4.5
I’ll start by saying, I don’t usually like second chance romances. However, I loved this one! It was so good!

Alex was a badass spy with such a fun personality. I loved how she knew when it was time to have fun and time to work. She was always on her toes and was able to come up with solutions to problems she’d encounter rather quickly. This made her a great spy. While she did have a fun personality, she also carried a lot of guilt surrounding her twin sister, so I did feel bad for her during parts of this book.

I really loved King too. He was also a great spy and had such a grumpy personality. At first, it feels like he doesn’t believe Alex is good enough to be a spy, but as we move through the book it was nice to see his perception change. I loved learning of his background and why he was even a spy to begin with.

These two had such fun banter. I seriously ate it up. I loved their fake marriage story and how Alex would catch King off guard with her comments. They were forced to work together and figure out who was after them and I loved how much they trusted each other.

I did really enjoy the dual timeline. I felt like it really gave us more context to what was currently going on. However, there was a part where I felt like I was getting confused as to if we were in the present or the past. Either way I enjoyed the book and the twist at the end.

I did listen to the audiobook and I loved it. Andrew Eiden and Emily Ellett did a fantastic job as Alex and King. They really brought the banter between the two to life and it was just a really great listening experience overall.

I would recommend this book to all my spy romcom, enemies to lovers, slow burn, second chance romance loving besties.

Thank you to Ally Carter, Avon, Harper Collins and Harper Audio for the #gifted physical book and audiobook for an honest review!

A fun romp that picks up the energy from "The Blonde Identity" and takes readers on a chaotic adventure between a new duo with the same insane plots.

I'm a big fan of stories where we go between timelines so we can see where the romance went wrong the first time/watching them fall in love all over again. There is so much banter and attitude, that I loved reading the characters interact with each other and felt the chemistry fly off the page.

Additionally, the narrators are some of my favorites, and I love it's the same duo from the first book in the series.

🩵 Spy Romance
🔍 Rivals to Lovers
🩵 Second Chance
🔍 Dual Timeline
🩵 Forced Proximity
🔍 “Who hurt you?”

🎧Dual narration performed by Emily Ellet & Andrew Eiden
• The narration by Emily and Andrew was absolutely fantastic, and if you are an audio lover, I highly recommend listening to this one! Emily perfectly captured Alex’s smart and sassy personality, and Andrew was completely swoony as brooding King. Both voice actors are so talented in their dual performances.

My thoughts:
I had the most amazing time listening to The Blonde Who Came In from the Cold! This book was filled with action, romance, and incredible banter. It is perfect for readers who love an action packed plot and a dual timeline. Alex was a sassy and bold FMC (my fave kind) and King was a broody, bearded hero *melts*. In Ally’s words “Is it 90,000 words of fanfiction about the time Captain America went rogue and grew a beard? Possibly.” With being a closed door romance, you could definitely feel the tension and chemistry between Alex and King, and they had me kicking my feet🤭

Thank you so much @avonbooks and @theallycarter for this #sponsored audiobook!

This was so fun!!! I love a long-distance yearning, a slow burn romance, and a man who will do ANYTHING at all for his girl. The spy thriller plot lines also added to the intrigue. Love this!

This series has been on my radar for a long time and getting the ARC for book 2 pushed me to read The Blonde Identity, which I loved, so I knew this was going to be a hit. I enjoyed this book even more. With both main characters being spies, it is packed with action and the best snark and banter between these two enemies to lovers. If you love a story where the man is absolutely gone for his woman then this one is for you. Michael Kingsley just can’t help himself. It is a spy book but it also has humor and depth as Alex and Michael decide what they want out of life and deal with past trauma. The Easter Eggs and cameos from The Blonde Identity were all that I wanted. My question is who is it in that epilogue?!? IYKYK

Both narrators perfectly brought these characters to life. I love dual point of view books and enjoy it best when there are two narrators.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the gifted audiobook. The thoughts and opinions in this review are my own.

Content Notes: Fade to black romance

Finished at the gym and it just felt right.

I LOVED EVERY SINGLE SECOND OF THIS. The rivals! The missions! The tension. THE DUAL TIMELINE PERFECTION.

It made me nostalgic thinking about how many times I watched Agent Cody Banks and Spy Kids as a kid. Like why didn’t I read Ally’s YA books as a kid??

This was my second Ally Carter book and this was just as fun as the first! But THE SPY ELEMENT (My first book was The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year).

The only way I can explain my feelings about this book is that I wanted to both binge and savor is at the same time.

And they are undercover spies who just HAPPEN to have to pretend to be together A BUNCH OF TIMES. The forced proximity was *chefs kiss*. At one point I was listening to this book and stopped cause I needed to also read it with my eyeballs and highlight every other sentence.

And yall… MICHAEL KINGSLEY 😮‍💨. What a simp.

Audiobook review:
Dual narration and both Emily Ellet and Andrew Eiden did a fantastic job! They narrated the first book in this series (The Blonde Identity) so if you liked that one you will probably love this one too. When I tell you their performance made me want to pause and highlight parts I truly mean it.

The writing along with their performance was stunning and Ally has a forever fan in me!

Thank you to Avon for the gifted arc and alc through HarperAudio and NetGalley!

Huge thank you to the publishers for both an eARC and physical ARC of this one! I can’t say I’ve ever read anything like this and I LOVED it! Enemies to lovers/second chance romance… But make them spies that are forced to work together! I loved that this was told in past and present so we got to see the full story of these characters. The shifting timelines did get a little hard to keep track of sometimes, but overall this was a really great read! definitely recommend if you like romance and spies 😊

I loved The Blonde Identity when it came out, and The Blonde Who Came in From the Cold is EVEN BETTER! Like OMG this book BLEW me away. The romantic tension was INSANE. Y’all need to read this immediately.

I will never get over Ally Carter's ability to craft the most insane sexual and romantic tension, but also make her books closed-door and do both of those elements so well. 10/10

The audiobook is particularly good. Thank you to Netgalley for my ALC.

Audio Narration: 4.5/5 Solid performance. No issues with pacing, pausing or inflection - I would have like a tiny bit more variation in voices for different characters but overall great listen!

This was an absolute blast to read! Technically book two in an interconnected series but I read it as a standalone and think it’s safe to skip the first one if you prefer.

What’s to love…
- Grade A banter
- swoony - will-they-wont-they “hurry up and kiss already” romance
- mystery
- multiple timelines and POVs — you’ll never be bored
- so much angst
- second chance romance
- slow burn
- action packed and fast paced

What might not work for some…
- it was a bit predictable for me, but not overly so.
- multiple timelines and POV swaps could get a little confusing at times but I usually do not enjoy this in books and found myself not minding it at all!

This book was incredible for beginning to end. Ally Carter always writes great books. Narration was great.

Listened to the audio for this one and would definitely recommend! It was such a fast paced and intriguing listen, I sped right through. I loved the characters and the setting. This shapes up as a fun, but mysterious story that I think many would enjoy.

I LOVED this book. It's epic. It's everything I never knew I needed. I read the entire thing in a single weekend. Alex and King’s story spans more than a decade, starting at CIA training camp, crossing paths throughout their undercover careers, and finally landing them handcuffed to each other in the middle of dark room… which is where this book begins.

I was blown away by the intensity of the romance. This book is closed door but I was LIVING for the chemistry between Alex and King. There were so many intensely intimate scenes (including a devastating and beautiful hair washing moment). King was so down bad for Alex, and his ways of showing it were totally swoony. I loved their entire dynamic. A+ banter, insane chemistry, and quiet affection.

The audiobook narrators did a truly wonderful job of conveying the suspense and emotion. Andrew Eiden and Emily Ellet brought so much personality and heart to the characters. Personally, I’m not the biggest fan of one of the narrators (there’s just the slightest tinge of an accent that takes me out of the book—totally a me problem), but objectively-speaking, this is a really excellent performance!

Enemies to lovers + spy romance = audiobook gold 🎧🕵️‍♀️💘

I listened to The Blonde Who Came In From the Cold by Ally Carter.
Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5!

Alex & King were SO cute: sarcasm, insults, and chemistry that had me grinning through my headphones.
Loved the dual POV and dual timeline, it kept things fun and fast-paced.
If you’re into silly moments, spy missions, and love languages that include witty banter, this audiobook is a must! 💥🎙️

Thank you to @harperaudio, @avonbooks, and @netgalley for the audiobook copy in exchange for my honest review! 💛

📘The Blonde Who Came In From the Cold - Our FMC wakes up handcuffed to her arch-nemesis and former classmate from “spy school”. Neither know how they got there, who is after them, or why. These two have a LOT of history and told in present tense with dips back to the past - we get glimpses of the tangled relationship between these two. While dodging bullets and trying to find somewhere safe, all those feelings prepare for a day of reckoning. Will either of them call mercy and give in to the chemistry that sizzles between them?

🎙️For my audiobook fans - we have an an amazing pairing with Emily Ellet & Andrew Eiden. They keep the tension, action and chemistry moving and you will feel like you just watched a cinematic experience! The sound quality and editing are flawless for a phenomenal listener experience.

✔️Highly recommend this read - it was fast paced, engaging and ultimately a feel good read!

🌷Thank you to HarperAudio, Avon, author Ally Carter and NetGalley for access to an advanced copy of this audiobook

This book just wasn't good. I couldn't take them seriously, especially Alex. She acted like a stuck up teenager who thinks she is way cooler than she actually is. The romance felt forced and the "clever" banter between them was really just childish and immature taunts. They had some cute moments and some good zingers but they were so few and so VERY far in between. I listened to the audiobook, and honestly, the snobby vibe for Alex may have been because of the narrator. I only got through this one because I received it free from NetGalley and HarperAudio Adult.

The second installment of The Blonde Identity is here, and this time it's Alex's story. We travel back in time to before Alex joined the CIA and follow her through to present day.

For me, the now and then timeline was harder to keep up with on audio. This story has less of the humor and less of the steaminess from the first book. And I get it because this book is about the more serious sister, but I did miss a little bit of that humor. It's still a great book. Still has a lot of action. There's a lot of mystery. There's a slow burn, will they/won't they. At times it was a little difficult for me to hear what the female narrator was saying when she was speaking for the male character so that took away from it for me. Just a little bit. As always, I think any book like this would be improved with duet narration, but I understand that it's a lot more costly. Overall, I enjoyed it and I'm hoping there is another book to wrap everything up. The ending didn't quite feel like the end. I'd love to have more of Zoe in the next one to provide some comic relief. We got a little at the end of this book, but I'd love to have more!

This was such a fun, fast paced spy romance with plenty of twists, banter, and tension to keep me hooked. I loved the mix of high stakes action and the complicated history between the two main characters the whole “rivals to lovers to maybe enemies again” thing was so well done. My only gripe is that it read a little too young adult for me at times, which pulled me out of the story here and there. Still, it was an entertaining ride, and I had a blast with it.

I thoroughly enjoy the sass and competitive nature of the FMC and MMC, Alex and King. While I wish there was a slight recap of book 1 to help tie the two together, it was stand alone enough that it wasn’t really necessary to understand or pick up from the last book. I enjoyed the background included in the book - explaining where the 2 MC came from and how they met. The back and forth timeline bridging the gap between then and now kept my attention and added to the level of entertainment. Can’t go wrong on a duet narration.

That ending. Mind blown.

Who doesn't love a great Spy Rom Com!?
I love the time jumps through the timeline of their relationship. I enjoy piecing it together as I go, I was one step away of starting a "crazy study" to put it all together.

I loved this book overall and provided 4.5-star feedback on the digital review copy. I also listened to 27% of the audiobook. The dual narration and the humor in the book was fun to follow that way, but I ended up deciding not to finish it. The main reason is that I am not a huge fan of Andrew Eiden's narration. He has a slight midwestern accent, which would be fine if all the characters he plays were midwestern (but this is not always the case). For anyone who is a fan of Eiden, this is not an audiobook to miss. It just wasn't for me! I preferred and loved the print.

4.5 stars for the book itself
3 stars for the narration