions, it’s also missing 80% of the characters that make that film so lovable, and fundamentally changed the rest that remain.

Mulan goes from headstrong, stubborn, and maybe a bit reckless to a traditional simpering rom-com heroine, and Shang is a flat, lifeless love interest, instead of building a relationship with Mulan on mutual trust. Mushu becomes the standard best friend character, which is the closest any character gets to working at all, and everything else is scattered with so many tropes that it took me ages to get through what should’ve been a two-day read at most. Read at your own peril.

Thanks to Hyperion Avenue and NetGally for the advance copy.

RATING: 3/5 STARS

I actually love the concept of these modern Disney retellings, but I don't feel like this one quite did Mulan justice. I did enjoy the plot and there were some sweet moments between Mulan and Shang, but I didn't connect with Mulan. I feel like there could have been a way to write her voice as more mature while keeping the humor and antics of the source material.

This was such a disappointing read. Worth Fighting For is a Mulan retelling with lots of feminist, girl power vibes and I’m here for it. But this book felt like it was written by a high schooler. Instalove at its very cringiest, Mulan claims to be in love with Shang after what seems like a week of knowing him and is so immature in her reactions to him that it doesn’t feel believable that she’s a woman in her late 20s. And then Shang. UGH. I’m directly quoting right now: “I think I pooped myself”. I died a little on the inside as I read this. How did the author make such a likable MMC feel so lame?! Mushu was equally disappointing. In the movie he was comedic relief but I felt like we got zero humor from the character in this book. Mushu was just kind of adding to the chaos that Mulan was experiencing. All three of them just didn’t live up to their original story namesakes which makes me so sad as someone who was obsessed with watching Mulan growing up. Thanks NetGalley for the e-ARC! (

Not my favorite in this series...

This is supposed to be a Mulan retelling but it fell flat for me. The plot didn't make really any sense at all, the interactions between the MMC and FMC are awkward, and the story felt choppy with weird pacing.

I love a Disney retelling but for some reason this just wasn’t it for me. I know ARC readers shouldn’t judge formatting but this one had some bad formatting issues that did make it kinda hard to get through. I made it about half way but still never got super invested in the characters.

As a girl who loves romance novels and who grew up on Disney movies, I've been excited for the Meant to Be series since the first book came out. When I saw that the newest book was based around Mulan I was so interested to see how her story would be retooled to fit a modern world.

After reading, I'm excited to say Ms. Sutanto did an excellent job. Worth Fighting For takes place in San Francisco where Mulan works in the finance sector as one of the few females in a land of finance bros. She wears a number of metaphorical masks as she works to be the daughter she thinks her parents want and the colleague her coworkers will actually listen to.

The book dives into cultural expectations for second generation immigrants in a very realistic way and explores how those expectations are conveyed from families to their children. It covers gender norms, both in the Chinese culture and the larger American cultural landscape as well.

My only complaint was that I found a small amount of dialogue a smidge repetitive and I had to suspend my disbelief a few times when I had a hard time believing things would run as smoothly as they did. Those could easily be hyper focus things unique to me though!

The story still has a Mushu, Shang, a big lie, and a problem to overcome but it's all fit into a modern world that many readers can relate to. It's a fun read even without the movie context and picking out the similarities only makes it more enjoyable.

Thank you to NetGalley and Hyperion Avenue for allowing me to read this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.

I just could not get into this book. I had to DNF at 30%. I couldn’t connect with the characters and the writing just wasn’t for me.

Thank you to NetGalley for the advanced copy in exchange for my honest review.

3.5/ 5 I loved Mulan growing up and this retelling delivered. I had everything you would expect from a Disney retelling with a modern twist. I also really enjoyed the view of Chinese culture and the shift from the elder’s generation to a more modern world view. If you enjoy female empowerment and a modern twist on this child hood favorite I encourage you to pick this one up.

Thank you NetGalley and Penguin Random House for the arc.

I really enjoyed the story in this 5th installment of the Meant to Be Series. The modern setting of the office and the old school and sexist finance bro vibes that cause Mulan to pretend to be her father, as well as the ranch setting, were both great backdrops to the story. The character development was decent and it was fun to follow along with the modern retelling.

However, I really, really struggled with the fact that the names were kept EXACTLY THE SAME. Mulan, Mushu, Shang. COME ON. Almost all of the other installments of the series changed the names in part (Kiss the Girls didn't but the story played up the little mermaid aspect because of the musical group plotline) and it was so distracting here. Disney originally used this name because of the Moo Shu pork dish that is popular at Chinese restaurants and it always seemed like a dumb name for a dragon - made even dumber in the book because it's an adult woman!

So overall, 4 stars (Mulan is a favorite Disney movie of mine) but knocked down to 3 because of the names.

This was a quick, easy read. I liked how it stuck to the Mulan story but there really wasn’t enough romance. I also LOL’d that Shang was living in the Bayview?? Richmond or the Sunset would have made more sense if you’re leaning into SF / tech lifestyle. Overall, it was an average read.

The Meant to Be series stays a hit or miss for me, with some all time favorites and some major lows.

While this is far from my least favorite in the series (looking at you, If the Shoe Fits), I have to say it was not my favorite either. I think Mulan is not only one of the best but also one of the most important and impactful Disney films ever made. I also think it is a story that is so intricately dependent on its setting that it makes it a hard one to transport to a modern world. Unfortunately, that difficulty showed in this book.

The biggest thing I didn't like was making Mulan a- and this is exactly how the book describes it- "finance bro." In this economy particularly I don't like being put into a position where I'm rooting for the big equity firm making multi-million dollar deals. Maybe that's just me, but I also don't think that's the career Mulan herself would choose if she was in a modern AU. But I digress.

I also took some issues with the overall plot. I understand why they didn't go with Mulan pretending to be a man, as that is both impractical in a modern business setting and also could end up transphobic if not done correctly, but I think the lie she ended up telling felt a little forced. If working with a woman was going to be a dealbreaker for this firm, it realistically would have been a dealbreaker no matter what. Meaning, whether they were working with Zhou's daughter, or if Zhou had been a woman the whole time, it shouldn't have made that big of a difference. If anything, telling the truth about Zhou probably would have made them sympathetic and been the better option. I don't know, I know we had to have a lie/scheme in there somewhere to make it like the plot of the movie, but it felt like such a pointless lie and I feel like she could've won them over even easier without it.

My other major issue with this book was that rather than relying on the extremely feminist themes already inherent to the story of Mulan, this book felt like it needed to really TRY to sell how feminist it was. It was girlboss feminism, and as a feminist, I'd rather just have real feminism than the girlboss variety. Mulan was a powerful legend in her own right without needing to try to be a ~girlboss~ and that will always hit harder, in my opinion. This is just a matter of opinion though. I know plenty of people who do enjoy that kind of thing more than me. AND even with my issues, I will say, the end with Auntie Jiayi was a really powerful moment, so it still hit at times.

The book also fell back a lot on what I consider to be cringe, millennial humor. But I'm not a millennial, I'm gen Z, so maybe I'm just not the target audience there. The book never really made me laugh, though, despite very clearly trying it's hardest. Mushu in particular was not very enjoyable to me, although what happened with her at the end was actually very sweet.

All this aside, I didn't hate the book! I really loved learning more about the experiences of Chinese immigrants, I think it's so important to read and learn about immigrants, now more than ever. I also loved the way Shang was written and thought the romance between him and Mulan was very sweet (although I didn't love how she was still lying about her identity at the start of their relationship since that wasn't how it was in the original.) There was plenty to like about this book even if it wasn't my favorite.

Thank you to the folks at Hyperion and NetGalley for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review!