My Thoughts on The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren

After reading Love and Other Words last year, I haven’t found a Christina Lauren book that I’ve truly liked. The ones that released after that one were good, but not moving me to tears or feeling a lot of things like Love and Other Words.

But then I picked up The Unhoneymooners hoping that this will be the book that turns me back on to what Christina Lauren is doing. Luckily, this one really did the trick.

The story follows Olive and Ethan, two in-laws that can’t stand each other. Olive’s twin sister, Ami, is about to marry Ethan’s younger brother, Dane. However, on the day of their wedding, the entire wedding party and all their guests come down with a bacteria (not food poisoning) that gives them the same symptoms of food poisoning. The only two people who weren’t hit with the weird bug are Olive and Ethan.

Because Ami and Dane were out sick, Ami urges Olive to take their honeymoon trip to Maui. That may sound like a strange request, but because Ami loves to win giveaways their honeymoon was also one of the giveaway prizes. No returns/exchanges/transfers. Olive takes Ami’s identity to claim her prize and Ethan comes along as her plus one.

So you can already see that this book is hilarious. The kind of luck Olive has is the kind I think I have; none. She’s outgoing and human and totally believes she’s a jinx meanwhile Ethan seems quiet. He seems to have a lot of hangups about food preparation and the way Olive dresses, but their hateship continues as they head to Maui together.

The kinds of stuff they come across in Maui (which I won’t get into because of spoilers) is the kind of stuff you would see in a romcom movie. It reminded me a lot of Just Go With It, a small romcom with Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston where Jennifer plays Adam’s ex-wife while he brings her and her kids to Hawaii with his newest girlfriend. They go there and see Jennifer’s frenemy from college and then have to play husband/wife and lie to everyone. Here’s the trailer:

If you’re a fan of enemies-to-lovers and quirky romances where the couple needs to lie to everyone, then this is the book for you. The only issues I had with this one was the part right before the ending. I hated Ethan for his disbelief in Olive and I hated Olive’s streak of bad luck when it come to her love life, her family/friends, and even her job. But all of her issues finally turn around and end the story on a lovely note.

The last thing I do want to mention is that Olive is Mexican-American in this book. While that’s not a problem for me, I thought it was weird that two white women were representing a woman of color in their book. I think my hesitancy with this is that it could lead to some stereotypes regarding her family and personality. However, it wasn’t. I do love that a Mexican-American woman played the main protagonist here and love the small pieces of representation they’ve been injecting. I won’t base my opinions off this fact, but it’s something to keep in mind.

• 4/5 Stars
• Find my review on Goodreads
• Find The Unhoneymooners on Amazon (presale until May 14th)

I received a copy of this book from Gallery Books for free in exchange for an honest review. My opinions have not been influenced by the publisher or the author.