After spending 3 years working as a surgeon in war-torn countries, Jude has briefly returned home for his best friend Collin’s wedding and is having trouble adjusting back to civilian life. Indira (whom we were briefly introduced to in A Brush with Love and Lizzie Blake’s Best Mistake) is a children’s psychiatrist who, after walking in on her boyfriend with another woman, decides to move in with her brother Collin and his fiancé…unbeknownst to Indira, her childhood enemy Jude is also staying with Collin. Eventually Jude and Indira call it truths and decide to be each other’s fake dates during the wedding festivities; Jude needs Indira to help him deal with his PTSD and Indira needs a date to save face around her cheating ex, who is also in the wedding party. The more time Indira and Jude spend together, the harder it is to deny their growing feelings for each other.
The Plus One is the third installment of Mazey Eddings’ A Brush with Love trilogy but can be read as a standalone. It’s a contemporary rom com featuring the childhood enemies to lovers, forced proximity, and fake dating tropes. Themes include mental health, love and heartbreak or marriage and divorce, trauma and war, family and found family, commitment, and abandonment. The Plus One is ideally suited for fans of books like The Charm Offensive by Alison Cochrun, Mr. Wrong Number by Lynn Painter, Count Your Lucky Stars by Alexandria Bellefleur, The Ex Talk by Rachel Lynn Solomon, Set On You by Amy Lea, Paris Daillencourt is About to Crumble by Alexis Hall, The Co-op by Tarah Dewitt, and/ or The Singles Table by Sara Desai. Trigger warnings for The Plus One include PTSD from working in a war-torn country, anxiety and depression, divorce and abandonment, and cheating. First off, I enjoyed the cute childhood memories and connections that Eddings interwove into Jude and Indira’s love story. I also loved Jude and Indira’s funny and witty banter! I appreciated that, even though there were a fair number of events leading up to the wedding, the novel wasn’t overly focused on the wedding; due to the cover art and title, I thought that most of the novel would be set at the wedding. Without spoiling anything, I would have to say that my favourite part of the book was Jude and Indira’s Hallowe’en shenanigans! Lastly, I appreciated that Jude and Indira didn’t experience the stereotypical third act break-up. Although all the therapy sessions and talk of mental health in The Plus One was refreshing and relevant, at times, I found it to be a bit much and some readers may find these scenes to be triggering or challenging to read. I was disappointed that the main characters from A Brush with Love and Lizzie Blake’s Best Mistake didn’t appear very much in The Plus One. Lastly, even though it was necessary to the story, I didn’t really like all the contract negotiations or legalities (related to Jude’s humanitarian work) that were included at the end of the novel. Overall, I was a bit disappointed as I didn’t enjoy The Plus One as much as I did the first two books in the series. But, if you like fake dating, forced proximity, and enemies to lovers, you should definitely check out The Plus One!
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