Ratings:
Star Rating: ★☆☆☆☆
If This Book Was a Movie Rating: R
Review:
Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
When I first requested this on Netgalley, I was literally over the moon. A heroine with infertility issues, IVF, falling for your donor, it just all sounded so unique and completely out of the box, I was HERE for it.
But after struggling through *that*, I swear I’d just dump the book and try to forget it ever existed if I wasn’t obligated to review this for Netgalley.
let’s keep this brief and start with the premise, shall we?
“Meet Gemma Jacobs. She’s driven, energetic, and a positive thinker. She has a great career working for famed self-help guru Ian Fortune, she lives in a cute studio apartment in Manhattan, and her family is supportive and loving (albeit a little kooky). Her life is perfect. Absolutely wonderful.
Except for one tiny little thing.
After a decade of disastrous relationships and an infertility diagnosis, Gemma doesn’t want a Mr. Right (or even a Mr. Right Now), she just wants a baby.
And all she needs is an egg, some sperm, and IVF.
So Gemma makes a New Year’s resolution: have a baby.
Josh Lewenthal is a laid back, relaxed, find-the-humor-in-life kind of guy. The polar opposite of Gemma. He’s also her brother’s best friend. For the past twenty years Josh has attended every Jacobs’ family birthday, holiday, and event – he’s always around.
Gemma knows him. He’s nice (enough), he’s funny (-ish), he’s healthy (she thinks) and he didn’t burn any ants with a magnifying glass as a kid. Which, in Gemma’s mind, makes him the perfect option for a sperm donor.
So Gemma wants to make a deal. An unemotional, businesslike arrangement. No commitments, just a baby.
To Gemma’s surprise, Josh agrees.
They have nothing in common, except their agreement to make a baby and their desire to keep things businesslike.
But the thing about baby-making…it’s hard to keep it businesslike, it’s nearly impossible to keep it unemotional, and it’s definitely impossible to keep your heart out of the mix. Because when you’re making a baby together, things have a way of starting to feel like you’re making other things too – like a life, and a family, and love. And when the baby-making ends, you wish that everything else didn’t have to end too.”
*sighs deeply*
See, there was potential.
It was squandered pretty quickly, but it was there.
plot discussion first.
So as mentioned in the premise, our heroine was diagnosed with stage four endometriosis. To put it simply, this disorder means it’s physically impossible for her to have children. As a side note, it’s awesome that the author chose to write a romance with infertility. It’s something many couples have to navigate and work through, and I love seeing that representation in this book 💕. However, with that all being said, the way the author handled infertility and IVF just made it feel weird.
I mean like maybe this is just a me problem, but I really didn’t need that attempt to make the IVF process ✨romantic✨, and I really really didn't need Dr. Ingraham’s scientific explanation of how babies are made.
like I just really didn’t need those mental images in my life tysm
In terms of the characters, everyone felt about as multi-dimensional as the milk carton I threw into the trash this morning. Gemma’s and Josh’s families felt like they existed to make the MCs look good, and then failed miserably at even that. Everyone else was completely forgettable lol
Speaking of our MCs, Josh and Gemma were terrible MCs.
Josh felt like Sir Plot Whiplash. Like right in the beginning of the book they were literally eating ice cream, walking around NYC, talking like regular people, and then Gemma asks him a simple IVF question and BAM the guy is giving her hecking bedroom eyes.
BEDROOM EYES. ON GRIMY NYC STREETS.
i mean sir this is a Wendy’s after all.
Gemma wasn’t much better. The amount of times she was like “hE’s SeXy aND hAWt AnD i wAnT HiM” was just annoying and felt like middle school all over again.
Also, those two had no bloody chemistry. Like it’s never clear why Gemma likes this man. Or why he gives a crap about her. But to be fair, WE ONLY EVER HAVE GEMMA’S POV. SO MAYBE HE’D BE BETTER IF WE ACTUALLY KNEW HIM HM?
no, I’m not salty about it why do you ask *sniffs*
anyways, this just really wasn’t the book for me. too strange and weird and cringe and I mean really I should’ve known all this from looking at the title lol
Friend me on Goodreads (yes, you, I wanna be your friend): https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/136268749-isabelle
Buy this book:
Recommendations That Are Better Than This Book:
Maid of Dishonor by Gracie Ruth Mitchell
Eye of the Beholder by Gracie Ruth Mitchell
Comentarios