ARC Review: Monopolove
Well pals I’m back at it with these ARC reviews! This time I’m recapping the upcoming rivals to lovers romance between a board-game store owner Harper and ENT Dr Declan that’s trying to find himself. Monopolove by Mia Heintzelman is hitting stores and shelves April 6th 2022, and I’m here today giving you a little early review ahead of its release! Spoilers ahead, if you’re ready for it: let’s go.
I’d like to thank Mia for the advance copy, thoughts below are my own enjoy!
So I’ll get this out in the open early, I definitely had a great time and really enjoyed this one (there were lots of moments I was so into) but didn’t all caps LOVE it in its entirety. But let’s back up a bit.
This is a classic rivals to lovers romance with two pretty strong personalities in Harper and Declan. Which played really well off each other as rivals. And there is a lot to love about them as individuals and as a couple (with a few rocky moments) but overall I think lots of folks will connect with independent board game business queen Harper. Including how these two first meet. From there we get a better sense of things. Both of these folks are in kind of transitions.
Declan is getting his deceased grandfather’s house restored and updated for a potential sale. And Harper has just found out that the board game store she owns with her half-sister is in financial trouble. Some of the moments that I think Mia absolutely NAILS (that I just loved) include:
How well she captures ALL the turbulent emotions when you’re first exploring your feelings for someone else
How much that request for friendship at the hardware store really hit me in my heart. The genuine request and vulnerability from Declan was a MOMENT (and oof, Harper babe we were friends off for a minute there)
The night at the stand-up show was pure movie magic goodness and I really enjoyed them converging and diverging in kisses and small moments (it felt SO real)
The hand kissing really worked for me NGL
Had some good chuckles at the Hasbro, and monopoly player nicknames (Friggin’ Wheelbarrow Walt!)
LOL’ed really hard at the supes casual “okay, love you” moment at the game store
See?! Lots to really love and I did enjoy a lot of these moments. I think there were some parts that I didn’t connect to as strongly with mainly fall into this camp:
It just felt like there was a lot going on on all fronts. Between saving the store, updating the house, the romance, the kind-of resolution with the dad and the monopoly tournament I kinda felt like we got smaller snippets where I wanted to go deeper.
Matt, we hardly knew ye, and yet I didn’t want to know you at all.
The 3rd act tension, break and resulting reconciliation was both too much and too little?
In terms of content / trigger warnings, I’ll also share that for kids of divorce or of separated parents that have experienced abandonment, def check in with yourself as you’re reading because there is a subplot that might trigger some things. And if you’ve lost a close parental figure or grandparent definitely be gentle with yourself while reading as well.
I think overall, Monopolove as a romance definitely worked for me. While it might not be one I’m going to shout from the rooftops over, I did thoroughly enjoy my time with Harper and Declan and know lots of folks will too! Be sure to grab this on pre-order and maybe pick up a Monopoly board while you’re at it, because I literally looked up where to get one locally because now I need to have my own Declan/Harper rivalry with my partner.
xo Kels