The Worst Best Man by Mia Sosa Published by Avon on February 4, 2020
Genres: Contemporary, Romance
Pages: 368
Format: eBook
Source: Library
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Critically acclaimed author Mia Sosa delivers a sassy, steamy enemies-to-lovers romantic comedy about a woman whose new job requires her to work side-by-side with the best man who ruined her wedding: her ex-fiancé's infuriating, irritating, annoyingly handsome brother. Perfect for fans of Jasmine Guillory, Helen Hoang, and Sally Thorne!
A wedding planner left at the altar. Yeah, the irony isn’t lost on Carolina Santos, either. But despite that embarrassing blip from her past, Lina’s managed to make other people’s dreams come true as a top-tier wedding coordinator in DC. After impressing an influential guest, she’s offered an opportunity that could change her life. There’s just one hitch… she has to collaborate with the best (make that worst) man from her own failed nuptials.
Tired of living in his older brother’s shadow, marketing expert Max Hartley is determined to make his mark with a coveted hotel client looking to expand its brand. Then he learns he’ll be working with his brother’s whip-smart, stunning—absolutely off-limits—ex-fiancée. And she loathes him.
If they can survive the next few weeks and nail their presentation without killing each other, they’ll both come out ahead. Except Max has been public enemy number one ever since he encouraged his brother to jilt the bride, and Lina’s ready to dish out a little payback of her own.
But even the best laid plans can go awry, and soon Lina and Max discover animosity may not be the only emotion creating sparks between them. Still, this star-crossed couple can never be more than temporary playmates because Lina isn’t interested in falling in love and Max refuses to play runner-up to his brother ever again...
This book was exactly what I needed. I’ve been in such a reading slump. I’m not struggling to finish books, I guess. I’m finishing them. It’s just taking me forever to read anything. This book, which I loved and couldn’t wait to get back to, took me at least 2 weeks. Folks – it is not that long of a book. I would normally bust through this in one sitting on a weekend, no more than 2 nights during the week, but it took two weeks. Two. Weeks.
Anyway – reading slump aside, I loved this book. I cannot tell you how hungry I ended up every time I picked this book up. The descriptions of food were so perfect. I wanted to eat everything. I would dearly love to have a store like the one Lina’s family runs in my neighborhood. I’d eat there every day.
So, the actual plot. Lina is dumped on her wedding day by her fiance, Andrew. Technically, Andrew is too much of a coward to dump her, so he sends his younger brother Max in to do it. It does not go well. According to the text Andrew sent to Max, which he showed to Lina, the reason Andrew broke up with her is that he and Max had a talk the previous night that made Andrew realize he couldn’t marry Lina. That’s where we leave them. Newly dumped Lina and Max, the annoying little brother who clearly screwed up somehow and ruined the wedding.
Three years later, everyone has presumably moved on, and Lina is now running her own wedding planning business. It’s so successful that she’s offered a partnership that would solve a lot of her problems. Her business is successful, and she’s good at her job, but real estate in DC is expensive, and the lease she’s had the last few years, that’s lower because of family connections, is about to end, and she doesn’t know where she’s going to actually run her business. But this partnership she’s offered would solve all of it. She’s competing for it with one other wedding planner, so she has to nail this pitch.
The reasons are a little convoluted, but she ends up working with Max on her pitch, while Andrew is assigned to help her competition with his. And that’s where the book really picks up. I was so here for Lina and her entire family. Moreso than I was here for Max. Frankly, I wasn’t that impressed with Max. I didn’t actively dislike him, but he was just sort of…. blah. I didn’t see anything special about him.
Lina, on the other hand, was amazing. She’s everything I want to be when I grow up. She’s so smart, great at running her business, knows what she wants and isn’t afraid to get it. But she’s also very conscious of the fact that as a woman, specifically a Latinx woman, the way she expresses herself, the emotions she allows herself to show, are held to a different standard. She tries very hard to avoid the fiery Latin stereotype at all costs, sometimes to a fault. She holds herself back so much. It’s one of the reasons I loved seeing her family so much. Not only were they well-drawn characters in their own right, each with their own traits and easily identifiable personalities, but I loved seeing Lina relax a little and let herself go a bit.
My biggest complaint about this book would be Andrew. That guy was a giant flaming pile of shit and no one ever really called him on it. Turns out,View Spoiler » I think a couple of people gave him a disapproving look over this revelation, but that was about it. Every time he showed up on the page, he acted like a complete asshole, and everyone just rolled their eyes and gave him yet another pass. I really hope that Mia Sosa isn’t planning to give him his own book because I just don’t want to read about him anymore.
And Max. Oh, Max. He recognized that Andrew was just trying to get into his head, but he let it happen anyway, leading him to break up with Lina. His reasoning didn’t make a lot of sense, and I felt like it was stuck in there because Max was so mild and vanilla that there wasn’t really much that would make him leave Lina otherwise.
I really liked this book. I knew when I saw that cover that I would, and I was right. It was so funny, and so relatable, and I just loved getting to know Lina and her whole family. I highly recommend grabbing this one and settling in.
About Mia Sosa
Mia Sosa is an award-winning contemporary romance writer and 2015 Romance Writers of America® Golden Heart® Finalist. Her books have received praise and recognition from Kirkus Reviews, Booklist, Library Journal (starred reviews), The Washington Post, Entertainment Weekly, and more.
Book Riot included her debut, Unbuttoning the CEO, in its list of 100 Must-Read Romantic Comedies, and Booklist recently called her “the new go-to author for fans of sassy and sexy contemporary romances.”
A former First Amendment and media lawyer, Mia practiced for more than a decade before trading her suits for loungewear (okay, okay, they’re sweatpants). Now she writes fun, flirty, and moderately dirty stories about imperfect characters finding their perfect match.
Mia lives in Maryland with her husband, their two daughters, and an adorable puppy that finally sleeps through the night. For more information about Mia and her books, visit www.miasosa.com.
