Synopsis:

Surprisingly Us includes a fake relationship between childhood friends who haven’t seen each other in 10 years.

Colette

I’ve spent the last eighteen years of my life living and breathing dancing, there’s been no time for anything else. Now, as a seasoned member of The City Ballet, my goal of becoming a principal dancer is within reach. But in order to land a pivotal lead role, the choreographer wants more passion and emotion in my dancing. The problem? My lack of experience with relationships and love. The solution? I need to start dating, if only as research for the coveted role.

I’m used to drilling footwork. Repetition. Muscle-memory. But how can I practice dating?

I never imagined Rhys Spencer, my childhood friend and notorious ladies’ man, would be the answer.

Rhys

I’ve only come back to NYC to claim my trust fund, but being faced with losing control of my parents’ legacy foundation to my cousin and rival has me rethinking my plans. Though my reputation as a ladies’ man paints me in an unfavorable light with the foundation board and has me desperate to change my ways, if only temporarily.

My childhood friend, Colette Davenport, is the perfect fake girlfriend. She’s talented, gracious, and stunning. With her on my arm, I’ll have no problem convincing the board I’m the right man for the position. Everyone is shocked by the pairing of the sweet, yet determined ballet dancer and a tattooed bad boy with a BIG reputation.

When the competition intensifies, and I blindside Colette with a new proposal, things start to heat up. Soon, I’m on my knees for a different reason and I’m breaking all our rules.

With every kiss, every touch, I’m even more desperate to have her. To keep her for myself. I never want our arrangement to end, and no one is more surprised than me.

Review:

Surprisingly Us is the second book in the Unexpectedly in Love series I’ve read, but it’s actually the last. This was purely accidental but it doesn’t really matter as they’re technically standalones, they just have the same group of characters. All that’s happened for me is slight spoilers for the other books but I’m ok with that.

It feels important to say very early in this review that Surprisingly Us is an 18+ book. Don’t let the cartoon style cover fool you, this features a lot of explicit content and profanity. I actually feel like it has even more than Reluctantly Yours, which was steamy to say the least. If you’re a fan of that, this is the perfect book for you, but if you only like clean romance, stay well away.

This book definitely has its flaws. Some of the writing isn’t particularly great and a little cringeworthy at times but I find that comes with books that are heavy in the spice department. Rhys does start out extremely unlikable, his first appearances boasts about how much of a manwhore he is, but by the end of the book I loved him. It’s called character development for a reason. This book is over 500 pages long, he has a lot of time to become a better man and he does just that.

Colette also wasn’t my cup of tea to begin with, but she really grew on me. I hate the stereotypical ‘I’m too busy with work to care about anyone in my life’ female characters but she learns that it’s ok to take a step back to build the relationships in her life. I also liked how no nonsense she was with Rhys. I’ve seen other people calling her a doormat but I didn’t get that vibe at all. Yes, she goes along with a lot of Rhys’s antics in public but that’s to save both of their images, she gives him hell when they’re alone.

Now, I’m not giving this book a high rating because of the levels of spice, I’m not that type of reviewer. Oh no, it’s because of the mutual pining, fake dating and he falls first and harder tropes. I feel like the word trope is a little dirty when it comes to romance books, but I personally pick up romances based on their tropes. Sorry, sue me. 

There’s a lot going on in this book and the fact that I got through its 500+ pages with ease says a lot. I haven’t read a book this long in quite some time, but this didn’t feel intimidating. It also didn’t feel that long, not to me anyway. The content flowed really well and for the most part, it’s a light hearted read. I didn’t want to put it down and I basically didn’t for the three days it took to finish.

There were a lot of parts I liked. The cats were particularly cute and the ballet scenes were very cool. The group of friends were fun as I knew some of them from a previous book, but I did find it hard to keep track of who was who as I haven’t read the entire series yet. The childhood friends to lovers was perfectly done as well. I love the friends to lovers trope but I absolutely adore it when they’re childhood friends.

Overall, I highly recommend Surprisingly Us to anyone that loves a steamy fake dating romance. I’d suggest checking out the other books first though so you can keep track of the side characters and their connections. That was one of the hardest parts of this book for me. Well that and the slightly cringeworthy writing at times–it was mostly good though hence my rating of four stars.

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