The Spanish Love Deception by Elena Armas

When the weather is starting to get chilly and you’re looking to cozy up with a romantic comedy, this would be the perfect book.

Catalina, also known as Lina, has made her escape to NYC after a breakup and much gossip in the community several years ago. With her sister’s wedding in Spain coming up, she’s eager to prove to them all that she’s made it in the big city in both the romantic and professional sense of the word.

She finds herself uttering a ‘teeny tiny’ lie claiming to bring a boyfriend to the wedding. The only problem is…there’s no boyfriend.

Cue in Aaron, a colleague from work, who seems to have some complaints on her punctuality to meetings and be all business, yet somehow offers to be her date to the wedding.

We meet Aaron in the very first scene and Lina blatantly refuses to talk to him directly and her friend Rosie keeps telling one, then the other what the other has said. It’s silly and seemed so childish and wanted to yell at them that they’re adults. Surely they can politely exchange a few sentences? At this point, I’m going to lie, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to continue reading.

Luckily, things improved somewhat. To an extent, I’d say they’re an unlikely pair, but somehow make it work. Aaron motivation is very unclear and we didn’t get to know him much until the latter half of the book but I was okay with that.

Lina’s quirks, needing to have everything printed on paper so she can organize her work, her being a team lead were all things I appreciated. Though I do have to say that a big work event was mentioned and we didn’t see a glimpse of it taking place afterwards. That was a missed opportunity to add some tension.

I wish they’d have seen more of Spain when they flew over for the wedding, I’d have loved to read more scenes set there.

Stereotypes about Spain and Spanish people are at play and I found them irritating (I love all things Spain and in fact used to live there!), but at the same time I understand why they’re there. Spain is not just sunshine, paella and sangria.

Love the words and phrases in Spanish thrown in, that Aaron has made an effort to learn the language. Lina’s family is precious, as much as the whole extended family delves into her personal life, they mean well.

I almost went on a rant that Spanish people don’t talk like that etc but then I read the author bio and Elena Armas is indeed from Spain so I’ll refrain from commenting further.

Multiple romcom tropes are at play: enemies to lovers, workplace romance, they want to be together but they can’t, you get the idea. I was not impressed by the plot twist (read obstacle they face), as anxious as Lina gets, her anxiety does not translate to the page very well.

Love for food on point.

Love the cover, it perfectly depicts the story.

Overall, this is a cute read but the writing is not the best. Then again, this is Elena’s first book, so I’m sure we’ll see some improvement in future books.

Have you read this book? Let me know what you thought in the comments below.