Pleasure pools low in my stomach, so intense I have to squeeze my legs together to keep from pouncing on him this moment, in front of Alice and her friends and everyone else in the bar.
I didn’t expect this. He wasn’t supposed to feel this good. The kiss was supposed to satisfy my curiosity-a one-time kiss to inspire me to move on to other one-time activities.
Gabriella Gamez’s debut novel, The Next best Fling is an addictive and fun rom-com and I cannot wait to see what she writes next.
Librarian Marcela Ortiz has been secretly in love with her best friend for years—and when he gets engaged, she knows it’s long past time to move on. But before she gets the chance, she has a bigger problem to contend with in the form of Theo Young, ex-NFL player and older brother of the man she’s in love with. When she discovers Theo’s plans to confess his feelings for his brother’s fiancée at their engagement party, Marcela is quick to stop him—despite how tempting it is to let him run away with the bride-to-be. She manages to convince Theo to sleep off his drunken almost-mistake at her place and when they arrive at a family brunch the next day together, everyone wrongly assumes they hooked up.
Since Theo needs a cover for his feelings for the bride and Marcela needs a distraction from her unrequited feelings for the groom, they decide to roll with the lie. Until one late night at a bar, they take it a step further and discover a layer of attraction neither realized existed. Soon, they find themselves exploring the simmering chemistry between them, whether in library aisles or Marcela’s bed. There are no boundaries for the rebound relationship they form—just a host of complicated feelings, messy familial dynamics, and uncovered secrets that threaten to tear them apart before they can even admit to themselves that their rebound is working. Maybe a little too well.
The cover is what drew me to this book. I’m pretty sure any romance bookworm swoons at the idea of the hero kissing the heroine against a bookshelf at a library. If you like your romances on the slightly more angsty, drama-filled side, this book will be for you. I liked this book, even though love triangles or, in this case, a love square is my least favourite trope. There is some major pining going on in this book. Both Marcela and Theo have deep, unrequited feelings for Ben (Theo’s brother and Marcela’s best friend) and Alice, who are newly engaged. As you can imagine, this book has plenty of drama, which I think is to be expected when a romance has a love square in it. I thought Gabriella did a great job at taking the love triangle/square trope and making it her own unique thing. There are some predictable moments in this book, which isn’t a bad thing. But she also added this uniqueness to the story by taking a couple of the characters and putting this spin on them that I wasn’t expecting. Their characters started out very stereotypical and changed into something more as the story progressed.
I loved Marcela; she is a gorgeous, curvy heroine who adores books and eating delicious food. Marcela feels stuck in her life because she is still harbouring some major feelings for Ben. This secret crush means she hasn’t been able to form any deep romantic attachments with any other guy. Well, that is until Theo walks into her life. Marcela is a relatable and real character. Anyone who is curvy (and fabulous) probably knows how strong those insecure feelings can be when it comes to how we feel about our bodies. I know I am one of them. Marcela’s struggles with loving her body was so relatable to me, and I loved how Theo made her feel like an absolute goddess. Marcela’s growth in this story is centred around her feelings for Ben and her growing feelings for Theo. Sorry, I know that is slightly vague, but I can’t really go into too much detail about Marcela’s growth without giving away spoilers. But I can say I loved her journey and I was rooting for her the entire time.
Theo was a delight right from the beginning. I thought he was going to be this cocky broody football player, but he wasn’t. He was a big softy with a giving heart and so unsure of what his future would look like. He definitely falls first and harder when it comes to his relationship with Marcela. He truly adores her, and his grand gesture at the end of the book made my heart melt.
The romance in this book is chaotic and messy at times but in a good way. There are a lot of big emotions in this book and that often means things aren’t going to be neat and tidy. I like Theo and Marcela together; they may have fallen in love with each other a little too quickly to make it believable. If you are a fan of fake dating, best friend’s brother, cinnamon roll hero, he falls first, love squared, and pining, then you will enjoy this story. When friends and family believe that Theo and Marcela are in a relationship, they decide that pretending that they are in a relationship might be the best way to get over the feelings they have for Ben and Alice. They become friends, and that friendship turns into a friend-with-benefits situation. Theo and Marcela have great chemistry, and even though I felt that the whole falling head over heels in love with each other happened a little fast, I was ok with it because I wanted them to be together. The spice is great, and the sexual tension between Theo and Marcela is built up perfectly.
The Next Best Fling is a sizzling romance that will satisfy any romance bookworm.
Thank you, Forever Publishing, for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
