After getting dumped by her long-time boyfriend and having an embarrassing one-night stand, Hallie decides to get her life together and join a dating app in the hopes of finding a date to her sister’s upcoming wedding. But, lo and behold, one of her first matches on the app is her one-night stand, Jack, who is Olivia’s brother and Colin’s best friend from Mr. Wrong Number. After deciding that they have no interest in dating each other, Jack and Hallie decide to place a wager on who can find “the one” first. Whilst Jack and Hallie bond over tacos after every bad date (which happens more often than not), they start to wonder if “the one” has been right in front of them all along. The line between friends and lovers starts to blur after Hallie enlists Jack to be her “fake” date to her sister’s wedding.
The Love Wager is interconnected with the first book in the series, Mr. Wrong Number, but can also be read as a standalone, and it’s a delightful contemporary rom-com told from a dual point of view. The fake dating reminded me of The Spanish Love Deception by Elena Armas and the friends-to-lovers romance was reminiscent of People We Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry, so if you’re a fan of either of these novels or tropes, you should definitely check out The Love Wager! Themes present include love and heartbreak, family, fate versus freewill, growing up, communication or lack thereof, commitment, and death. I think that the “Don’t you think the possibilities of love are worth the risk?” from the book nicely highlights the moral of Jack and Hallie’s story.
When I started this book, I didn’t know that Olivia and Colin (from Mr. Wrong Number) would make appearances in The Love Wager, so that was a nice surprise! Comparing the two, I actually seemed to enjoy this book more as Hallie and Jack’s “love wager” was easy to be intrigued by and you become invested rather quickly! It was also easy to read and get into since it flowed nicely, the plot was engaging, and the page count wasn’t overly long. Without spoiling too much, my personal favourite parts were Jack and Hallie’s laugh out loud texting banter and their “fake” romance during Hallie’s sister’s wedding in Vail, Colorado, plus who can ignore the inclusion of the swoonworthy “guy falls first” trope!
On a slight downside, a fair amount of the plot was set at a wedding (Jack and Hallie meet at Olivia’s wedding and Jack and Hallie’s “fake” relationship takes place at Hallie’s sister’s wedding); so, if you’re not a fan of weddings, then The Love Wager might not be for you.
Overall, The Love Wager was an enjoyable read and perfect for fans of books with the friends-to-lovers, fake dating, or “he falls first” tropes.
The Love Wager is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers, like your local bookstore.
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Synopsis | Goodreads
Hallie Piper is turning over a new leaf. After belly-crawling out of a hotel room (hello, rock bottom), she decides it’s time to become a full-on adult.
She gets a new apartment, a new haircut, and a new wardrobe, but when she logs into the dating app that she has determined will find her new love, she sees none other than Jack, the guy whose room she’d snuck out of.
Through the app, and after the joint agreement that they are absolutely not interested in each other, Jack and Hallie become partners in their respective searches for The One. They text each other about their dates, often scheduling them at the same restaurant so that if things don’t go well, the two of them can get tacos afterward.
Spoiler: they get a lot of tacos together.
Discouraged by the lack of prospects, Jack and Hallie make a wager to see who can find true love first, but when they agree to be fake dates for a weekend wedding, all bets are off.
As they pretend to be a couple, lines become blurred and they each struggle to remember why the other was a bad idea to begin with.
