Book: In the Frame: A Fake Dating Queer MM Romance by Hayden Stone
Reviewed by ErikaWasReading
Rating: 4/5
Matty Gowen-Smith is determined to make it as an artist in London; he just needs to keep his bartending gig and find his own flat before the friend he’s apartment-sitting for returns. When he spills a tray of drinks on a guest in VIP, he quickly offers to lend out his only suit as a temporary replacement. Angry, soaking wet, and not wanting to spoil a friend’s birthday, Florian de Ligt takes him up on the offer.
Despite the evening going from bad to worse, Matty and Florian come to an agreement that quickly becomes a fake dating pact. But as they spend more time together, their feelings get more real, and when a conflict erupts between their worlds, it may be too much for their fake relationship to handle.
Though he started as a complete boor in the bar, I absolutely fell in love with Florian. You can see from the first fake date that he is curious about Matty and genuinely interested in what he thinks and feels. And while he seems like a generic businessman at the beginning, we see that there is so much more to everything he does.
Matty was very relatable. I mean, freshly graduated, living in a new city, and trying to figure out how to make life work? I’ve been there! But I definitely struggled with him as a character until we got to the third-act conflict. Once things came to light, it was very easy to work backward and see how his anxiety played a larger role in his actions and outbursts.
Like the first book, I had issues with the writing, as it felt disjointed in places, like things were moved around and not edited for continuity errors. It also felt like there were major questions in the story that we never got answers to.
And while this feels pedantic to point out, the book’s blurb says, “Especially after Matty ruins Florian’s suit on a big night out for Florian’s birthday,” yet in the novel, when they are in the elevator, Florian says, “Because, in fact, it’s Billy’s birthday. I promised I’d be there tonight.” The fact that it’s Billy’s birthday and that Florian made a promise are both incredibly important to the larger storyline. There are similar examples in the book, but I used that one to keep my review as spoiler-free as possible.
But I finished the novel absolutely loving it because of the resolution between Florian and Matty, and how sweet their love story is.
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I received an advance copy of this book from Gay Romance Reviews at no charge. This is my honest, voluntary review.