Reviews with content warning for Sexual content - Count Your Lucky Stars

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Count Your Lucky Stars by Alexandria Bellefleur

83 reviews

_kayreads_'s review against another edition

challenging funny hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

This was spicy and humorous. I loved it. The longing and the depth and desire was a wonderful telling. I t was an audio book which was a just a great help and hard.

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just_one_more_paige's review against another edition

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funny hopeful lighthearted fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

I find romances to be fantastic vacation reads, light and fun and easy to jump in and out of as you. So, I was thrilled when my hold on this final book in the "Written in the Stars" romance series came in the week before I was set to travel for a long weekend. I sped through the first half on the flight and finished up the rest over coffee in the mornings before heading out for sight-seeing (and eating and drinking, haha).

The final installation in this series focuses on Margot, Elle's best friend and former roomie who, though very excited for the pairing-off of all her friends (Darcy and Elle, Brendon and Annie), is starting to feel a little bit left out, sort of a fifth wheel. When she shows up to tour a potential venue for Brendon and Annie's wedding, she runs into a very unexpected person: the wedding planner is Olivia Grant, Margot's childhood best friend, longtime crush, first love all rolled into one. Olivia, excited and nervous at this major opportunity in her career, is *just* as surprised to see Margot for the first time in over a decade. They've both lived full lives since then, are coming in with emotional changes, but neither has managed to forget the perfect week they spent together in high school, and those feelings are coming back strong for both as they spend more time together.

As with all the books in this series, when this friend group gets involved, all bets at how supportively nosy they get are off. I honestly love reading about them. I mean, sometimes it walks the line of healthy or not, their emotional codependency, but they're so lovable and cozy and, at the end of the day, so supportive, that I cannot help but feel safe and at home with them. That's probably because I know, despite any disagreements and over-involvement they have, that in the end they will both tell the hard truths and support whatever the other(s) decide...and because it's a romance, it'll end happily.

Other things I loved, in general, included the group text messages with Margot's family. I wish we had gotten to actually meet them, or at least get a little more on page time with their voices, because they were laugh out loud recognizable (thank goodness airplanes are loud, because I am not joking about laughing out loud), with the two brothers and the spot on sarcasm. Also, Bellefleur again crushes the sex writing. The sex scenes are steamy and fantastic. And as a particular highlight of this book, the way she wrote sensuality and sexual tension into the small things, like eating a piece of cake on a fork or the way a shirt lays over a character’s body, is top notch. Finally, and this has gotten better from book to book, in my opinion, I thought the "third act conflict" here was great: realistic and well-handled and not overdramatic. Just a regular fight like anyone would recognize, where things are said that are maybe too aggressive, but not unforgivably hurtful, and both Margot and Olivia are mature enough to want to keep working on it after a little time to cool off/regroup. I so appreciate that, as a contrived situation in this part of the story is really a turn-off for me. Plus, in this case, there was a little tongue-in-cheek disaster humor, the "everything that could go wrong does," that was a bit humorous, since as a reader we already know it will end happily. And on that note, Bellefluer again delivers on the "sparkles and fairy lights and champagne bubbles" style romance vibes that I have come to expect (and love) from her. When you want that, there are few better.

My final note is a small criticism. And to be honest, there is a chance that I was just reading too fast because these romances are the "speed through the pages" type reads for me, so please bear that in mind. But. I found that I struggled to tell Olivia and Margot apart, perspective-wise. Their holding back communication issues about the relationship were basically the same. (However, let me please note that I appreciated that they recognized when they were falling into the insecurity/miscommunication trope. It makes it easier to handle as the reader. I get that it is hard, for real, but the self-awareness is a real balm for me in dealing with this heavily overused way to create tension). Anyways, I’d have liked more separation of development/voice for our two MCs. Even in their dialogue sometimes, I lost the thread of who was speaking. And though their individual stories (jobs, families, life trajectories, etc.) were well developed, their personalities and mannerisms just seemed too similar.

All to say that, I was super pleased with the closure we got for everyone's relationships at the end of this final book. I had fun reading this whole series and this was a spectacular overall ending. This is just really high quality fuzzy and comforting reading material.

“Love isn’t supposed to be quantifiable, relationships held up against one another, pitted against one another. That's a shitty thing to try to do, like asking someone to compare their love for their mother to their love for their partner or their best friend.”

“Reality was different. Talking, sharing, like so many things, was easier said than done. 'Look, normally I am totally team talk about it. But it's so much easier to tell someone to talk than to actually do it. The problem isn't opening my mouth and saying the words - that's the easy part. It's - it's what comes after. When the words are out there, and I can't take them back.'”

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kylieqrada's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

3.5 ⭐️s. This series is great, but I think this one is my least fave of the 3. Still love the characters, and Olivia is a great addition to the friend group.

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beccaand's review against another edition

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emotional funny lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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beccamarriner's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

I took this book for my holiday read this year and I think it fit the bill perfectly. It was a light hearted romance and I do enjoy the trope of friends to lovers. It was a bit cheesy in some places and I found certain plot points a bit irrelevant but nothing too detracting from the overall story. I admire how the characters were able to realise their own securities and miscommunication issues as i feel like in other books, it has been swept under the rug. Perhaps a bit smutty for my personal tastes but thats just my preference. I went into this book blind, not realising it was the third of a trilogy but I would like to read the other two as something fun to read about a friend group with an entertaining dynamic.

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the_vegan_bookworm's review against another edition

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funny lighthearted relaxing medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This was a very cute and heartwarming end to the trilogy! I loved Margot and Olivia, and I saw myself in a lot of their core conflicts.

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theespressoedition's review against another edition

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funny lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

Normally, I'm a huge fan of friends-to-lovers. Okay, huge fan is actually an understatement because it's really my favorite trope ever. This book just didn't do it the justice I had hoped for.

There wasn't a lot that I enjoyed about Count Your Lucky Stars, if I'm being really honest. Both of the protagonists were pretty unlikable, lacked basic communication skills, and weren't very mature for adults. I wanted them to just talk with one another about the awkward situation they went through in high school… that, by the way, could've been not at all awkward if they'd just talked then, but… they kept avoiding it and avoiding it until the weirdest possible moment.

When they finally did talk? I had this moment of "AWW yay - they're cute and happy now." But what happened next? I'm not even talking a third act break-up. I'm talking WITHIN THE SAME SCENE, the conversation went from them discussing their past and deciding to be together long-term to a massive argument for no real reason aside from a lack of faith in someone's parent???

Truly, I just wanted both of them to take a breather and look at the big picture like 30x throughout the story. I couldn't help but find myself getting frustrated over and over again. It could've been cute. It really could've been. But this one fell so flat for me.

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danajoy's review

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emotional lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character

2.5

I'll preface this by saying that I have not yet read the other 2 in the series.
I liked the initial set up, young wedding planner gets her big break arranging a huge wedding last minute just to find out that her childhood friend and one that got away is the best woman for the wedding.
I feel like this concept wasn't really utilised to its fullest - especially when another big trope

"and they were roomates"

is introduced REALLY early. Having two big tropes like that felt like way too much to me.
They are cute together and have a lot of chemistry but I felt pretty let down overall by this one. Communication is an issue the whole way through. Personally, I didn't enjoy the way things were hashed out.

It soured things for me that they got together and then straight away talk about the lack of communication that caused things to go bad 10 years prior and then its just left? I might be bitter but if I were Olivia I would've been a bit upset for a while after I found out the person I'd really wanted, who told me to get back with my ex, had been angry with me about it for years when she never suggested wanting anything different. Not a deal breaker but I'd be a lot more timid about going into things.

There was also A LOT of the couples from the last two books. They had in jokes I didn't get most of the way through. Also, because they were the protagonists of the previous books they're just so perfect and happy that it felt a bit dull.
Olivia didn't have any friends. Her coworkers are only shown at the very beginning (and huge missed opportunity in my opinion) abd the only other people she really communicates with are her ex-husband and dad.
I really didn't like the 3rd act conflict. I found both the characters annoying through it.

If your girlfriend is in a panic and she's an hour drive away from clarity and peace why would you be so set against her going when your big point against it is "wanting her to do things for herself".

For me this didn't have nearly enough pining.
Also...we don't even get to see the wedding.

Or find out what happened about the stolen car. That just never gets addressed!

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taelights's review

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emotional funny lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes

4.0

I was honestly such a huge fan of Written in the Stars so I was super excited to see the 3rd book in this series was another sapphic romance.

This had so many tropes I love: childhood best friends to lovers, reunions, roommates, second chance romances. So I knew I'd probably love it and I did.

The writing style was great, the sex scenes were very hot, and the chemistry between the characters were great!

I will definitely be keeping an eye out for more sapphic Alexandria Bellefleur books in the future.

My only warning would be for frequent mentions of past toxic hetero relationship with mentions of cheating, some emotional abuse, and other forms of toxicity.

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stacy837's review against another edition

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hopeful inspiring lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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