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A review by christinemomo
The Dating Disaster by Saxon James
4.0
February 2023. MM romance enemies to lovers opposites attract college housemates. Starts with a disastrous date with different preconceived notions and miscommunications, before discovering they will be housemates for the next year.
Includes characters treated positively who are bisexual and ones who are gay.
Also includes positive portrayals of diverse body types without it seeming objectifying or reductive (like chunky bears).
And positive portrayals of demisexuality without seeming sex negative or inherently against sex outside a committed relationship.
I liked this quite a bit. Like the other couple Saxon James novels I’ve listened to or read it’s pretty sweet overall, there’s no homophobia and everyone’s friends and family etc. are good and supportive.
A few intimate scenes but more romance and pining than physical moments.
This one’s roadblocks to a relationship are their different personalities and their different attitudes toward sex and dating. One of the characters, Felix, wants a boyfriend but also enjoys casual sex regularly in the meantime and wraps up his self-worth in it. The other one, Marshall, is shy and reserved and demisexual and rarely tries to date and has never pursued a relationship or sex, and when he finds himself interested in Felix is worried he just wants another fling and doesn’t want to scare him off.
There are a couple miscommunications that end up feeling like a bit much, but overall their differences set up a plausible reason it takes them a while to realize they are both equally serious about a relationship and attracted to one another. Honestly part of why I tend to prefer mystery/crime/other genre + queer romance is because I often end up wishing a pure romance book was a bit shorter because there are just too many miscommunications to stretch things out, so this is as much my general preference and complaint as anything specific to the book.
I really liked that Marshall is a chunkier guy (fondly referred to as a teddy bear and Marshmellow) and that Felix is super into it and genuinely attracted to him. Most romance novels have a couple “ideal” body types in them and it was nice to see accurate descriptors like chunky used appreciatively as a compliment.
Listened to the audiobook on Scribd, I believe it’s on kindle unlimited too. I picked the art for the paperback because it’s cuter. it’s a spin-off about the son from the second book in the Divorced Men’s Club, and is part of a series ”Franklin U” which has a bunch of individual but interconnected novels by different authors set at the same college.
“Dating Disaster” by Saxon James.
Includes characters treated positively who are bisexual and ones who are gay.
Also includes positive portrayals of diverse body types without it seeming objectifying or reductive (like chunky bears).
And positive portrayals of demisexuality without seeming sex negative or inherently against sex outside a committed relationship.
I liked this quite a bit. Like the other couple Saxon James novels I’ve listened to or read it’s pretty sweet overall, there’s no homophobia and everyone’s friends and family etc. are good and supportive.
A few intimate scenes but more romance and pining than physical moments.
This one’s roadblocks to a relationship are their different personalities and their different attitudes toward sex and dating. One of the characters, Felix, wants a boyfriend but also enjoys casual sex regularly in the meantime and wraps up his self-worth in it. The other one, Marshall, is shy and reserved and demisexual and rarely tries to date and has never pursued a relationship or sex, and when he finds himself interested in Felix is worried he just wants another fling and doesn’t want to scare him off.
There are a couple miscommunications that end up feeling like a bit much, but overall their differences set up a plausible reason it takes them a while to realize they are both equally serious about a relationship and attracted to one another. Honestly part of why I tend to prefer mystery/crime/other genre + queer romance is because I often end up wishing a pure romance book was a bit shorter because there are just too many miscommunications to stretch things out, so this is as much my general preference and complaint as anything specific to the book.
I really liked that Marshall is a chunkier guy (fondly referred to as a teddy bear and Marshmellow) and that Felix is super into it and genuinely attracted to him. Most romance novels have a couple “ideal” body types in them and it was nice to see accurate descriptors like chunky used appreciatively as a compliment.
Listened to the audiobook on Scribd, I believe it’s on kindle unlimited too. I picked the art for the paperback because it’s cuter. it’s a spin-off about the son from the second book in the Divorced Men’s Club, and is part of a series ”Franklin U” which has a bunch of individual but interconnected novels by different authors set at the same college.
“Dating Disaster” by Saxon James.