I LOVEDDDDDDD this romance!!!! I don’t always go for the childhood friends to lovers trope but it was sooooo well played in this one. Anytime fake dating is involved, I am SAT and this book exceeded even my highest expectations. Julia is an absolute powerhouse goddess supreme (imo) and Tae is truly my soft, caring lover boy dream boat. I really appreciated having a male love interest that flipped the word ‘successful’ on its head. So much of the book was surrounded on Julia’s career and financial success (valid!!!! boss angel!!) & the same from her potential suitors. But Tae was the best of them all, maybe not successful in the career-centered sense but successful in how well loved and respected he was by his community. He is the most special boy in the whole world and I love him sm. We love a selfless, caring king!!!!! Anyways, I’m gay but clearly I would lay it down for THIS man specifically, so thank you, Susan, for writing him.❤️

Susan Lee is my favorite! You can see her personality shine throughout the story. I laughed, I cried. It was perfect. The BTS and K-Pop references were my favorite. The love that Susan has for her cultural, but also poking fun makes the story relatable and the characters so human for me. It brought Julia to life and I felt like the character was so relatable. The story had all the K-Drama vibes. And that ending, I loved. Cried. Thank you Susan for writing this story! Thank you to NetGalley and Harlequin Trade for allowing me to read this ARC.

Did Susan Lee name her main character after her BTS bias? Of course she did.

Tae is everything. Julia is who I want to grow up to be.

A tiny age gap and best friends brother (who's loved her forever) mixed with Halmoni and Unnies running amok? All day every day.

For Susan's first foray into New Adult... she sure knows how to write sexiness. 🔥

Julia Song is the CEO of a Korean beauty brand, successful, smart, and beautiful. But one thing that her family still wishes she had? A husband. This leads to a story of love, growth, and family meddling. I was laughing and giggling throughout this whole book. Tae is such a gem and I was totally head over heels for him like Julia. Susan Lee did the thing and it’s this book.

Susan Lee crushed this one.

Jules and Tae have my heart. This book follows two adults on very different paths finding their way to each other. While her career is THRIVING, Julia Song has had a hard time with relationships and her Korean family finally decides they are going to guilt trip her and intervene. She doesn’t have the best track record tho and through multiple avenues ends up receiving dating practice from her childhood neighbor and friend, Tae.

Tae feels a bit down on his luck - the crushing expectations to take care of everyone and provide are starting to be a bit much and he isn’t really taking care of himself, but one thing he can help with (besides the literal ten thousand things he helps with in his community) is show Jules how to date.

There dates are pressure, the Korean humor/family dynamic seemed really well done. The family expectations and crushing reality of family, financials, and more were so relatable.

Thank you to my Harlequin friends!!

Susan Lee is out there doing the good work of incorporating Korean culture into traditionally published romance novels and I commend her for it. There were so many standout moments that reflect my own upbringing and I found myself empathizing with both Tae and Julia, who both carry this weight of being duty-bound to take care of their families in their own ways. It's not easy to tread the line between "Korean tradition and customs" and "American life and values," and Lee does a great job of showing her characters' own struggles with that as the children of immigrants. I really enjoyed the conversations with their families, their friends, and each other, where they grappled with what they want in the context of appeasing their families.

All that being said, the writing itself just didn't jive with me. Despite being an adult romance, the writing felt very YA... which makes sense, given that Lee was previously writing YA romances. I was hoping her adult debut might be more my speed, but alas, she's just not the author for me. But that's okay! There's absolutely an audience for her work that I would be happy to recommend this book to so they can enjoy all the K-drama shenanigans to be found in Julia Song is Undateable.

First of all, I live in Irvine and there is not a hot fix-it man in my neighborhood. I liked this romance but I had so many questions. Sometimes you read something and you just let the funky stuff go and sometimes it keeps bothering you. Julia Song is a great CEO of her own cosmetics company but we never see her acting professional only acting like “a nut.” I enjoy bad dates but would all of them really be that bad? If they were, when did she ever find anyone to have sex with? There was also not enough SEVENTEEN in the story. I did love the trot singer though.

Thank you to NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for this DRC.
#JuliaSongIsUndateable #NetGalley

I’ve heard Susan Lee’s name over the years, but I’m not typically the biggest fan of YA romance, so I haven’t picked up any of her books before. But with this being her first adult romance, I figured it was finally time to give her a try!

The storyline isn’t the most unique, but it still kept me pretty entertained. The story is dual POV and follows Julia, a successful businesswoman, as she goes on several dates set up by her meddling Korean family. Her neighbor and childhood friend, Tae, is back home taking care of his parents, and helps her practice for her dates.

Julia and Tae were both such sweet, lovable characters, and were so easy to root for. Where it kind of fell apart for me was at the conflict towards the end. I knew something had to be coming, because there was still quite a bit of the story left when they got together, but the conflict and subsequent resolution were very unsatisfying for me to read. It made me completely forget the fun chemistry from the first part of the story, because I was too distracted by the overly forced conflict later on. So that was a bit of a bummer, but all in all, still a fun read with a great cast of supporting characters.

Thanks to NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing/Canary Street Press for the ARC of this book!

thank you @htp_hive @htpbooks for the complimentary DRC.

Unfortunately I could not finish this. The conversation felt so stilted and unnatural, the story felt like I was reading a YA and so repetitive.

I love everything Susan Lee writes! Her first adult novel did not disappoint. As a woman who just turned 30, I related so much to Julia. Just wanting people to see who you are and all you are and not narrow you down to a few quirks or failed relationships is all too real for me. The characters faced real challenges and came out the other side. Sometimes you true love is right beside you all along and you just have to take a risk. But always be true to yourself. Go read this book!

This book was hilarious! Julia Song is a first generation Korean American who is approaching 30. Her family is panicking to get her married. Her family forces her into several dates, but the problem is- she’s horrible at dating! Then she meets Tae, who offers to coach her with dating. The story goes from there and I loved every word!

HIGHLY recommend!

Thank you, Harlequin Trade Publishing and NetGalley for this e-arc! If you love the trope childhood friends to lovers, then this is your next read. Susan Lee is hands down one of my favorite authors, her writing is hilarious and charming. I loved the K-pop references and I learned of some celebrities who are BTS ARMY. Tae reminds me a little bit of Du-sik from Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha with helping the community and we love a selfless handyman. The racecar, such a great scene hehe. I highly recommend this book to everyone!

Julia Song Is Undateable is a sexy rom-com about two former neighbors and childhood friends. Tae is a very caring and kind man who does handyman favors for everyone in town and takes care of his parents, and he has a pattern of dating a woman right before she finds the man she's going to marry. Julia is 30 and her family is freaking out that she hasn't settled down already. Nevermind that she's a successful businessman who founded her own Korean American skincare brand. Julia's grandmother celebrates her 80th birthday by telling Julia her dying wish is that Julia find a man to marry. Julia agrees to go on three dates with people here family sets her up with, and Tae agrees to go on some practice dates to help her.

The tropes are some of my favorites, so obviously I loved it. The story also explores the characters' struggles with taking care of family while still chasing their own dreams, balancing expectations and finding success and careers and love on their own terms and not by society's narrow definition.

#BookReviews #RomanceRecs #ConRomCom

Thank you to Netgalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for a copy of this eARC in exchange for my honest thoughts!

RATING: 4.5/5

I've been a big fan of Susan Lee ever since I read and adored Seoulmates. It's been a delight to follow her author journey, and I was so excited to get my hands on an early copy of "Julie Song is Undateable." The thing I love most about Susan Lee's stories and her characters is her knack for writing characters that feel so real in their flaws and their growth. With Tae, I like that the book flips the script by showing a male character who has people pleasing tendencies, a trait often relegated to female characters. But at the same time, the plot accepts this as a core part of his personhood, allowing Tae to still perform acts of service to his community and those he loves, learning to accept help and exert boundaries.

As his foil, we have Julia: an immensely awkward and blunt personality with a heart of gold and the career success of a lifetime. There are so many of her scenes that lean in a direction many would call
"cringe", but I loved her dead-pan attitude and her fumbling social interactions. Her conversational clumsiness on all her dates offered a whimsical charm to her personality that I feel is often lacking from female main character's, who's flaws are often wrapped up in societal issues outside their control. And while there are ways in which this is the case for Julia, her personality added depth to her story in a way that created more multi-faceted emotion.

But in my heart of hearts, the scene in this story that I loved the most was the third act breakup. I feel that the author truly had the most mastery over her characters in this moment, with both characters throwing incendiary verbal volleys steeped in miscommunication. Throughout the story, we had seen Tae and Julia's feelings for each other begin to grow on top of the internal character strife they were each dealing with. Neither character allowed the other to see the other in their fully honest and vulnerable core, in a way that wasn't always intentional.

The purposeful timing of their sex scenes, for me, was the beginning of their unraveling. In a moment that is, at its core, the peak of intimacy and vulnerability, the author shows the internal conflict that plagues these characters in their most exposed state. As a result, it was only natural for their third act breakup to come to such massive blows to their other's psyche. And it's in this state, when it feels like there is no way that these characters could ever re-couple, that I feel the best romance authors execute their finest work. "Julia Song is Undateable" is a story that understands forgiveness and what is needed on both characters ends, internal and external, to fully allow for these character's growths to reunite their relationship. While I do dock off half a star for an ending where I wanted more time for character depth and exploration of emotional progression, I still absolutely adored where the story concludes.

Finally, at it's core, with both Tae and Julia's story arcs, this is a book that is just so innately Korean in a way that moves past the surface level of many diaspora stories. Not only do the characters engage with Korean culture through K-beauty, KBBQ, and K-pop, but the filial piety that Tae and Julia exhibit, two sides of the same coin, allow for Korean culture to permeate into the emotional depths of this story. This is a pattern l've noticed comes across so strongly in each and every romance that Susan Lee writes, and it's as aspect I value so strongly. I would definitely recommend this romance, especially for those looking for flawed FMCs and simp-y MMCs.

I wanted to love this more but I found it mildly stiff and the pacing slightly off. The characters were great and I loved the Korean culture aspects.

It is a cute romcom and a fun story just couldn't fall in love with it as much as I hoped.

I really appreciate being invited to read the arc and although not my fav it was still a fun story and I'd recommend to others looking for a cute romcom.

Julia Song is the successful CEO of Starlight, the skincare company she built from the ground up. While she's thriving professionally, her dating life is a different story. Julia often worries she's “too much,” and every date seems to end with her overthinking or unintentionally self-sabotaging. Just as she's about to give up on love entirely, her grandmother reveals her dying wish is to see Julia happily partnered. In a reluctant attempt to honor that wish, Julia agrees to go on three blind dates arranged by her family. But she'll need a little help: enter Tae, her neighbor and childhood friend, who steps in as her dating coach and biggest cheerleader.

This is Susan Lee's first adult romance, and I absolutely loved it! It has all the charm and sweetness of her YA rom-coms, plus just the right touch of spice. The story is equal parts heartwarming and hilarious, all while tackling deeper themes around family expectations, mental health, and vulnerability. As always, I appreciated the vivid incorporation of Korean and Korean-American culture, which always makes me feel so nostalgic. And the BTS references? Chef's kiss. Especially the playful nod to our MMC, Tae, and his namesake!

The side characters also shone brightly. Halmoni completely stole the show for me! I was laughing out loud at some of her one-liners. I'm secretly (or not so secretly) hoping we get companion stories. Rachel? Jisoo? Yes, please!

Overall, Julia Song Is Undateable is a fun, heartfelt, and deeply satisfying romance. Susan Lee continues to be an auto-buy author for me, and I can't wait to see what she writes next.

Huge thanks to NetGalley and Harlequin for the opportunity to read this ARC!

This was a funny rom-com that had some real laugh out loud moments. I loved the character development between the characters and being able to watch them realize they are perfect for each other throughout the course of this book. While I enjoyed this book and would recommend it to people, there was an element missing to really make me fall in love with it. Overall, this was a great book and very happy I read it!

thank you to the author susan lee, netgalley and harlequin trade publishing for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!

i was locked in from the first page. this was such a fun read. you know that cher interview where she quotes her mom saying she needs to marry a rich man and she says “mom i am a rich man”? that is julia song. i love reading about successful and powerful women. she knows exactly who she is and while we follow her along her dating journey with her family’s chosen suitors, we also follow her on her journey to loving all of the parts of herself she previously thought made her unfit for love. and thankfully the super hot neighbor she grew up with is the perfect guy to help her on both of those journeys.

*camera pans to taehyung kim* tae is the neighborhood “fix it man” whether it’s a home improvement project or being translator at doctors appts or in this case, julia’s dating coach, he is the guy everyone calls on. never mind that he has had a crush on julia since they were kids, that won’t interfere at all! *wink wink* while tae is juggling the unknown of his future and career and the anxiety of taking care of his parents, he still goes above and beyond to prepare “pre dates” for all of the dates julia’s parents set her up on to show her that she is in fact not undateable. i found myself yelling at the pages every date JULIA THE LOVE OF YOUR LIFE IS RIGHT HERE!!! RESEARCHING VEGETARIAN MEAL OPTIONS AT A RESTAURANT FOR YOU SO YOU’RE COMFORTABLE ON YOUR DATE WITH ANOTHER MAN!! *SWOONS*

anyways, these two characters learn their worth, strengthen their relationships with their families, and create unbearable tension you could cut with a knife that i ate UP.

DNF 5%
I’ve tried all of Susan Lee’s books so far and something about the writing just doesn't click with me… (the exception being The Romance Rivalry that I gave 5 stars)
I really wanted to like this one because the premise sounds fun and it’s the author’s adult debut but unfortunately but it just wasn’t working for me.
arc provided by Netgalley

Loved loved loved this book. This book had me smiling while I read it. I loved the characters, loved the plot, and can’t wait to read more by this author.