Hello Everyone!

Today I’m bringing you a review of The American Roommate Experiment by Elena Armas!

Title: The American Roommate Experiment

Author: Elena Armas

Publisher: Atria

Number of Pages: 387 Pages

Genre: Romance

Age Category: Adult

Date Published: September 6, 2022

Buy the Book: Amazon, Indigo, Book Depository

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Rosie Graham has a problem. A few, actually. She just quit her well paid job to focus on her secret career as a romance writer. She hasn’t told her family and now has terrible writer’s block. Then, the ceiling of her New York apartment literally crumbles on her. Luckily she has her best friend Lina’s spare key while she’s out of town. But Rosie doesn’t know that Lina has already lent her apartment to her cousin Lucas, who Rosie has been stalking—for lack of a better word—on Instagram for the last few months. Lucas seems intent on coming to her rescue like a Spanish knight in shining armor. Only this one strolls around the place in a towel, has a distracting grin, and an irresistible accent. Oh, and he cooks.

Lucas offers to let Rosie stay with him, at least until she can find some affordable temporary housing. And then he proposes an outrageous experiment to bring back her literary muse and meet her deadline: He’ll take her on a series of experimental dates meant to jump-start her romantic inspiration. Rosie has nothing to lose. Her silly, online crush is totally under control—but Lucas’s time in New York has an expiration date, and six weeks may not be enough, for either her or her deadline.

After falling in love with Lina and Aaron in The Spanish Love Deception earlier this year, my bookish bestie Hannah and I knew we had to read The American Roommate Experiment as soon as possible. I’m so glad that we were able to squeeze this book in before the end of the year because it was a delightful and fun read.

I want to start off by talking about the characters in this book. I thought that both Rosie and Lucas were both delightful. I loved that Rosie was taking a huge leap and following her dream while Lucas was trying to figure out what his next steps were. I loved how much they cared about each other and how much they believed in each other. I also loved that Lucas cooked and I found myself getting hungry reading about his culinary creations.

The relationship between Rosie and Lucas is the main plot in this book, but I also appreciated some of the side plots that were going on. I liked reading about Rosie struggling with her writing and her deadline and second guessing her choices. I liked Rosie’s family struggles and her concern about her brother. I also liked Lucas’ story while he deals with the trauma he faced and accepting that his life has been significantly altered.

As far as the romance goes, I enjoyed it. I thought that the fake dates that Lucas took Rosie on were swoon-worthy. I liked that that Rosie and Lucas seemed to have fun and actually enjoy each other’s company on the dates. The romance in this book was a bit of a slow burn and it took a while for anything steamy to happen. I also liked that this book had a handful of grand romantic gestures.

As far as tropes go, this book had a pretty great meet cute in the beginning. It also had forced proximity, fake dating, and friends-to-lovers. I thought that these tropes worked well together and that worked well for this book. This book also had a decent amount of moments that made me laugh-out-loud, which is always appreciated.

Finally, I loved that Lina and Aaron make appearances in this book. I enjoyed reading about Lina and Aaron in The Spanish Love Deception, so seeing them in this book brought me an extra boost of joy. I especially liked Aaron in this book, and he had some moments that made me like him even more than I initially did.

Overall, I thought The American Roommate Experiment was a very cute and enjoyable romance novel. I liked the characters and the tropes and I definitely understand the hype.

Rating: 4.5 stars!

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