ARC Review: How Sweet It Is by Dylan Newton

“It’s fun, and funny, and a great summer read”

~ Under the Covers

It turns out that the Queen of Happily Ever Afters and the Knight of Nightmares might have more in common than you would think in this super cute Beach Read meets The Wedding Planner story.

Kate Sweet is an event planner extraordinaire known for making dream weddings come true. But at the last minute, her best friend drags her into planning the book launch for a bestselling horror writer. Kate’s introduction to Drake Matthews… could have gone a lot better. But injuries and chaos aside, Kate inspires Drake to take his writing in a new direction. And as they get to know one another, maybe they’re also getting to know what they want out of life?

Right off the bat, I totally understand why the blurb for this book suggests that it’s perfect for fans of Beach Read. There’s a very similar premise: Kate and Drake strike up a deal where Drake will let Kate do basically anything she wants for the book launch event so she can try to win an award and Kate will help Drake with research for his next book. You also have their first introduction as a complete disaster and Kate ends up injuring Drake and also flashing his neighbors. This absolute chaos from a normally super-organized person really sets this story up to have similar vibes to the movie The Wedding Planner. Although it’s not the most original premise, it did make a good set-up for an enjoyable story. Drake being a horror novelist gave an interesting twist on the plot, since a Halloween horror party is definitely different than the beautiful weddings Kate usually plans. Hearing about her crazy plans and how she manages to convince Drake to let her implement them definitely was amusing. With the small-town setting, we also get the usual cast of quirky, meddling family members and friends. I loved how involved everyone was and how invested they were in helping Drake be happy.

The biggest thing that kept this book from being a 5-star read for me was the third act break-up. Given that this is a romance novel, we all know that it’s coming. However, the cause of the break-up and the resulting reconciliation was really frustrating. Basically the first real test of their relationship was a complete failure. I think the groveling could have used some work too. However, ultimately these annoyances didn’t keep me from enjoying the book as a whole.

If you enjoy romantic comedies, I definitely think you should give this book a try. It’s fun, and funny, and a great summer read (even if it’s actually set in the fall). Although I don’t see anything announced yet about this being the start of a series, the ending pretty clearly hints that we should be seeing some more of the Matthews brothers, and I really hope that happens!

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