The Wedding Date by Jasmine Guillory

The Wedding Date by Jasmine Guillory
Release Date - January 30,  2018

Publisher Website - Penguin Random House
Publisher Social Media - Twitter
Pages -  304 pages
My Rating - 4/5
**received for an honest review from publisher**

Here is the Goodreads synopsis

A groomsman and his last-minute guest are about to discover if a fake date can go the distance in a fun and flirty debut novel.

Agreeing to go to a wedding with a guy she gets stuck with in an elevator is something Alexa Monroe wouldn't normally do. But there's something about Drew Nichols that's too hard to resist.

On the eve of his ex's wedding festivities, Drew is minus a plus one. Until a power outage strands him with the perfect candidate for a fake girlfriend...

After Alexa and Drew have more fun than they ever thought possible, Drew has to fly back to Los Angeles and his job as a pediatric surgeon, and Alexa heads home to Berkeley, where she's the mayor's chief of staff. Too bad they can't stop thinking about the other...

They're just two high-powered professionals on a collision course toward the long distance dating disaster of the century--or closing the gap between what they think they need and what they truly want...

The Wedding Date has a premise that is straight out of a romantic comedy movie. A guy asking a girl to be his date at a wedding he doesn't really want to go to alone kicks off a whirlwind romance. It's the perfect kind of meet cute that seems just plausible enough to happen but also kind of magical.

The chemistry between Alexa and Drew is instantaneous. The reader feels that spark the moment they first banter in the broken down elevator. It is part of what makes any romance novel enjoyable, and this one captures that chemistry easily. It's an easy rapport that they have, and it makes their falling in love feel all the more believable. It also doesn't hurt that this plays with the fake to real relationship trope which is one of my favourites. It can be delightful when done correctly like it is here.

This is a romance novel where the heroine of our story is a black woman and the hero a white man. I cannot speak to the representation held within, but I enjoyed the fact that it's simply a love story. There are parts of the story that are directly driven by the fact that Alexa is a black woman, and things that are specific to things she would experience. There are times where Drew has to confront his privilege as a white man and the impact that has on their relationship. It, however, really is just a love story at it's heart. It is totally a rom-com movie in book format and I look forward to the eventual movie starring Chris Evans and Lupita Nyong'o (at least we can hope).

There is, of course, the required amount of angst to be found within these pages. Each of these characters have their own set of insecurities that come to the surface as their connection continues to grow. With these insecurities come irrational decisions, communication failures, and assumptions that lead to even more ill advised decisions. I appreciated that both characters had issues they had to work through, and that both of them were shown to have flaws. It made for a more realistic read. There may be a feeling of repetition to this element of the story, but I found it worked within this novel. You can't deal with your feelings until you talk about them and Alexa and Drew are the Queen and King of Not Communicating. It may be a little frustrating at times, but only because you want them to work through their issues and just be together already.

There is so much talk of food in this novel that I was basically hungry the entire time I was reading it. Be warned that there are numerous mention food that seem specifically written to induce cravings. It's something that is included in the very first time Drew and Alexa meet so it becomes kind of cute that it is something that is continued throughout the novel.

The secondary characters were one of my favourite things about this book. Both Alexa and Drew have friends and family that are fairly fleshed out. I looked forward to seeing them interacting with their friends and family almost as much as I looked forward to seeing them together. Drew's friend, Carlos, almost provided a lot of comic relief and the friendship between them was something that stood out while reading.

If you're looking for a steamy, fun read that I recommend that you pick this one up. This may be Jasmine Guillory's debut novel, but I anticipate that romance fans will be eager to read whatever she writes next. It's also a perfectly on theme with its release being just in time for a Valentine's Day read.