By Any Other Name by Lauren Kate: Book Review

By Any Other Name

BY Lauren Kate

Rating: 3.5/5 
Genre: Contemporary Romance/Women Fiction
Steam: No Steam-- Kiss Only
Publisher: G.P. Putnam's Sons
Pub Date: March 1, 2022
Thank you G.P. Putnam's Sons and NetGalley for my Advanced Copy! You're the best!
Available: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | BookShop

By Any Other Name Synopsis:

With a successful career as a romance editor, and an engagement to a man who checks off all ninety-nine boxes on her carefully curated list, Lanie’s more than good. She’s killing it. Then she’s given the opportunity of a lifetime: to work with world-renowned author and her biggest inspiration in love and life–the Noa Callaway. All Lanie has to do is cure Noa’s writer’s block and she’ll get the promotion she’s always dreamed of. Simple, right? But there’s a reason no one has ever seen or spoken to the mysterious Noa Calloway. And that reason will rock Lanie’s world. It will call into question everything she thought she knew. When she finally tosses her ninety-nine expectations to the wind, Lanie may just discover that love By Any Other Name can still be as sweet.

By Any Other Name Review:

In complete honesty I don’t exactly know how I feel about this book. I want to say I did enjoy it and I do feel good recommending it to others to read it, but it wasn’t a favorite book. I adore when books are written about the publishing world and this book is that!

My biggest issue with this book is that it didn’t feel complete. It took to 24% of the way through the book to get to the characters meeting. Look I can handle slow burn and even later for characters to meet (looking at you Fastest Way to Fall), but there’s like no conversation between them up to that point. I mean technically they’ve been emailing for the past 7 years, but there aren’t enough emails or moments leaning back on those to make me feel like they know each other.

I liked where the characters were going and I could start to see some of the build-up, but there wasn’t much chemistry between them. Maybe if their emails had been shown more or slipping into their history had occurred I wouldn’t feel this way. Idk.

That ending was anti-climatic. I seriously read it like three times making sure that it was the end of the book. The fallout of everything was SO needed and it was skipped.

I will say that BD, a secondary character (grandma), was absolutely phenomenal and she was the shining light in it all. She was truly the highlight of the whole book and such a badass. I want BD as my own. I loved Lainie’s history and how she came to be in her work. Lainie was a great main character and I wanted so much more for her.

Long Story Short:

Do I recommend it? Probably not for a big romance reader, but for someone who wants a non-explicit read and feels more women’s fiction–YES! I don’t want to seem like this was a terrible read because it wasn’t! If anything this book made me desperately want to travel to NYC to feel the full magic. And I definitely will pick up additional releases by Lauren Kate as the come. It just fell a bit flat and I wanted more. I did enjoy it, but it just won’t be a favorite of mine.

If You Like This One…

I would highly recommend checking out  To Sir, With Love by Lauren Layne as it is another very non-explicit romance and just as adorable! Another good one if you want a non-explicit romance but make it historical would be The Siren of Sussex by Mimi Matthews–it’s SO good and layered. There’s also Meet Me in The Margins by Melissa Ferguson that is about publishing and writing and is also cute and non-explicit. All of these would be great options!

Lauren Kate is the #1 New York Times– and internationally bestselling author of nine novels for young adults, including Fallen, which was made into a major motion picture. Her books have been translated into more than thirty languages and have sold more than ten million copies worldwide. She is also the author of The Orphan’s Song, her debut adult novel. By Any Other Name is her second adult novel. Kate lives in Los Angeles with her family.