Can't Escape Love

A Reluctant Royals Novella

By: Alyssa Cole

Narrated by: Karen Chilton

Alyssa Cole delivers another fun, sexy romance novella in the Reluctant Royals series!

Regina Hobbs is nerdy by nature, businesswoman by nurture. She's finally taking her pop culture-centered media enterprise, Girls with Glasses, to the next level, but the stress is forcing her to face a familiar supervillain: insomnia. The only thing that helps her sleep when things get this bad is the deep, soothing voice of puzzle-obsessed live streamer Gustave Nguyen. The problem? His archive has been deleted.

Gus has been tasked with creating an escape room themed around a romance anime…except he knows nothing about romance or anime. Then mega-nerd and anime expert Reggie comes calling, and they make a trade: his voice for her knowledge. But when their online friendship has IRL chemistry, will they be able to escape love?

Ambw love story

I kinda feel like this book is a 4-4.5 for me. It wasn’t boring like the second book but I just didn’t feel like their chemistry was as scorching as the f/f book and the first book. The highlights were that they were both of color( by her description she seems mixed race black and white, he’s of Vietnamese descent) and they both had disabilities.

She was super geekish and they communicated online before they meeting irl which was interesting.

It happens at the same time as her twin sister’s story. The writing is great, but it’s in the bottom two for me. Maybe having more culture would’ve attracted me more but it was a cute story.

Nice Fluff

what pulled me in was the narrator's voice. I loved the story. so cute.

Short and Sweet and Beautiful

I love this author. She knows exactly what I want to hear. I appreciate the research that obviously went into blerd and disability culture that obviously went into this. As a brown girl who frequently dates asian men I related a lot. The autistic, parasocial relationship was a unique twist I was really pleasantly surprised and satisfied by. My only bother is that I wish the voice actor had looked up how to pronounce some of the nerd jargon. Hearing aneemeh every time was awkward and took me out of it a bit.

Must listen!

This novella is part of a series but is also a great stand alone story. The narrator is great and I love Reggie. Can’t wait to listen to more Alyssa Cole books.

Real love stories

I just loved this book cuz it was real people and it’s lovey reading interracial, neuro-divergent, love stories. We all need love and representation too!