4.5⭐. Thank you NetGalley & Forever for the ARC.

Where do I even begin with how I fell in love with Love in Focus? I giggled, I kicked my feet, I cried (yes there were tears!), I self-reflected. That's just how much of an impact this novel had on me.

Second Chance Romance is such a huge YMMV, since it's heavily dependent on the reason why the couple broke up in the first place and if that reason is forgivable. Thankfully for LiF, I didn't find it to be a particularly huge dealbreaker since 1) Celeste broke it off without warning since her family was experiencing a HUGELY turbulent time (view spoiler); 2) they were both 21 (speaking as someone in her 30s, people in that age are still Young & Dumb™); and 3) the characters don't excuse nor condone their missteps. There is acknowledgement for the hurt caused, the seeking of forgiveness, and empathy from both parties. As a whole, I felt it was aptly and sensitively handled.

Once that was addressed, I could sit back and enjoy their blooming romance. The benefit of Second Chance Romance that I enjoy as a trope is the lingering attraction that never truly went away and the chemistry that is easy to fall back into, without me getting annoyed that it felt like instalove. They have all this history already, so it's both heart-wrenching and heart-afluttering that despite almost a decade later, both of them still remember each other's likes and dislikes. What makes the other tick. How to cheer up the other person. Reminding each other why they fell in love in the first place. There are SO many cute moments.

(And spicy moments. Get ready for (view spoiler).)

After I got past the secondhand embarrassment that is Gemma's panic over working with her Hot Ex, her working together with Celeste is actually a lot of fun. It helped that I loved the concept of their magazine assignment—"Modern Love in Focus"—whereby they interview and photograph couples of various age groups, ethnicities, genders and sexualities. One of the novel's highlights is when Gemma suggests that they interview an old sapphic couple, after realising that she didn't grow up with sapphic couples as role models for romance, be it in media or real life. It's a no-brainer in this day and age that representation is important, and so the impact of seeing queer elders in a committed relationship can't be understated. That even after struggling for years against internal and external factors, queer joy through growing old with someone you love is possible. I'm so happy that author Lyla Lee chose to feature this, given how much I related to Gemma & Celeste's lamentation on this subject of not having queer elders to look up to.

On that same note, the emphasis on wanting to interview queer couples of color is also great, given that a huge part of the novel addresses Gemma and Celeste's life experience of being sapphic AND Korean. Both have Traditional Parents that struggled with their daughters' sexualities, though it's gotten much better now that they're adults pushing 30. It's also not all doom and gloom, as Lee seamlessly includes instances of their culture that made me feel like a familiar hug, being Asian myself.

And as I grew more and more invested in Gemma & Celeste's romance, LiF also made a point to proudly declare "Love isn't just romantic.". In Gemma's POV, she reflects on how her parents and best friends were still there for her in her lowest moments; the latter of whom even let her move in with them after her engagement fell through and she moved out from the apartment she shared with her ex-fiancé. There was a point in the story where it seemed like Gemma was going to go on the oft-seen journey in romances where the Careerwoman Moves Far Away For a Huge Promotion, but LiF subverts that because her loved ones are too important to her to move across the country for a job. Your community, your family by blood AND by choice, are just as important.

But what really, REALLY cemented this as a romance for me to love wholeheartedly was actually the Third Act Breakup ... well, more specifically the reason behind it and the aftermath that led to their eventual reunion. I love love love when a couple takes the time to WORK on themselves. At the climatic moment when both women admit their love for the other, the easy route would be for them to go "fuck it, let's just give into our feelings and BE together". But Celeste's debilitating fear of their relationship ending badly a second time and Gemma's rushing into another romance a mere two months after her seven year-engagement ended are symptoms of their deeply rooted issues. Issues that they had to tackle on their own before devoting time and energy to someone else. They're both messed up individuals and it takes courage & maturity to acknowledge that.

It's after they work on said issues (hello therapy!) and end up emotionally healthier and more secure in themselves, that makes their reunion by book's end soooo much sweeter and satisfying. Sure, at this point it's practically a Third Chance Romance, but hey, third time's the charm.

For all the great points of LiF that I liked, I rounded down the .5 because there's an unfortunate part of the novel early on in Celeste's POV that can easily and understandably be interpreted as biphobic:

"But nothing could mitigate the intense pain and betrayal Celeste felt when she'd finally managed to pull herself back to the surface, only to discover that Gemma had not only moved on, but she moved on with a man. A lesbian's worst nightmare. Since then, Celeste had refused to do relationships, a rule that Gretchen Sanders [Celeste's current fling] had blatantly ignored. It's only natural for someone to think they would be the exception, that they would be the one to change someone else and achieve that pipe dream happily ever after. "

And I don't begrudge any bi reader for disliking this! I would've felt the same as a bi person myself. I will say it didn't feel like an immediate punch to the gut since the paragraph preceding the above a mere page earlier was,

"Gemma told Celeste that she'd never dated a girl before. But after countless days and nights of going on dreamlike dates around LA and whispering sweet nothings in each other's ears, Celeste had hoped she was the exception."

So this seemed to me that Celeste was spiraling over the possibility that she could've very well been a phase of experimentation, though this is an interpretation of mine and if intended, is very very awkwardly written. My reading into this is compounded by the fact that it's later revealed that Celeste's main point of contention* was that Gemma moved on fast from their more-than a-year-long relationship. And that she wasn't always sure if Gemma actually enjoyed their physical intimacy during their past relationship, since Gemma didn't tend to reciprocate as much as she received. Would Celeste had felt differently if Gemma had romantic experience with other women before Celeste alongside men, or gotten into a relationship with a man much later after their break up? Who's to say.

*That and the fact that her parents divorced after twenty years together. Both incidents were what led to Celeste's disillusionment towards love and she outright states so.

I choose to give Lyla Lee the benefit of the doubt, given that 1) she is a bi writer, and I would not have taken this as kindly if the writer wasn't bi; 2) every time Celeste mentions she felt hurt by her past relationship was because of how SOON Gemma got into a relationship rather than the gender of her next partner; and 3) Lee includes the various microaggressions that Gemma faces as a bi woman, such as people assuming she's into threesomes and feeling like her parents are hoping she ends up with a man. It felt out of the norm to slip in another microaggression that goes unchallenged.

Again, other bi readers are well within their right to dislike the choice of words; I am merely stating why I'm not wholly thrown off by it.

Love in Focus had so much potential but fell flat for me. It was cute but i kept catching myself bored at some points.

If you wants a quick, OwnVoic, second chance, sapphic beach read this is definitely for you

Thank you to Forever for access to the e-ARC and ALC in exchange for an honest review.
This book was giving me ALL the feels. Gemma and Celeste are such an amazing pairing, and reading about/listening to them both grow together and apart was honestly amazing. I love the way the author created their relationship, and how they kept on coming back to each other throughout the book. I love all the romance novels references, and I love the found family that was formed. Kiara and Val are the perfect found family for Gem. The narrators did a FANTASTIC job voicing Gemma and Celeste, and causing me to laugh so hard and tear up at different times. Overall I highly recommend this novel and the audiobook!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

Celeste and Gem are exes. It's been 8 years and Gem thought she would never see Celeste again but a work project has thrown them back together unexpectedly. Their chemistry is still off the charts and with Gem recently single the sparks are hard to resist.

I loved this one. The audio was fantastic, and the story was fantastic.

Recommended!

Love in Focus by Lyla Lee was such a sweet, sapphic romance story.
I loved the story and the writing so much.
The characters were great and the story flowed smoothly.
The writing is warm and heartfelt, full of moments that made me pause and feel every emotion with the characters.
A heartwarming, slow-burn, funny queer romance that was utterly delightful.

Love in Focus is a heartfelt sapphic rom-com about Gemma, a relationship columnist, and her ex Celeste, a photographer, who reunite for a project that reignites old feelings. Lyla Lee offers engaging writing and authentic exploration of identity, healing, and queer love within a rich cultural setting. While the pacing is a bit fast, the story is a refreshing, emotional read for fans of inclusive romance.

Love in Focus was such a cute sapphic second chance romance! It follows Gemma, whose seven year relationship just abruptly ended, despite the fact that the two of them were engaged. Now Gemma's trying to figure out where to live and wondering exactly what went wrong while also taking on this really amazing opportunity at work to write an article entitled Love in Focus. The catch? The photographer she's been paired with is Celeste, who also happens to be her ex-girlfriend from college who one day just disappeared from Gemma's life.

I loved the way the work aspect of this job is truly what brought the two of them back together. I felt like getting to see these various couples talk about what love is to them and seeing how they love one another was such an important piece of this book. And actually, the sapphic elders? The best inclusion. In fact, one of the best aspects of this book was how much social commentary there was. I will say that the reason for the break up originally irritated me a bit, but I can see how college students could have made the decisions that led to this happening. All in all, I enjoyed this one and I hope that you will too!

well... shock to see that this second chance sapphic romance book has (ex) friends-to-benefits trope at the last 30% of the book...

aside from that, i'm tired at both characters. for gemma, she said that she didn't want to talk about james; her ex-fiancé, but she stills talking about his ex chapter per chapter. celeste on the other hand, that one chapter for the last <i>modern love in focus interview is the reason why she and gemma got miscommunication FOR YEARS. of course, some of the pop terms mentioned sooo...

but the only positive comment about this is the concept of modern love in focus interview. i admire some of the interviewers

for the audiobook, i'm in awe to hear natalie naudus' voice again (since i've her since kiss her once for me). and yep, still love her narration. catherine ho however, also great narration, but some of the character's voices sounded the same. overall, it's okay

Thank you so much to Forever and Lyla Lee for this ARC! This book was so cute, was a quick read, and had such great representation included in the story!!

I love a second chance romance, and Gemma and Celeste were the perfect blend of “what could we be right now if we had just communicated better before?” and “we needed that time apart to grow into the people we were meant to become!” The heart of why I love this trope so much!! What really stood out to me that sets this story apart from others is the Gemma and Celeste get talking about what went wrong almost immediately. They may have downplayed how some elements truly affected them but the bones of what happened were revealed to each other soon after they reunite. I loved this because we got to see them with more of a fresh start than other second chance romances allow!

The true heart of this story though was love, in all its forms! When we first meet Gemma at the start of this book, her fiancé has just ended their engagement with no real reason as to why he has suddenly stopped loving her after 7 years together. Gemma is 29, sleeping on her friend’s couch, and just trying to figure out what her next move is! Her boss assigns her to a story feature about modern love and the photographer brought in is OBVIOUSLY none other than her college ex Celeste! There is of course Gemma and Celeste fighting the attraction that never went away between them, but there is also them getting to know each other as adults and learning more about their lives during their time apart. But there is also the beautiful love stories of the couples they feature in the story, Gemma’s parents love and worry for their daughter going through a rough time, Kiara and Val’s love for Gemma and wanting her to be happy, Celeste and her best friend Min-Joon and the way they both support each other through their life, and also my personal favorite of Gemma and Celeste learning to love themselves again to be better prepared to receive and give love back to others. I was truly captivated by this story!

If you’ve ever wondered what would happen if an early 2000s rom-com met a queer millennial crisis—with a splash of real-life heartbreak, cultural nuance, and the world’s spiciest reunion—Love in Focus is that book.

This story follows Gemma, a romantically-skeptical writer who’s just been dumped after seven years by a man who didn’t even bother with a decent explanation. Oof. With her love life in shambles and nowhere to live, she throws herself into a major project at work, only to find out she’ll be partnering with her ex-girlfriend, Celeste. You know, the one who ghosted her in college via a single, sad little breakup text. Casual.

What Gemma doesn’t know is that Celeste didn’t ghost because she stopped caring. She left to take care of her sick mom in Korea, sacrificing her own heart in the process. Now, years later, fate, and some workplace proximity, forces them to reckon with what happened…and what could still be.

Tropes? We got ‘em:
✅ Second chance romance
✅ Forced proximity
✅ Sapphic soulmates
✅ Columnist meets photographer
✅ Sweet with a heavy dash of spice

The chemistry between Gemma and Celeste is electric, full of lingering glances, simmering tension, and some truly blush-worthy scenes. (Seriously. I listened at 2.25x speed like a degenerate and still managed to gasp out loud.)

But it’s not just about the heat, it’s also a story about healing, identity, and the beautiful messiness of queer love across cultures and generations. Through the interviews Gemma and Celeste conduct for their joint assignment, we get poignant insights into how queerness intersects with race, family, and community. Celeste’s Korean-American background and her choices around duty vs. desire hit especially hard.

Yes, there are a few moments where the book dips into slightly cliché territory (Beyoncé shoutouts and zodiac signs abound), and some queer themes are over-explained for the audience. But if you’re sapphic and into star signs, you’re probably just nodding along anyway.

Love in Focus is a heartwarming, slow-burn, laugh-out-loud queer romance that isn’t afraid to get vulnerable OR spicy. Whether you’re in it for the Clementine-colored couch, the “will-they-won’t-they” tension, or the joy of watching two flawed people find their way back to each other, this one’s a total win.

✨ ARC Review ✨

I enjoyed this steamy sapphic novel. Did it wow me? Unfortunately, no. But it was a solid effort with some genuinely sexy moments.

Gemma has just been unceremoniously dumped by her fiancé after *seven* years together. No explanation. She’s bunking on her friends’ couch now. Aaaand she’s just found out she’ll be working with her college era ex-girlfriend, Celeste. Celeste who completely ghosted her eight years ago. Again, no explanation.

I’ll be honest: this part of the story DID NOT work for me and since it’s central to the entire thing, this is why I only enjoyed it rather than wanting to sell it to every person I’ve ever met. Celeste’s reasoning for not letting her girlfriend know why she hightailed it back to Seoul was asinine.

Okay, now for the good stuff: I loved Gemma’s friendship with Kiara and Val. I loved the desire to find elder Asian lesbian couples for the article they’re creating. Representation matters always. I loved all the food descriptions. And I loved the way Gemma and Celeste yearned for each other and those times they let that yearning loose? Sexy. Hot. 🥵

Would I recommend it? For the reasons I loved? Sure. Overall? Only if you’ve read every other sapphic romance available.

I was given this eARC via #netgalley and @readforeverpub. Allison thoughts are mine alone.

#romance #romancebooks #contemporaryromance #sapphicromance #sapphicbooks #sapphiclovestories #lgbtqia+ #lgbtquia+books #bookreview #bookstagram #loveinfocus

Thank you Forever for the ARC and Hachette Audio for the ALC!

There were some things I liked about this but overall it didn’t really work for me. I liked the representation and discussion around not seeing elder queer people who look like you but I wanted to like the relationship more than I did.

Gemma was ok but Celeste annoyed me. She never really took responsibility for how she ended their relationship years ago. Instead she continued to be upset that Gemma moved on after a few months, even though she’s the one who left without a word! And Gemma apologizes for it?? And god forbid she moved on with a man 😱 that line of ‘a lesbians worst nightmare’ really bothered me and felt super biphobic. I just couldn’t get past how caught up Celeste was about Gemma moving on, making it a huge deal when she’s the one who did something wrong, and then using that as an excuse to not pursue things in the present.

I also didn’t love the switching of tenses and point of views between the two women. It felt unnecessary and jarring and honestly with how little we saw from Celeste’s POV it felt like hers could have been cut entirely. They didn’t really add anything to the story.

Overall, it had some good moments and I liked the concept but it just didn’t execute it well enough.

Romance advice columnist Gemma Cho is devastated when her fiancé breaks up with her after seven years. James told her abruptly that he just didn’t love her anymore, so Gemma gave back the ring, packed up some clothes, and moved in with her best friends Val and Kiara until she figured out what to do next. Crashing on her friends’ sofa, a comfortable orange couch named Clementine, helped Gemma to feel better. But James works at the same magazine she does, so when she stumbles on him making out with another woman at the office just weeks after he had broken up with her, she is feeling especially low.

But she has to focus. She has been given a big story to work on, and with the right interviews and photos, it could potentially be a cover story. The project is about love, the interviews on couples who have been together for a while. Gemma will be asking each couple about their backstory, how they met, how they make it work, and what love means to them. Personally, it’s a hard time for Gemma to be around so many happy couples, but she wants to be on this project, so she tries to put her personal feelings aside. And the magazine has hired a photographer to take pictures and videos of the couples.

Gemma is shocked when she meets the photographer. It’s Celeste Min. Celeste is a world-class photographer and her work could put their project over the top for Gemma and for the magazine. But more importantly, Celeste is the woman in college who made Gemma understand she was bisexual, and she was Gemma’s first love. They had talked about spending the rest of their lives together. And then Celeste disappeared suddenly, leaving Gemma alone and confused. Gemma tried to get ahold of her, but Celeste didn’t answer any of her calls or emails. Gemma was devastated and ended up blocking Celeste on social media. She finished school and started working at the magazine, where she had met James.

Now it’s seven years later. Gemma is newly single. And she’s spending time with her ex-girlfriend as people talk about their love stories. Will they be able to keep things professional, or will the benefits in their friendship become more than just what HR has to offer?

Love in Focus is a charming sapphic love story about broken hearts and the work it takes to find healing. With the feel of an old-fashioned rom com, these women figure out what works best for them as they decide whether to put their hearts back on the line or not. Both of these women are Korean, and the culture adds more drama as they try to live up to the expectations of their families and their communities. Set in San Francisco, this love story has layers of sweetness and heartache, acceptance and rejection. But it’s truly a sweet sapphic love story with some genuinely funny moments.

I listened to the audio book of Love in Focus, narrated by Natalie Naudus and Catherine Ho. Most of the chapters are told from Gemma’s point of view, but Celeste has her own chapters as well, so we do get to find out what had happened that caused her to leave school so suddenly and not reach out to Gemma for all that time. I thought both narrators did an excellent job bringing these characters to life, and there was no hesitation in those spicy scenes either. Listening to Love in Focus was a lot of fun, and following the love story of these Korean women made for a special read.

Egalleys for Love in Focus were provided by Forever, and a copy of the audio book was provided by Hachette Audio, both through NetGalley, with many thanks, but the opinions are mine.

This was an interesting read. I liked the characters and found it to be a nice read. The story felt realistic and the romance took a while to take off. The ending was unique and gave me a bigger appreciation for the story. Definitely a read that others should check out. 3.75 stars

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the arc

thank you foreverpub for the e-arc and physical copy of love in focus! this sapphic second chance romance is out now.

gemma (she/her) is a romance advice columnist and gets assigned a new project. the photographer on the project is her ex celeste (she/her), who she hasn't seen in eight years. the project forces them to spend time together and neither of them feels over the other, but the two of them are kind of messy and celeste is scared. gemma's chapters are written in first person, and celeste has fewer chapters that are written in third person.

i enjoyed how messy they were, it felt realistic for them not to be thinking logically because many of us don't, either, and i surprisingly didn't mind the switch between first and third person. the sex scenes felt realistic—not knowing what to do, not being used to something and running out of energy, needing breaks. the two of them cannot keep their hands (or mouths) off each other, and i was in the mood for an open-door book.

a few things that made me rate this a 3.5ish out of 5:
- the amatonormativity. the project gemma and celeste are working on is about "modern love," which everyone interprets as romantic love. one of the people they interview mentions other forms of love and gemma is like oh that's interesting, but then that thought doesn't really go anywhere. there are also a few moments of "everyone wants love" or "everyone loves love" even though aromantic people are mentioned at one point.

- lockdown is mentioned, which means covid has happened in this universe but there's no mention of public safety at alllllll and we all know how i feel about that

- there is one line i want to talk about because i've overthought it several times: "...only to discover that gemma had not only moved on, but she'd move on with a man. a lesbian's worst nightmare."

because on one hand, i understand the knee-jerk, immediate reaction of "ugh god men." we live in a patriarchal, capitalist society that values toxic masculinity, and it's easy to assume that someone is going to date a mediocre or terrible man and that can feel incredibly disappointing. i'm not going to pretend i think men are wonderful or that i think all of them deserve romantic or sexual attention from the wonderful women i know, and honestly i've thought the same thing about an ex. on the other hand, i understand how this is being read as biphobic, because we don't get to decide what other people do with their lives and we need to trust and allow people to make decisions for themselves, and those decisions include what genders to date, and celeste knew that gemma was bisexual. and then i continued thinking and it made me feel gross as a lesbian, like not being attracted to men is such a big part of our identity and we go around hating men all the time and we care more if an ex is dating a man than if they're dating someone who is abusive or racist etc. and after reading the rest of the book, it felt out of place for celeste to think--she was heartbroken that gemma had seemingly moved on so quickly and didn't mention or seem to care about who gemma moved on with. i don't know. but the line did make me uncomfortable and i wanted to call it out.

3.5 rounded to 4⭐️

I really enjoyed this book! It was a quick and easy read with great characters and solid representation. I enjoyed seeing Kiara & Val’s healthy relationship and watching Gemma really come into herself as her own person.

This was such a cute Queer rom-com. I really enjoyed this cute little love story.

Absolutely worth the read for any fans of LQBTQ romances.

Thank you to Netgalley & the publisher for my early e-arc copy.

2.5 stars.

Firstly, I want to say that the concept of this and the characters were fun and I did enjoy parts of it. However, there were multiple times where I didn't want to pick it back up or didn't want to continue. And this is the second time I've started it; I tried a few months ago and couldn't get past 20%.Part of my problem was the switch from 1st person to 3rd person for Celeste's chapters- it really took me out of the book and it just didn't make sense to me. And there were almost not enough of them to make it even worth having Celeste's POV. [I also thought Celeste was a lot more 'betrayed' than she should have been when she found out Gemma had moved on. She ghosted Gemma completely for months- it's not fair of her to blame Gemma for how she chose to deal with that. (hide spoiler)]

That being said, I rounded up to three stars because there were parts of this that were cute and that I liked and I really appreciated the queer Asian rep and the discussion of not only queer elders, but queer elders of color.

Delilah Green Doesn’t Care meets The Bold Type in this sapphic rom-com where two exes reconnect and are given a second chance at love.

Love in Focus was a great sapphic romance, with a nice sprinkling of spice and just a great storyline overall. I really enjoyed the way the main characters' relationship evolved over time and the outcome of the story overall.