by Elena Armas (Goodreads, Twitter, Instagram, Website)
Published on February 21, 2021
Genres: Romance, Contemporary
A wedding. A trip to Spain. The most infuriating man. And three days of pretending. Or in other words, a plan that will never work.
Catalina Martín, finally, not single. Her family is happy to announce that she will bring her American boyfriend to her sister’s wedding. Everyone is invited to come and witness the most magical event of the year.
That would certainly be tomorrow’s headline in the local newspaper of the small Spanish town I came from. Or the epitaph on my tombstone, seeing the turn my life had taken in the span of a phone call.
Four weeks wasn’t a lot of time to find someone willing to cross the Atlantic–from NYC and all the way to Spain–for a wedding. Let alone, someone eager to play along my charade. But that didn’t mean I was desperate enough to bring the 6’4 blue eyed pain in my ass standing before me.
Aaron Blackford. The man whose main occupation was making my blood boil had just offered himself to be my date. Right after inserting his nose in my business, calling me delusional, and calling himself my best option. See? Outrageous. Aggravating. Blood boiling. And much to my total despair, also right. Which left me with a surly and extra large dilemma in my hands. Was it worth the suffering to bring my colleague and bane of my existence as my fake boyfriend to my sister’s wedding? Or was I better off coming clean and facing the consequences of my panic induced lie?
Like my abuela would say, que dios nos pille confesados.
The Spanish Love Deception is an enemies-to-lovers, fake-dating romantic comedy. Perfect for those looking for a steamy slow-burn romance with the sweetest Happily Ever After.
Disclaimer: I initially rated this as 4 stars, but looking back at how much I enjoyed this baby, this deserves all the stars it can get!
A new addition to my All-Time Favourites list, Elena Armas sure brought out the big guns with this stunning debut with a delicious mix of the best romance tropes in history: enemies to lovers, fake dating, and a bit of an office romance; topped off with a hefty serving of slow burn and laugh-out-loud banter! Did I mention fake dating? This book is a whole ass meal and I just want more!
The Spanish Love Deception follows Catalia “Lina” Martin: single and dateless to her sister’s upcoming wedding where her ex-boyfriend is the groom’s brother. She shouldn’t care about her singlehood and neither should other people, but she left Spain for a reason and she’s not about to reunite with her Hispanic family and be the subject of all pitiful glances so she tells them she has an American boyfriend, who ends up being her pain-in-the-ass coworker, Aaron Blackford.
I knew I was going to be hooked just from the blurb alone, but The Spanish Love Deception starts off with an iconic first line that immediately grabs you from the get go. I just knew I wouldn't be able to put this book down. Everything about this book left me in giggles; the dialogue is superb and fabulously hilarious. I truly can’t express how much fun I had reading this book. You can tell Lina and Aaron’s chemistry would be explosive just from the very beginning and them pretending to be dating just added so much fuel to the fire. However, what made me slightly frustrated was how much of a slow burn this book is! (SCREAMS) It’s not all fun and games though (Spoiler alert: watch out for the Wedding Cup). This romantic comedy surprisingly delicately explores a lot of vulnerabilities, especially from Lina’s point of view and the deeper reason behind her decision to leave Spain for the US. A brilliant (and successful) attempt by Armas, I might add.
Another thing that sets this book apart from the other enemies to lovers romances I've read is the integration of the Spanish language in dialogues, most especially during parts with Lina's family. As a Filipino, I'm quite familiar with some Spanish words and phrases but I still had to use the Translate option on Kindle a few times but it's truly no trouble at all. It's an added uniqueness to this book and I even enjoyed sounding out the phrases!
All in all, The Spanish Love Deception is just incredibly stunning and a must-read, especially for times when you just need to feel good and have a lot of fun. It’s got everything I want in a romance novel with its own unique Hispanic twist, and I just need more of this. Here’s to reading more of Elena Armas’ works in the future!
Buy Links: Amazon US / Amazon UK / Amazon CA / Amazon DE / Amazon ES
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