The Dating Charade

Title: The Dating Charade

Author: Melissa Ferguson

Genre: Rom-Com/Women’s Fiction

Publishing Date: Dec 3, 2019

Length: 336 Pages

About the Book:

Just when you think you’ve met your match . . . the charade begins.

Cassie Everson is an expert at escaping bad first dates. And, after years of meeting, greeting, and running from the men who try to woo her, Cassie is almost ready to retire her hopes for a husband—and children—altogether.

But fate has other plans, and Cassie’s online dating profile catches the eye of firefighter Jett Bentley. In Jett’s memory, Cassie Everson is the unreachable girl-of-legend from their high school days. Nervously, he messages her, setting off a chain of events that forces a reluctant Cassie back into the dating game.

No one is more surprised than Cassie when her first date with Jett is a knockout. But when they both go home and find three children dropped in their laps—each—they independently decide to do the right and mature thing: hide the kids from each other while sorting it all out. What could go wrong?

Melissa Ferguson’s hilarious and warmhearted debut reminds us that love can come in very small packages—and that sometimes our best-laid plans aren’t nearly as rewarding and fun as the surprises that come our way.

My Review:

Whew, that was one emotional rollercoaster I wasn’t quite expecting! One minute I was laughing out loud, and the next I was fighting back tears tears (not always successfully). This novel was a splash of rom-com mixed with a hurricane of emotional drama.

I appreciated that the romance in this novel was the comedic relief. For me I often consider humor to be the perfect medicine so I found Cassie and Jett’s relationship quite amusing amid everything else that came crashing in on them. The ups and downs from laughter to tears highly reminded me of the movie P.S. I Love You (just with emotions not the storyline). I will admit that I am a sucker for a book that makes me cry because it means it’s made me feel something. But that also means I need a good laugh every now and then to lift my spirits–so a book that can both make me laugh and cry and then laugh again? Yup, it’s a keeper!

Foster care has been something deeply on my heart for many years. My heart instantly went out to Star and her younger sisters. It’s not to say that it didn’t for Jett’s Niece and nephews, but Star stuck out to me in a way that demanded my heart and attention. I don’t want to spoil too much from the story but I will say that I appreciated the author’s heart to share not only the heart of foster care, but the struggles of it as well. It was no easy feat trying not to cry through much of their story.

My only complaint was that the ending was a little too abrupt for me. I feel the ending scenes needed a little more page space to feel like a more satisfying conclusion. Oh how I wish there could be a sequel to this one though, because I feel that it could be just as gripping emotionally while continuing to share the reality of their circumstances. Either way it’s still going down as one of my favorites this year.

I believe this book falls under the rom-com genre but it’s also an emotional drama. So it might just end up being labeled as a general Christian women’s fiction novel. So just know what you’re getting into when you read this one but I absolutely highly recommend it!

*I received a copy of this book from the publisher. Thoughts and opinions expressed are mine alone.

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