Book Review – ‘The Next Best Fling’ by Gabriella Gamez

Synopsis

Librarian Marcela Ortiz has been secretly in love with her best friend for years—and when he gets engaged, she knows it’s long past time to move on. But before she gets the chance, she has a bigger problem to contend with in the form of Theo Young, ex-NFL player and older brother of the man she’s in love with. When she discovers Theo’s plans to confess his feelings for his brother’s fiancée at their engagement party, Marcela is quick to stop him—despite how tempting it is to let him run away with the bride-to-be. She manages to convince Theo to sleep off his drunken almost-mistake at her place and when they arrive at a family brunch the next day together, everyone wrongly assumes they hooked up.

Since Theo needs a cover for his feelings for the bride and Marcela needs a distraction from her unrequited feelings for the groom, they decide to roll with the lie. Until one late night at a bar, they take it a step further and discover a layer of attraction neither realized existed. Soon, they find themselves exploring the simmering chemistry between them, whether in library aisles or Marcela’s bed. There are no boundaries for the rebound relationship they form—just a host of complicated feelings, messy familial dynamics, and uncovered secrets that threaten to tear them apart before they can even admit to themselves that their rebound is working. Maybe a little too well.

My Thoughts

‘The Next Best Fling’ by Gabriella Gamez is her debut novel and I have to say she did a slam dunk with this book.  Right from the start I was able to get into the book and from the moment I started reading I couldn’t put it down.  The way she built the world and how the fling became something more was a nice read.

The only downside I found with this book was with Marcela. You would go thinking great she is moving on and able to work through the issue, but it was brought back again.  What I love is Theo didn’t give up on her and was there for every moment making sure she could move on. Even with this downside, I am giving it 4 stars.  The journey these characters had to take during the story was worth the read and made up for that.

If you are looking for some spice ‘The Next Best Fling’ has that as well. The sizzle between Marcela and Theo was so good and burned up the page when they were together.  ‘The Next Best Fling’ has a sizzle rating of 3.

This book comes out July 9^th and will be available wherever you get your books.  If you want to keep up with Gabriella Gamez, make sure to head to her website. And you can pre-order the book here.

**I would like to thank NetGalley and Forever (Grand Central Publishing) for the ARC copy of this book. Getting the ARC Copy did not influence my thoughts on the book as they are all my own.**