My Favorite Half-Night Stand

3.5 rounded down.

I enjoyed this friends to lovers book. Although I didn't find it as funny as some of the other Christina Lauren books I've read, it was still a very enjoyable story.

The friend group dynamic was good, the dating site adventure was good, however, the conflict for me was not.

You can see where it's going, you can see what's going to happen. I think both MCs handled it poorly, and I think the MMC was sort of shit to his friends and the FMC, blowing things out of proportion and making the apology drag out for too long.

it's not the same as josh and hazel's guide to not dating, because nothing can beat josh im (duh) but it was fun to read this because this was one of those books for me where i was like huh doesnt seem like my kinda book but then it surprises me and makes me enjoy it. Although i dont like the miscommunication trope, or the lying, but it was really fun to read about their friendship and dynamics.

This was a fun read, though not my favorite CL book. The writing was excellent as always, the humor a bit hit-or-miss for me (also par for the course), and I really liked the group of friends, especially Reid. Millie, on the other hand, was quite frustrating at times.

Barely three stars out of obviousness. And the drama for the “betrayal “ was slightly too much imho.

I'm sure I've said it before, but this author duo can do no wrong in my book! I absolutely loved My Favourite Half-Night Stand, it may (dare I say it!) be my favourite of theirs and that is high praise. Josh & Hazel and The Unhoneymooners were also amazing, but this one just had so much heart. I adored the friend group and their dynamic, I loved the deeper family stories which came out of the story right until the end and I really loved the inclusion of the chat and text conversations. I laughed, I cried and I read it all in 24hrs - is that not a sign of a fucking good book?!

3,5/5

Cute, sweet, fun to read. I found myself wishing that there would be sequels for the guy friends which is something I hardly ever want – I don't often connect with secondary characters much. But the guy friends were pretty adorable. More than anything, I was drawn in and kept in by the promise of epistolary romance in the style of online dating website messages. It was cute. Apparently one of the tropes I like most, if it's a trope, is secret internet identity? Positive and hopeful catfishing? I recommend it if you like epistolary romance, girls who are ‘one of the guys', and/or internet dating.

I am so NOT the target demographic for this wildly popular author duo, but every once in a while I have to pick up one of their books to see what I'm missing, only to remind myself exactly why they don't work for me. I guess it's refreshing that Millie is “one of the boys” and that for a change the woman is the one who has trouble processing and expressing her feelings, but her actions were fairly inexcusable, and she really lost me when she explained her family situation (your father has Parkinson's disease and you're leaving your sister to take care of everything because you don't want to be reminded of your mother's death? Grow up, put on your big girl panties, go home and act like a decent person. Sorry, but I have an elderly mother with whom I have a very complicated relationship, but I take care of her because that's what you do for your parents. End rant).

Lauren has a fun, breezy style and enjoyable secondary characters (although I spent most of the book unable to remember the difference between Millie and Reid's 3 guy friends). The sex scenes are spicy without being unnecessarily explicit. There's just something about the writing that makes me feel every one of my 55+ years. I'll probably wait another three years until I forget why I didn't love this and pick up another Christina Lauren book.

GAHHH I am so happy. I LOVED this book.

We're first introduced to a group of five best friends. Four guys and a girl. They all decide to venture into the world of online dating in hopes of finding dates for a work event. Of course two of the friends already kind of have feelings for each other without realizing it themselves. What I really enjoy about the friends-to-lovers trope is that the characters are already comfortable with each other and they know everything about each other, leaving for some really fun and sweet moments as their relationship builds to something more. This is one of those books that left a big grin on my face from the overwhelming cuteness and the TENSION, my goodness.

I also loved that there is a great cast of supporting characters in this book. C&L did a great job of incorporating the entire friend group into the story, rather than using them as filler characters that we only see once and then they're never heard from again. I would love a book for each of them.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advance copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own
3.5 stars

Friends, this is a hard review to write. I have turned into such a Christina Lauren fangirl this year, but I wasn't a huge fan of this book. My problem might be that I just expected so much more from this amazing duo.

I liked the set up, I really like the concept, even the characters started out interesting to me. Also part of the dialogue is through IM which I found to be so cool. This is how we converse now! Even the online dating talks were interesting because I'm sure so many people have been there before. And of course, the writing is magnificent as always.

So, even though I'm gushing over this book, I still giving it 3.5 stars... why? I think it is because I have such issues with Millie. She didn't handle things right, and yes she does grow and get better, but at times I thought she was super thickheaded. She didn't feel like a 30 year old, but someone who should still be in her early 20s. Really, all of the characters felt younger than they should have been, yet older since they had such a hard time with their dating profiles. There was just so many disconnects.
Another thing is a praise open communication, which totally didn't happen here– in fact it is the main conflict in this novel, so I should have known I was going to have problems with it. I could understand Millie's ability to be more open online, I get it, but :/

I think 3.5 stars is the lowest I've rated a Christina Lauren novel. I will definitely read whatever they write next and hope this was just an outlier.

Review soon.

It's a bane reviewing books by your favorite authors sometimes, because you expect so much from them and you really want to love the book a lot. And then you end up being quite harsh about it, because it didn't live up to the expectations. That's what happened with this one. I enjoyed the story and had a lot of fun while reading, but I inadvertantly kept comparing it to Josh and Hazel's Guide to Not Dating, which was probably not right on my part.

Millie and her gang of friends Reid, Ed, Alex and Chris are all working as professors or research assistants at UCSB and being very dedicated to their work isn't conducive for their love lives. While Millie is able to create fun and interesting online dating profiles for her friends, she is not comfortable talking about herself, online or in real life. The death of her mother in her childhood and subsequent mourning by her father left her as an emotionally closed off person, who is very good at listening to others but keeps things very close to her chest. She knows so much about her close friends but their knowledge about her is quite superficial. Being a criminology professor with a fascination for female serial characters and very much in love with her work, leaves her with little time for dating and her aversion to being emotionally open lets her live in her bubble of work and friends.

I really loved the friend group. They are quite frank with each other, are very funny and I loved their interactions. Their group chats and texts are very entertaining and I was really looking forward to more of them. Reid and Millie are best friends and I really liked the comfort they shared in each other's company; it felt very realistic and natural. The emails that Reid shared with her online alter-ego Cat were very honest and heartwarming and just like Reid, I kept hoping that Millie could be that open in real life. It's also quite easy to relate to both Reid's loneliness and wanting more from a partner; and Millie's unwillingness to be more vulnerable and open herself up to a world of hurt if she loses her best friend in the process.

The humor in this book is on point, very similar to other Christina Lauren books. It was also very interesting to get to know about the modern online dating landscape, and how the reality is so different for women as compared to men – the guys get matched to girls who want to chat with them and get to know them better, Millie gets asked for full body shots or sent dick pics. I also liked that all the characters were in their late 20s, early 30s because it is possible that not everyone has their love life sorted just because they are settled in a career. I absolutely loved the fact that they were all in academia but none of their work, especially Millie's as a criminologist is developed upon, and that disappointed me. It would have been great to know more about their interactions at work or why they chose their respective fields. I also totally felt the amazing friendship between Reid and Millie and will completely believe that they make a great couple, but there was not much chemistry between them – atleast not the sexy swoon worthy kind; they are more respectful and understanding of each other. And despite this, she remains dishonest with him for a long part of the book and that angered me a little. It makes for a good conflict and angst in the story, but it didn't endear me to her.

Overall, this book was fun and entertaining in Christina Lauren signature style. But it had it's problems and even though I loved the friendship dynamic and wanted to be a part of their group, the romance left me slightly unsatisfactory. I think if you are a fan of the author duo, you should not compare this one to their previous works and that might help you enjoy this book more. I also feel that you should take my review with a grain of salt and have fun reading this interesting romcom 😉😉