AUTHOR: Jodi McAlister GENRE: Adult Romance PAGES: 336 pages RELEASED: 3 January 2024 SERIES: Marry Me, Juliet #3 SYNOPSIS: Reality TV producer Murray O’Connell is used to being in control. He’s the showrunner for reality dating show Marry Me, Juliet, and that means he’s the boss: he controls the cast, the crew and the story. Until Lily Fireball turns up. Lily is everything viewers love to watch: she’s feisty, dramatic, and not afraid to cause a stir. Her villain narrative on the show should be the cherry on top of the cake of Murray’s perfect season, but what no one knows is that Murray already knows Lily. Not as Lily Fireball, but as Lily Ong: his former best friend. Now Lily has thrust herself back into Murray’s life, and into the most stressful season he’s ever worked on. Why is she here? What is her agenda? And why can’t Murray just concentrate on his job, instead of fighting to shield her from hateful viewers – and keep her with him forever? This book was kindly sent to be by NetGalley and Simon & Schuster in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. The one where the producer falls in love with a contestant, but with twist…
Murray O’Connell has been working in the reality television sphere for thirteen years, and he’s worked hard to get to where he is now - showrunner of season 11 of hit reality dating show Marry Me, Juliet. Only this season, he’s without his best friend, fellow producer, and reality partner Lily Ong. This season is one that Murray and Lily had been pitching for years - one with a diverse cast and not just one token person of colour. It has to be perfect. Running the season was already going to be hard enough with Lily by his side, but now the world has been thrown into a global pandemic resulting in a skeleton crew and the inability to send eliminated contestants home. And Murray not wanting to delegate in order to be across absolutely everything is already causing a world of stress. The last thing Murray expected was Lily Fireball, the network’s last-minute villain, to walk into the pre-villa interviews. Because Lily Fireball is his Lily, the one who cut him out of her life a year ago in order to pick up the pieces of her life. He hasn’t heard a peep from Lily in that entire time, and now she’s suddenly back in his life, and he isn’t sure why she’s reinventing herself as the ruthless Lily Fireball. Murray has dealt with curved balls in reality TV, but this is his biggest curveball yet, and he doesn't know how to craft this story. I have been hanging out for the beauty from the moment I finished Can I Steal You For A Second? back in April! And although it’s felt like forever, the wait has been WORTH IT! Jodi has been teasing Murray and Lily throughout the previous two books and she has crafted a story that not only lived up to expectations but exceeded them. I was hooked from page one and couldn’t put the book down until I turned the final page. I know I said my favourite trope within the reality dating show trope is romance between contestants, but I absolutely adore a good crew/contestant romance! As I mentioned in my previous two reviews for Here For The Right Reasons and Can I Steal You For A Second?, Jodi’s writing style works so well when it comes to inner monologues and flashbacks, and she took the flashbacks to a whole new level in this book. Where the flashbacks were brief and scattered in the first two books, Lily’s entire perspective in this book was flashbacks to key moments in her and Murray’s professional and personal relationship. Meanwhile Murray’s perspective was all current time, with the small scattered flashbacks we’ve been accustomed to. And as much as I was wanting to see Lily’s perspective while being on the show, I actually love how Jodi framed both of their stories before the timelines finally met up at the end. Through the snippets of Murray and Lily’s relationship in the first two books, you could tell they had chemistry. Their dynamic is such an interesting one because of how compatible they are from both a romantic perspective and a professional one. They just seemed to work on all levels, and you could feel that as the story progressed, even when both of them went on to marry other people. In both the past and the present, Murray and Lily’s romance was a slow-burn that simmered below the surface until it finally boiled over in the most reality TV way. I don’t want to pick favourites, but these two might be it… If this was an actual season of The Bachelor, I’d be ALL over the messy drama and unintended/unexpected love stories. Jodi pulls back the curtain on the production of a Bachelor-inspired show and delivers all the television magic that goes into crafting the must-watch love stories that they’re trying to create season after season, with a heavy focus on the messy behind-the-scenes drama that we don’t get to see unfold onscreen. While it definitely doesn’t matter the order in which you read the first two books, this is definitely one to save for last. All the characters have already been introduced, the crazy drama already established, and we’ve already witnessed Murray at breaking point across the perspectives of the previous two books. This book so effortlessly slots into the gaps into a story we’ve already read about twice, and it’s nice to be able to now piece the entire picture together, from all sides of production. You could totally pick this book up first, but I think reading this series in it’s intended order will make for a totally different and better reading experience! To have the same story and timeline from SIX different perspectives has been so fun, and I'd love to see more authors tackle this type of storytelling. Jodi has made each book in this trilogy really enjoyable, despite it all taking place at the same time and with some overlap. I am seriously hoping Jodi is writing another book because you can’t just casually drop a twist about the follow-up season of Wherefore Art Thou Romeo in the final pages, and then not actually show us how it came about. If these three books are anything to go by, another installment or a spin-off would be absolutely FABULOUS and filled with ALL the juicy reality drama! If your guilty pleasure if trashy reality television and you absolutely live for the messy drama that unfolds on said reality television, this book, and whole series, needs to be at the top your TBR! Start 2024 off on the right foot with some must-read Aussie romances! |
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