Title: Destination Weddings and Other Disasters
Series: Belize Dream Book #2
Author: M.C. Vaughan
Format: 🎧
Narrator: Meg Sylvan
Publisher: Harlequin Audio
Genre: Romance
Pub Date: July 1, 2025
My Rating: 3 Stars
Pages 288
Julia Stone’s mother Michelle just got engaged and Julia is not all that happy ~ true there is anything wrong with her future stepfather Jim Miller ~ It is his son Carson an Event Planner who is the problem.

Julia and Carson are about to be step siblings and have been forced to plan the wedding in Belize of their parents.
Ten years ago Julia and Carson were High School classmates; Carson was a BMOC and Julia was the intelligent bright student –in fact, Julia tutored Carson. However, he was a big jerk to her and she has not forgotten it.
Present Day: He tells her he has changed.

The story was sort of fun but there is a however . . . .

I am a big psychological thriller fan and not really a romance fan but every once in a while I like to read a nice sweet cozy romance - I just finished a story that was very gruesome and this cover and blurb got my attention .

However, it wasn’t a sweet cozy romance. As it had more foul language and was spicier than I expected ~ which got in the way of me really enjoying this story.
This was my first read by this author and finally looked her up
~ M.C. Vaughan is a Baltimore-based author of contemporary romance riddled with humor and local flavor. So, if you want to giggle
throughout your sexy stories, Welcome!
You’ll root for her characters as they fall for their perfect people...and you’ll simultaneously shake your head as they stumble along the way.

No giggles but Yes! I was shaking my head -thinking this was not working for me
However. . .
The descriptions of Belize and the ending did save it from the 2.5 rating I was planning!

Want do want to thank NetGalley and Harlequin Audio for granting me this audiobook.
Publishing Release Date scheduled for July 1, 2025.

Audio Narration:5/5 Great performance, no notes!

Cute. Quick. Spicy.

This is the second book in a series of interconnected standalone, but you definitely don’t need to read the first to enjoy! It’s my first by the author but I’ll be keeping an eye out for books from them in the future!

Conceptually this book is a wild ride. Julia and Carson had unrequited crushes on each other in high school. Carson was the hot headed jock and Julia his tutor, fast forward to the present these too are soon to be step-siblings planning their parents destination wedding in Belize (in less than a week)!

What’s to love…
- Second Chance, high school crush
- Strong confident FMC
- golden retriever MMC and reformed bad boy/asshole
- lots of LOL moments
- spectacular tension + well executed spice!
- travel/tropical setting
- excellent character growth and development for such a short book!
- Only one room (I mean not quite as good as one bed but still good!)

What I didn’t love…
- I didn’t jive well with the prose at first, but if you’ve been following my reviews at all you’ve probably noticed I’m rather picky with my prose. It’s actually a running joke among my bookish friends. But I digress… Once I switched to the audio format the prose became a non issue.

*A Note about the step-sibling aspect. This is much less taboo than it seems. Their parent’s romance is whirlwind and they see each other again (since high school) for the first time right before being whisked off to Belize to plan the wedding. Don’t let the step-sibling situation scare you off, it’s actually a rather fun quirky “what if” aspect.

🌶️- 16, 19 Explicit, on page & very sexy! I may have missed some, I mostly listened and I’l terrible at bookmarking when reading via audio.