A review by bribreez
Bridesmaid for Hire by Meghan Quinn

funny hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? N/A
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

*Thank you to GoodGirlsPR and Meghan Quinn for sending me this book! I greatly appreciate! As always all opinions and thoughts are my own. 

4.25⭐️/3-4🌶️

Weddings are a time of celebration, a union between two people coming together to celebrate their love in the next step in their relationship. Most would think it’d bring people together, but for Maggie and Brody it was just a means of “helping” each other out. When Maggie is on vacation in Bora Bora, the last thing she expected was finding out that the owner of Hopper company was having his daughter’s wedding at the same resort she was staying in. The possibility of meeting said owner and potentially gaining a well known client for her event planning business, Maggie was ready for anything, even pretending to be her brother’s best friend’s girlfriend. Brody needed to ensure his business proposal went through as the main choice at Hopper, where he worked, and when he came face to face with his best friend’s sister, Maggie, he suddenly found himself with a fake girlfriend to help him out. An enemies to lovers romance with brother’s best friend, a destination wedding, and fake dating, sounds like a fun read to me! 

Maggie and Brody had always been around each other throughout their lives mainly because Maggie’s brother was Brody’s best friend. The enemies to lovers trope in this book was clear from the beginning with the way Maggie and Brody acted around each other with annoyance, disdain, but also some attraction. The thing that I found really interesting was when I found out that both Maggie and Brody once shared a steamy hook up session! That wasn’t all though! Both, Brody and Maggie secretly still had feeling for each other, but due to Brody not wanting to go against his best friend’s wishes of going after Maggie, Brody spent years distancing himself from her. I guess you could say that Brody inadvertently made himself to be the “bad guy” in Maggie’s eyes. So, with Maggie believing Brody wanted nothing to do with her, she also distanced herself from him and went on to disliking him. Overall, Maggie and Brody were enemies at the beginning of this book, but through their fake dating they went from wanting to annoy one another to admitting long felt feelings. 

One of the many things I liked about this story was the faking dating trope! Imagine, being in Brody or Maggie’s shoes, having to pretend you have a significant other, but really it the person you despise the most! (Gasp) I can’t imagine pretending to be in love with my “enemy”, but Maggie and Brody made it work. I think the good thing about the fake dating was seeing how Maggie and Brody’s past came into play. Specially, the moment when Brody and Maggie shared a steamy make out session during Maggie’s brother’s wedding. The wedding was a significant moment as it set off the change between Maggie believing Brody didn’t like her and Brody trying to adhere to his best friend’s wishes of not going after Maggie. Now, with Maggie and Brody pretending to be together, it was a combination of unknowingly bringing deep seated feelings they had for each other and making them a reality. 

Overall, this was a lighthearted and humorous story. Meghan Quinn always manages to bring humor and lovable characters to each of her books, and this one also showed another favorite trope of mine which was fake dating. With Maggie being Brody’s best friend’s little sister, there was also a little bit of the forbidden romance trope so it made things a bit more interesting between them. At first, I liked Maggie and Brody, but as I continued I didn’t necessarily feel a deep connection to either them. I would say, I laughed at certain points in the book, but I wasn’t as excited as I had hoped before starting this book. I did like the setting of the story as it felt like a mini vacation while reading. I also liked the tie in to Almond Bay with characters like Hattie who was Maggie’s best friend. Plus, I got the feeling that the next book in this series will MAYBE potentially involve a certain billionaire??…I could be wrong but that’s just the impression I got. Anyways, this was a good book, gave summer vibe, laughable moments, a secret years long crush, brother’s best friend, and a lighthearted romance.