If you love D&D and nerdiness, this book is for you. I personally am not into D&D, so I found myself scrolling through the majority of this book to get through the role playing bits. Sadie and Noah have good chemistry, but their meet cute did not do much for me. Sadie is torn between wanting to return to the big city and work or staying in small town Texas with a new found passion.

The writing is great, so while I was not totally sucked in by the genre/theme, I will give it 4 stars. There are so many other readers this is targeted to, and I know they will enjoy it.

Thank you to Ballantine | Dell and NetGalley for the ARC. The opinions expressed are my own.

3.5 Stars
This was a really charming read. I especially loved Sadie's character and how we got to learn about her past, her desires, goals, and dreams. I connected with her a lot and really enjoyed reading about her friendship with Liam and the D&D group.

To be honest, the D&D storyline within the book wasn't quite for me; it took me a while to get into it. This also affected the romance, which went hand-in-hand with that part. I didn't feel like we got to know much about Noah until much later in the book, and I struggled to connect with his character and his relationship with Sadie.

Overall, I'd say it's an entertaining and cute story, but it just wasn't exactly for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and Dell for the eARC!

This was a cute, nerdy romance (and I mean that in the best way). I've never played D&D, but I was able to follow what was happening - I do wish we had gotten a bit more of what actually happens in addition to the campaign storyline. But it was fun to watch this couple flirt and try at romance in both realms (the D&D storyline and the real world).
It was also fun to see Sadie learn a lot about herself. And with Noah, it was interesting to see such a different lifestyle from what I feel like most people are used to (in a lovely way).
And Woods created such a great cast of side characters - I hope she'll visit this group of friends again in the future.

Roll for Romance is another entry in what seems to be a mini-trend or microtrope of "geeky" themed rom-coms. And there is a lot to love here - the author clearly loves RPGs for their storytelling potential and ability to bring people together. Indeed, the "in-game" portion of the book might have been the strongest part.

I think that's what holds me back just a little regarding this. That part worked great. But there was so little actual conflict in the main novel (and I'm fine with "cozy" books, btw) that the main plot drug. From almost the beginning of the novel I could predict what was going to happen: And while that isn't bad, it also didn't end up being exceptional. The writing is good. But a part of me wondered what might have been if the "real world" portion had been more of a mystery. Not necessarily an "enemies" book, but one where the main characters didn't know each other.

That said, you can't review the book you wanted...you have to review the book as it is. And it is definitely fun. I enjoyed it a lot. It just wasn't my favorite. 3.75 stars - rounding to 4 for GR.

Thank you to NetGalley and Dell for a chance to read an advance copy in exchange for a fair review. All opinions are my own and uncompensated. Roll for Romance is out July 15 and you can preorder it now!

Thank you to Ballentine Books and NetGalley for providing me with a digital copy of Roll for Romance by Lenora Woods in exchange for an honest review.

After losing her high-flying marketing job, Sadie Brooks is lost. She's stewing in a deep depression when her BFF Liam shows up, drags her down to stay with him in Texas, and introduces her to Dungeons and Dragons. The game inspires her in ways she hasn't felt in ages. Before she knows it, she's brushing her hair, willingly leaving the house, running errands, and making the fantasy art she'd given up ages ago.

Liam has invited other newbies to join the D&D campaign, including handsome wanderer Noah Walker. Noah is smart, funny, personable, and kind., not to mention very, very good-looking. He's in town to help his buddy establish a brewery. But Noah lives that van life, and he doesn't settle down anywhere in particular, so Sadie does her best not to get too attached. They'll both move on eventually anyway, right? She'll go back to her life in marketing, and he'll head out to his next adventure.

The story continues along parallel tracks: Sadie and Noah's story (told from her POV only) and a story version of Liam's D&D campaign. So the stories alternate between a contemporary romance, and a semi-cozy romantasy featuring Sadie's and Noah's characters. In this second tale, Priestess Jaylie and Bard Loren are recruited with a few others to act as guards at a power wizard's wedding. Things naturally go awry, and when the bride is abducted, the party must go off to rescue her.... or else. Over the course of this adventure, Jaylie and Loren grow closer until tragedy strikes and sacrifices must be made.

This second story injects a little drama into what is otherwise a sweet, very low-stakes romance between Sadie and Noah. They are two likeable people who meet while they're respectively figuring out what they want to do next. Eventually they'll have to make choices, and the only question then is whether they want those choices to include each other. By adding the fantasy elements, the author incorporates the kind of action that you can only get with magic and swords.

A minor (truly minor) quibble is that it doesn't read like a D&D campaign as someone might experience it around the gaming table. When you play D&D, the emphasis tends to be on action and dialogue because the players aren't reciting reams of narrative text. This secondary story is more like a novelization a campaign, stripping out player banter, arguments, and other extraneous elements. So readers should not read Roll for Romance if they're looking to get a feel for how a Dungeons and Dragons campaign works and feels from a player's perspective. That's not the point of this setup.

But if you're in it for a dual love-story with fantasy elements, enjoy! Recommended for readers who like fantasy and romance and maybe a little bit together but aren't ready for a full Morally Gray Shadow Daddy. (Ginger gentle-giants FTW!)

Contemporary romance
Love letter to D&D, mental health rep, golden retriever MMC, artist FMC, slow burn, small town, friends to lovers, self discovery

Thank you to Ballantine, Netgalley, and Lenora for entrusting me with an early copy!

Sadie is reeling from losing her job and is practically dragged to live with her best friend to help get her back on her feet again. While her sneaky friend is slowly forcing her out of the house with small errands and favors, perhaps the biggest thing that helps pull Sadie out of her depression is finally giving into his invitation to playing Dungeons and Dragons after avoiding it for so long. As she loses herself in her amazing new friends and their adventures, she still struggles with how her last job ended, what to do next, and if she should allow the attraction she feels towards a fellow player to become something more.

I adored this book! We got both Sadie and Noah's story and a fun D&D campaign story! As someone who hasn't played yet but has watched a million hours of others playing and discussing D&D and other table top role playing games, I loved the magic of the game and the new players falling in love with the game! I feel like the story captured the excitement and wonder of new players SO well, which is something I love watching in campaigns. There was much care put into this depiction of D&D! On the "real world" side of the story, I loved the painful self discovery and reflection put into where to go in life next, and they way there was fantastic communication between the FMC and MMC! The slow burn friends to lovers was so worth it!

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the arc.

This book was ok. I think where it went sort of sideways though is that instead of focusing on character development, it focuses more on the game of D&D. This is good for people that don't know much about the game, but also boring (in a sense) for character development.

I have never read a book like this before. It was such a fun way to watch the romance between Sadie and Noah. I was concerned at the start that I would get lost in part of the story because I haven't played D&D, but I wasn't at all. The way the author wove in the 2 storylines was seamless and I was able to follow easily.

Here we follow Sadie and Noah fall in love with each other along with their D&D characters fall in love in the campaign. We see Sadie rediscover her passion for art and learn to recognize what she wants and then go for it.

I loved how the story brought in the elements of burnout from a work environment. Sadie's experience and path to burnout followed my own experience with burnout. I also really appreciated how Sadie and Noah worked through their decisions on their own and it was clear neither tried to interfere in the decision making.

I will absolutely read another book by Lenora Woods.

Spice: 3/5
Fun: 4/5
Overall: 4/5

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for providing an eARC for an honest review.

Thank you Ballantine|Dell and NetGalley for the eARC of Roll for Romance by Lenora Woods.

This is a classic example of a book that just wasn’t the right fit for me, but I know it will be a great read for others. I think I needed a little more background knowledge of D&D to be truly engaged. Toward the very end, I finally started to get a grasp on the D&D story within the story, but it was jarring switching between the main plot with Noah and Sadie and the D&D quest storyline.

With the characters in the real-world plot plus the characters in the campaign, I often got confused about who was who. I believe Sadie, the main female character, also had another name, Josephine, so for one character we had Sadie, Josephine, and Jaylee. It just got a little hard to keep track.

That said, I did enjoy the characters in the main plotline, and it was cool to see the D&D campaign integrated into the story. There was just something that made it difficult for me to fully connect and get drawn into both narratives. I think that’s more of a personal issue, since I’m not very familiar with D&D or campaign-style games.

It was very well written, and I’m looking forward to reading more books by Lenora Woods. I’ll definitely try more books that feature D&D, because the concept was really interesting. I just had a hard time connecting and being pulled in.

Wow. I just love the dynamic of the co-written storylines. There’s a DND storyline is so fun and interesting, and seeing the way the internal DND storyline affects the outside characters was so fun.

And the romance between the mains is good. They really just slowly fall into love, it’s fun.

This is a spicy story. Lots of make-outs and sexual tension and some one page shenanigans I skipped.

4.5 stars!! This was one of the cutest rom-coms I’ve ever read!! I personally have never played D&D but I do have a lot of love and appreciation for it!

Honestly, I found Sadie so relatable. She’s trying to figure herself out after being completely burnt out from her demanding job and honestly feeling a bit lost so running towards one of her most supportive people was so understandable. I loved Liam immediately, him giving her little tasks to get out of the house was adorable.

Noah was literally the human embodiment of sunshine, I ADORED him. He and Sadie were adorable and truly loved them together. This book was really just about two nerds falling in love and I ate it up!

I loved how we were able to get the intertwined story of their real lives and within the game. I thought it made the story so much more entertaining. I found myself so invested in their game as much as I was with the romance! And I want to see all of Sadie's art!! Lenora did such a great job describing her drawings and the mural and all the character descriptions, I need art prints of them all!

Highly recommend checking this one out if you are a D&D, fantasy, and/or ren faire fan!!

Sadie lives in NY and works herself so hard to achieve the thing she’s always wanted. Next thing you know she finds herself in small town Texas, unemployed, and staying with her best friend. Her best friend Liam, talks her into staying at his place, the only condition is that she finally plays his D&D game with him and a groups of new players he’s put together. Sadie plans to stay for the summer and then to get a new job and move back to New York but as the weekly D&D campaign goes on she finds herself more and more unsure about what her next step should be...

I’ve been around D&D my whole life. As a young kid, I remember my step dad playing. Now, two of my four kids play. I’ve always been a fan of the story telling and imagination involved but I’ve never played.

I always cheer on the players because I’ve witnessed the negative opinions of the game itself and the people who play it. That being said, this book just wasn’t for me. I really wanted to love it but I hadn’t realized that the book would be split between the main story and the D&D story. I do believe Sadie had more pages than Jaylie (Sadie’s D&D character) but at the same time I feel like Jaylie had the more complete story. I wanted more Sadie and Noah. I wanted more Liam and more of the rest of the crew. I did enjoy getting to know each of them but it wasn’t nearly enough. Jules was hilarious. She was more relatable to me.

I also found it frustrating every time the book switched back to the fantasy story - it was always right when it was getting good. I found myself skimming the fantasy just to get back to the main story and had to make myself go back and read it. I wanted to dive into the book but I couldn’t. I feel like I could read each part individually but switching back and forth just took me out of the story too much.

If you love D&D, romance and fantasy I think you will enjoy this book. The fantasy story was written beautifully. I’ve never read or heard anything like it in D&D. The romance was ok but there were parts I couldn’t get into. As I said above I feel like the main story was missing the depth that the fantasy story had.

This book has a couple of steamy scenes but nothing too bad.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine | Dell for this eArc!

This was definitely a cozy, nerdy romance. I absolutely related to Sadie and her wanting to discover what she really wanted out of live. I thought the connection between D&D and real life was well done and kept the story interesting. I liked that Sadie had to find her voice both inside and outside of the game and she really came into her own at the end.

This was a quick, easy ready with plenty of character building to keep you invested.

2.75 stars

I was really excited for this book and I sadly struggled to get through it. I started playing dnd with a group of gals a little over a year ago, so I was pumped to read a romance with dnd in it. I wasn’t sure to what extent the game would be involved but sadly I didn’t love the way it was integrated into the story BUT I could see people loving this story…it just wasn’t for me. The book switched between the real world story of Noah and Sadie and the in game dnd story as if the campaign were its own fantasy story. I personally didn’t like this for a few reasons - 1) both stories didn’t feel fleshed out and full of as many details because two completely different stories in different worlds were being told. 2) I felt like the flow was a bit choppy since the stories kept changing. And 3) I was wanting to see the DnD experience as I currently experience it with moving pieces on a map and such and not as a vivid story where you can’t tell what’s actually happening behind the scenes of the actions of the dnd characters. I’m not sure that made much sense, but that was much more of a personal expectation that wasn’t met. I generally liked the main characters and wish there was a bar like Alchemised, the bar that Noah the MMC works at, near me! If you’re looking for a bit of a mix with fantasy and romance but don’t mind more surface level, less in depth stories, this is the book for you!

Spice: 🌶️

Not for me, but it might be for you

| romantic fiction | contemporary romance | dungeons and dragons | role play | slow burn | slow development | personal growth | animal companion | table top game | role play game | rediscovery of self | artist | nomad | friendship |

Would I recommend this book? No, I wouldn’t. It was immensely slow for me, so I don’t see myself recommending it to friends.

Is it spicy? No, I wouldn’t call this book spicy. It’s definitely more relationship- and growth-oriented.

As someone who plays D&D, I was actually quite disappointed with how this book was written, particularly the pacing. The main issue for me was the way it jumped between the real world and the role-playing world. There wasn’t enough emphasis on the separation of time in every instance, so it felt jarring, shifting from a very contemporary setting to a fantasy realm that bordered on romantasy.

Given that Dungeons & Dragons is inherently a group game, the romantic relationship between the two main characters felt a little out of place. It weighed heavily on the game aspect for me. In a typical D&D campaign, the party works as a unit, making decisions together. Here, the romance often influenced in-game decisions, which clashed with the collaborative nature of gameplay. The initial conflict that sparks their quest already carries a romantic undertone, so the added romantic focus between 2 characters in a 4 character campaign felt slightly awkward, especially since it unfolds in front of other players, often excluding them from the limelight of the campaign.

I also found the book slow because it served as a basic introduction to D&D. The Dungeon Master (DM) is essentially explaining everything to the players, since none of them have played before. For experienced players, this level of exposition can really drag.

That said, one thing the book captured well was the pacing between game sessions. I can’t tell you how many times a cliffhanger has happened mid-campaign, and I’ve had to wait a whole week to continue. That’s one of the most realistic and relatable feelings this book conveyed, although not in every instance. In the gaps where the characters are not role-playing, they are further developing their relationship as themselves while carrying the banter and dialogue of their characters from role-playing.

If you’re curious about D&D, this could be a great intro—especially if you're also a romance reader. It weaves in a lot of beginner-level information about the game. I wouldn’t recommend it to readers of high fantasy, but contemporary romance fans might enjoy the unique blend.

Happy Reading, Friends xx

This story made my nerdy little heart so happy. While I myself have not ventured into tabletop games (yet), I know enough about them from friends and family to thoroughly enjoy the TTRPG parts of the story.

The protagonist, Sadie, is crashing at her BFF Liam's home in Texas while she regroups after losing her high-pressure job due to burnout. To get her out of her funk, Liam suggests she join a new D&D campaign he's cooking up for some other newbies.

Suddenly, Sadie has something to look forward to, rather than rotting in bed all day. The weekly D&D campaigns lead to new friendships and a blossoming relationship with the semi-nomadic Noah.

I loved how the D&D campaign parts were written almost like a novel within a novel and how you can see the personalities of the people playing the characters peeking through. It definitely had me considering finding a D&D game to join myself.

Thank you NetGalley & Lenora Woods for the opportunity to advance read this adorably nerdy romance!

This book was listed as cozy and it was definitely a cozy romance. I finished with a smile on my face. Now I have never played D&D and clearly this is a D&D romance but I still enjoyed it. This book actually has two storylines, the real world and the D&D campaign characters. I thought that was very interesting so I definitely think fans of D&D will LOVE this romance novel. So Sadie has lost her job in New York City and has come to regroup with her friend Liam that lives in Texas. She is going to stay for the summer while she figures out her life. Liam gets a group together of people who have not played D&D before and he is the Dungeon Master. Sadie starts taking a liking to Noah who is a bartender. Noah is someone who likes to roam and not be tied down to a place. Since Sadie is only there for the summer should they start something? Or will it be just a summer fling? I enjoyed this and thought it was very cute.

-"I don't just want my songs to get stuck in your head, Jay. I want you to be the reason I write them."

I *loved* this book! As a D&D girlie who doesn’t get to play nearly as much as I’d like, this story was the perfect fix. The structure was so much fun—interweaving the real-life plot with the group’s in-game Dungeons & Dragons adventure, told with its own narrative flair. I was fully invested in both worlds, and the way the romance blossomed between the characters *in* the game, as well as between the players in real life, was absolutely adorable.

The friendships—both long-standing and newly forming—were another highlight, giving the story great found-family vibes that I’m always a sucker for. While it’s definitely a treat for D&D lovers, I think even readers new to the game would enjoy it—the book does a great job of making everything accessible without dumbing anything down.

There is a bit of spice, but nothing too intense. Overall, this was such a warm, geeky, joyful read, and I’m so glad it landed for me. Definitely a new favorite!

Thank you to Netgalley and Random House - Ballantine (Dell) for providing me the ARC in exchange for my honest review!

This was such a fun read for me. As someone who plays D&D, I loved getting the combination of both the main romance plot as well as the in game story. I especially loved how Woods used key elements of the campaign to allow Sadie and Noah to explore their relationship and growing feelings for one another. They had great chemistry and played well off one another. I also enjoyed Sadie’s character development as she came to terms with what happened in New York and what direction she wants her life to go. I’m a huge fan of the found family trope, and I love the found family that develops between the D&D group. They’re all so different but complement each other resulting in great friendships. The one issue I had with this book was that it seemed to stall out in the middle, but aside from that, I had a great time with this book.

are you looking for a cute romance that will also keep you hooked? then add roll for romance to your tbr!

in roll for romance you’ll meet Sadie goes to stay with her best friend after unexpectedly losing her job, being convinced to join his D&D game where she’ll meet Noah, the handsome bartender in town.

the author did such a good job switching between the D&D world and their world, each world keeping me captivated. you can truly see Sadie grow and bloom as her D&D character, Jaylie. the D&D world truly had me hooked the whole way through.

now it didn’t lack in their world either. the bond that the main characters (and even side characters) made created a nice cozy vibe to the whole story. found family in a way!

this was such a fun, cute read that i definitely recommend!