Reviews with content warning for Gaslighting - The Unhoneymooners

Reviews tagging 'Gaslighting'

The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren

97 reviews

kyrstin_p1989's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny hopeful lighthearted reflective fast-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

5.0

I love an enemies to lovers, especially when there’s a grumpy sunshine element too. These characters are adorable and so is their love story. This book is hilarious. I laughed so loud and long that my husband looked at me like I was nuts. And maybe I am, but still, the book is funny. I loved Love & Other Words and now I love this book, so I’m going to have to check out the rest of the books by this incredibly talented author pair.

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esrin_cordova'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? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

the ride throughout was funny and tense in all the right ways, except for the later parts of the book which almost spoiled the rest of the witty dialogue and fun interactions the honeymoon part built up so well.

It started precisely when they went home and it became obvious Dane was cheating on Ami as he tried insinuating to Olive she can still go to Dane if she got sick of Ethan, but neither Ethan nor Ami wanted to believe Olive. There were moments during the honeymoon itself where Olive tried to bring up the "coincidences" yet Ethan shot her down at every turn, only for Olive to end up being doubted and blamed by both Ethan and Ami about Dane. While he received judgment, it wasn't truly very satisfying, and I didn't like the way Ethan tried to make up for it either; not the method I approve of.

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psliz's review against another edition

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funny lighthearted fast-paced

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

2.25

enjoyed the majority, lost me in the last 90 pages. such a tone shift to create an unnecessary third-act conflict

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leahfoko's review against another edition

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emotional funny lighthearted fast-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

3.0

This book was fun and cute, enjoyable enemies to lovers fluff. I don’t have a whole lot of unique stuff to say about it since it was what you would expect from an enemies to lovers romance but I am a sucker for enemies to lovers romance so I don’t have any complaints about that.

I do however have complaints with everything involving Dane. I was high key stressed by everyone gaslighting Olive about Dane. Spoiler territory about how this was resolved that I had issues with.

I will say what brought my rating down so far was that I felt the resolution between Olive and Ethan after the fallout of the literal gaslighting and not believing her about his dude bro brother that he was doing was kind of lackluster and incomplete feeling for me. I felt like he barely apologized for believing she was lying and gaslighting her basically about how she is just so negative and sees the negative in everyone. I was like, are you kidding me? Idk I felt like he said like one line about how he was going to regret not believing her for a long time and she was just like, okay that’s fine then. I felt like I needed more groveling from him or like a more thorough acknowledgment of what he did wrong and I was a little disappointed that we didn’t get that. I just felt like it wrapped up too fast. Also, it was always excused as “well he loves his brother and can’t imagine he’d do anything wrong” and I have two issues with this. One, if my brother was being a lil shit and doing what Dane was doing I would’ve immediately questioned him on it. I wouldn’t have just gone along with it because he’s my brother and I love him. I can sort of understand why he wouldn’t be inclined to believe Olive about the flirting thing at the bar who he hasn’t known as long because he could think she read it wrong but he has been around Dane all this time and should’ve known something was not adding up and called him on it. I don’t feel that brotherly love excuses it. And in that thread and context of the story is my second point. Olive was willing to acknowledge that maybe her sister had known about this and maybe she was wrong. Olive was willing to admit that she might be wrong and give him the benefit of the doubt. And he continued to do the wrong thing. Ethan wasn’t really giving Olive the benefit of the doubt ever. And then it just worked out at the end? I just really felt like he handled that whole thing horribly and the fact that they went back to normal happy trust almost immediately just drove me crazy. This relationship has already hit one of the biggest trust hurdles and they just said well, too bad, the sex is good? I just did not like the way their relationship got fixed way too easily.

I loved Olive and Ami’s family, I found them all so wonderful and appreciated the latina main characters. I enjoyed the show down™️ at Ami’s house near the end. I love fake marriage tropes. I love enemies to lovers tropes. I enjoyed all this stuff. So overall I enjoyed the book. But that stuff with Ethan fully not believing Olive about his brother was just not it for me. 3 stars.

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bookswithlauren's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional funny hopeful lighthearted reflective sad fast-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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dukeofkel's review against another edition

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emotional funny tense 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? It's complicated

3.75

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beewalkin's review against another edition

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lighthearted fast-paced

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

2.0

This book is an easy read, pretty entertaining in the first half, but loses momentum quickly and has a pretty problematic plot as far as the romance goes. It’s enemies to lovers/misunderstandings, but it’s over-simplified and doesn’t have realistic “obstacles” for the characters.

way too much victim blaming and not believing the main character when her brother in law comes onto her. It’s reconciled at the end, but totally just glosses over it like it was a small misunderstanding. all the trust flew out the window and it’s like “nbd, he’s still so cute” like what. Also, I don’t like how many people took low blows at the main character’s personality—she also gets fired from a much-needed job because of this dude and I didn’t feel like that way necessary.

. Would not rec this book—read a summary, and save your time.

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izziepng's review against another edition

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adventurous funny lighthearted relaxing medium-paced

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

3.75

I truly feel no strong feelings towards this book I enjoyed reading it.

SPOILERS AHEAD

I think that Olive really needed the character development.

Also was Ethan completely dumb he thought that Dane leaving Ami on things like valentine’s day and their anniversary ment that Dane though that they had nothing planned??? And that they weren’t serious until HE PROPOSED!! Was he even listening to the bull shit he was spewing??

And when she saw her future boss why didn’t she pretend to be Ami and be like “yeh sorry definitely not Olive I’m Ami her twin sister” I feel like that would of work out 1000 times better?? Or am I just being dumb and that wouldn’t of worked??

I think Ethan proposing was cute. I think that books don’t always have to end with them getting engaged or married or having a baby but I think it fit for this one. You know with them being back where it started it’s cute.

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jeaniedew's review against another edition

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adventurous funny medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Honestly would have gotten five stars, but I am mad about how the whole situation with Dane was resolved as far as Ethan and Amy’s reaction to Olive telling them, especially the bit of gaslighting when she told Ethan, and then the apologies just didn’t feel sincere enough to me. They only apologized when it turned out that she was right, which implies that the two most important relationships to Olive would have been destroyed were it not for them finding out the truth, rather than them deciding to trust and believe her first before looking for proof. Otherwise a good book, but those bits made me feel slimy.

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jamespotterluv's review against another edition

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funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted fast-paced

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

2.25

it's not a bad book, perse. it's... readable. the overall concept is really good and i love a good enemies to lovers, but the execution was mediocre at best. the whole enemies to lovers trope wasn't written that well and when the plot twist came i was not surprised (and it felt like a waste of time.) there were a lot of stereotypes in the book that i didn't like at all. it was borderline lesbophobic w comments that were made abt ximena and the only confirmed gay character just felt like he was included for diversity points? how the authors portrayed him... i'm not going to get into how they portrayed olive's body since one of the authors is plus sized so they can probably speak on that. what they can't speak on is the hispanic culture (the main character is hispanic.) both authors are white and whilst i have no issue w culture being included, what bothers me is how they included it. we got a surname, a few spanish words, some stereotypes and that was it. it added nothing to the plot. don't get me started on ethan/olive's relationship and the portrayal of dane/ami. it's sanist too btw.

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