White Boyfriend is a sweet, fun filled story of self love and friendship.

I really rooted for Nikki through the story. She has always been the good girl, following the rules and trying hard not to disappoint her parents, which means she missed out on a lot of fun. Her break up with the 'perfect' man Bron makes her really look at her life and see she was just going through the motions. It was nice to see her stand up for herself and do what she wants to make her happy.

Goodness, I wish I could find a group of friends like Nikki has! I love how supportive and sweet they are helping Nikki break out of her shell.

I will be honest, this didn't quite feel like a rom-com to me, rather a story of self-discovery, which I didn't mind, but I was expecting more of a focus on the romance. Also, the ending wasn't as satisfying as I wanted.

If you're looking for an uplifting read all about friendship, having fun and finding yourself, then I recommend White Boyfriend!

This was a fun, lighthearted read which I whizzed through really quickly! I enjoyed reading about Nikki and her initial struggles, as someone who also identifies as a people pleaser, some of her internal monologue I really identified with. Her friendship group were also really fun and the girls trip they went on made for some really enjoyable reading.
I do feel that the title is somewhat misleading as others have mentioned, while I liked Mike and Nikki’s relationship, I don’t feel this was the main plot point of the book. This, for me, was definitely a story of self discovery and finding your inner strength to get what you want from life. Obviously her relationship with Mike played a part in this but I don’t feel it was the main focus.
One piece of criticism from me was over the ending and how things played out with Mike. I feel Nikki went 0-100 in her feelings. One minute they had just started dating and the next she wanted to know what their long term goals were. I feel if this has played out a bit more and were dating for longer I would have resonated with it more, but it just felt a bit rushed to me.
Overall this I enjoyed this one a wouldd recommend if you are looking for a lighthearted, fun read

White Boyfriend by LeeSha McCoy

Published: March 10, 2022
Bookouture
Pages: 329
Genre: Multicultural Romance
KKECReads Rating: 4/5
I received a copy of this book for free, and I leave my review voluntarily.

LeeSha McCoy is the author of all things African American Romance. She released her first book in 2012 and currently writes African American Urban Romance, Paranormal, Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Romantic Comedy, and Steamy Contemporary Romance under the pen name Karmen Kane. With over 30 books published to date, representation is important to her, so you will always find positive representations of black men and women in her books, with a focus on family bonds, growth, and above all, strong fiery heroines and the heroes that love the hell out of them for it. Writing novels that make her readers 'feel' is her mission; she does not just write stories to be read but for her readers to experience. As someone who has lived through many ups and downs in her personal life, she uses those experiences in all of her stories, priding herself on the realism in her work, regardless of genre.

“Rejection is redirection.”

Nik thought her life was great. She has a job she loves, incredible friends, loving, albeit overbearing, parents, and a long-term boyfriend. Until her long-term boyfriend ends the relationship stating he’s bored. Now, Nik is questioning everything. Luckily, her girls have her back.

I enjoyed this book. Nik was a fantastic lead character, and her journey is relatable. I loved the pacing, the themes, and the fact that this isn’t your typical romance.

The girls were all beyond amazing. I loved the sisterhood, love, and support in the group. Good friends are worth their weight in gold when Nik was at her lowest and had such a supportive group to help her find her way.

I enjoyed Nik’s development throughout this story. She definitely blossomed into a self sufficient queen and started seeing that she had to live her life and be the author of her own story.

I enjoyed the writing style, the dialogue, and the humor. This was a fun read, mixed with the perfect amount of drama. This is a fantastic book to read if you need a reminder to live your life and love your journey.

Synopsis:
Nikki has been in a relationship with Bron for over 3 years and he has suddenly decided that their relationship is boring and he leaves her. Nikki is forced out of her comfort zone when her friends encourage her to try new things to try find out who she is outside of a relationship. But there is a cute guy in the class, Mike, who seems to give Nikki a new perspective of life. Can you put aside their racial differences and perhaps become more intimate with him?

Opinion:
I quite enjoyed this book. It’s major theme is self discovery and finding out who you are after breaking up a long term relationship that defined you for so long. There was a lot of entertaining and uplifting moments where the MC had fun with her friends on holiday and with her love interest where she discovers how helpful yoga and the art of going with the flow can help her. I really enjoyed the supporting characters as they were full of life and added to the plot. The MC annoyed me at times due to her inability to stop overthinking and there was the sub theme of interracial relationships with her toxic family forcing her to get back with her ex due to the image it would have on the family rather than her new man who is white.

Overall, I think it was an uplifting and empowering read about finding yourself and how you don’t need a relationship to find inner peace. White Boyfriend is out now, it is available on Kindle Unlimited or as paperback too

CHEEKY . FUN . CUTE . UPLIFTING . DISAPPOINTING . MISLEADING

OK, before you read my points- please understand that I really wanted to love this one and genuinely started off really enjoying it so much to the point where I got another of the author's books (which I now regret but can't return).

I don't like 'not liking' books especially by lesser known authors but I got to the point where I was just forcing myself to read it to get to the end. The book is set up to be plot driven but is written as though it's character driven which was confusing and meant there was wayyy too much description and dialogue one minute and then not enough of it the next. The characters were easy to understand and most were likeable enough but there were too many "close friends" so they all became a bit muddled)

Right so...
- It never really got started - meaning everything centered around the main character DECIDING to start living her life for herself and most of the book was that, - her deciding rather than doing.
- It's set in the states with American characters but they used very British language ("longing it out" and "ass over tits") which on one hand made for a fun read because I began to picture the scenes unfolding in London so it felt closer to home, but also could get confusing when it went back to referring the places and things in the states
- I eventually had to google to find out  if the author was British or American because it was throwing me off - it turns out the she is from the states but has lived here for years and so uses our colloquialisms. Unfortunately, it didn't really work.
- The title is misleading - I was expecting a LOT MORE focus on Nicola getting to know Mike, making the choice to date him or not (I assumed the former as the title suggests) and then for it to just be a witty, whimsical, funny story of them getting to know each other and breaking barriers and biases together. It's mainly about Nicola discovering that she should stand up to her dad, working on big projects and accounts at work and spending more time with her girlfriends. In truth, Mike barely features?!?
- It started off STRONG but then as I got further into the book, I realised, nothing had really happened and I was still at the 'start' of the story. I was desperate for it to get to the good part.
- A bit gutted at Nicola's final decision and the abrupt/rushed ending. She came to some conclusions that were slightly dramatic. After spending the entire story coming to the conclusion that she shouldn't get in her own way, I found that her final decision was one that LITERALLY got in her own way and was the result of overthinking and refusing to learn how to grow.- It didn't need to be over 300 pages - it could easily have been 211 pages and still got the point across.

I can really relate to Nikki because I was her years ago. Always seeking parental approval until I had enough and stood up for myself.

I loved her friendship with her girls — it was refreshing to see a group of young women supporting each other.

There's no need to write a long review for this, but if you love
1. Relatable character
2. Real-life issues
3. Friendships
4. A story of finding yourself

Then this is for you.

This is a book about a person with control over their life but not. This is the book where you fall in love and then hate and then comprehend the hate and finally do not know what to do with yourself

The author did a great job narrating a story so complete to let you know you can not take life for granted.

I hope and definitely need to have book 2 about Nikky. I beg to have this book 2. This heart of mine is broken but my womanhood is so proud.

For all the above said I am giving a five-star rating to the author for such a great job, and obviously a big thanks!

This ARC was granted to me through NetGalley and approved by Bookouture in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!

I really struggled to finish this book. The story wasn't bad per se, but the plot developed so slowly. It was also a bit underwhelming in a way? The title makes the reader think that this interracial relationship is going to play a much bigger role in the story than it does, and in a way it was almost an aside. I didn't feel like much really happened in the story, unfortunately.

White Boyfriend is my first book by LeeSha McCoy. I admit that I originally requested this book due to the cover and title. But the synopsis also grabbed me.

Nikki was dating Bron and thought she was having a perfect life with a perfect job. But Bron breaks up with her and Nikki is left alone questioning about her relationship. With the help of her friend Alicia, she enrolls into a yoga class where she meets cute Mike. Soon their friendship blossomed and turns to romance until Bron gets back to her life.

Overall I found this book pretty cliché with a similar story of breakup and the journey of finding new love. But I did stick with it to the end, so I would recommend it.

Man, I hate disliking books, especially from smaller authors, but this was not good. This book never gets out of first gear. The title is the book version of a clickbait headline. The character can’t get out of her own for three consecutive minutes. It’s a frustrating read.

Some of the choices early on made it difficult to get into the book. We meet around ten characters within the first ten percent of the book and they’re not always clearly defined to remember who is who. Many of them blend. I don’t know if this is planned to be the first of a connected series or not, but it felt like it was setting up the friend group to each have their own story eventually, so it felt a little info-dumpy. There’s no need to know the main character’s best friend’s father’s name or that he lives in England unless it’s going to be relevant in *this* book.

After that, the main character spends the rest of the book making up relationship problems that don’t exist - to the extent that nothing is actually wrong but she’s going to find something wrong, so she’s going to google problems in interracial relationships and dismiss everything her friends tell her when she asks them, despite them having actual experience in interracial relationships. There are good examples of attempting to communicate with the boyfriend and addressing concerns, but it all goes right out the window because she ignores everything they discuss anyway. “I have this concern and I need to address it.” The boyfriend reassures her that he doesn’t think XYZ and actually has experience with topic 1 and is well versed in Topic 2. “Well yeah, he said everything I needed to hear and I believe him but I’m going to make a big issue out of this anyway.” Argh

I feel like a different editor could’ve made a world of difference with this book. There are too many characters throughout the entire book and most of them could be removed with a little reworking to make this book better. I believe the writer is American but the publisher is British and that feels pretty obvious throughout the book. Lots of Britishisms that could be removed, even from people who aren’t the British friend in the book.

And it’s not a romance without a HEA so be aware of that going in. Call it women’s fiction or something but if there’s not happy ending for the couple, it’s not a romance despite what the publisher’s own website says. It’s billed as a good rec for fans of Spoiler Alert and that could not be further from the truth.

There was so much potential with this idea and it all falls terribly flat.

CW: There’s a few mentions of food intake, moralizing food as good or bad, and switching to “good” foods. It’s not a major plot point but if you’re sensitive to those topics, be aware of that. It’s consistent throughout and could be a pretty significant trigger for people with a history of eating disorders.

2.5 ⭐

This book had so much potential, but I think it ultimately came down to poor editing. LeeSha's premise was solid for this book and initially it drew me in--I loved Nikki and her wonderful friends supporting her through a break up. However, there was no driving conflict that pushed me to continue reading this book. It felt like I was just following someone as they went through say to day life which doesn't work for reading a novel. I think a little bit of stronger editing would have helped this book maintain its pace, but in its current form, I've decided to DNF.

Thank you NetGalley for this Arc. I read until chapter 9 but unfortunately, I had to DNF. To be honest, I got bored. I felt like the story was dragging on and nothing was actually happening.

Unfortunately this one just wasn't for me, I struggled to get into the book. Thank you for the opportunity to review.

Nikki has a great group of friends. The fun starts there and I liked the ride the book took you on but i wished for more description and details. The familial relationships were definitely relatable but the romance wasn't completely on the mark for me. I gave it 2.5 stars

I'm sure a lot of people will love this, but this book wasn't for me, so I didn't finish it. I didn't enjoy the writing style nor the tone of the book, and there were a little too many things I didn't agree with that kept adding up.

I liked the positive female friendship group and the main character standing up for herself with her parents but other than that this just did not do anything for me. I could not get immersed in the story and beyond her friends I did not find Nicola’s other relationships engaging at all which meant it was a struggle to get through the story. (2 ⭐️)

Thank you NetGalley for this book in exchange for an honest review!

Honestly I couldn’t get into the momentum of the book and I really wanted to like the book. I ended up DNFing it. But what I did read was pretty good!

The front cover actually pulled me to request this book and so I was thrilled when I got accepted this ARC. But unfortunately, this book wasn't my cup of tea.

Nikki was dating Bron and thought she was having a perfect life with a perfect job. But Bron breaks up with her and Nikki is left alone questioning about her relationship. With the help of her friend Alicia, she enrolls into a yoga class where she meets cute Mike. Soon their friendship blossomed and turns to romance until Bron gets back to her life.

OK, initially, I did enjoy the book a little bit. The story is told from Nikki's perspective and mainly, it talks about her friendship with her friends, how the romance developed between Mike and Nikki and her complicated relationship with her father, who seemed to want her to get back together with Bron. But as I reach in the middle, I felt like I was watching some really bad romantic comedy. First of all, why was her father hell bent and force Nikki to date Bron again? Too much dialogue and I found the story getting slightly boring but nonetheless I continued on. The ending, left me...well lower the rating. I did not like the ending at all. Despite these negative thoughts, I must say, I like the author's writing style so I really hope she will continue writing better romance novels in future as I suppose she is capable to writing.

Overall, this is nothing compared to Take a Hint Dani Brown by Talia Hibbert--slightly boring, a Hallmark cheesy romance novel. Worth 2.5 stars.

This review contains spoilers!!

I’m warning you!

Okay, I enjoyed this book for the most part, I loved the healthy relationship Nikki had with her friends and there were a lot of really light hearted and fun moments. I also enjoyed the emphasis the book put on self improvement, doing what makes you happy and putting yourself first. It was actually very refreshing to read a romance where the girl is still single at the end!

The thing I didn’t like however was mainly the narration and writing style of the book, I would’ve liked it to have been more descriptive instead of show and tell and I’m also personally not a big fan of books where characters seem like they’re writing a blog or talking to the reader, I’m sure it’s other people’s cup of tea though!

At first glance Nikki is a successful woman with a good job, a happy home and a solid 5 year plan, but when her long term boyfriend breaks up with her she realizes she’s not as happy as she thought she was.

White Boyfriend is the story of Nikki finding herself and growing into that person. Backed by her 3 closest girlfriends Nikki starts her journey to find happiness. That true happiness with herself that comes from knowing yourself, balancing setting boundaries and stepping outside of your comfort zone.

During this journey she meets Mike, her complete opposite in personality. Where she’s organized and well planned he goes with the flow and doesn’t plan beyond today. He’s outdoorsy and adventurous while she’s more of a Netflix and chill kind of woman. The thing is the two have some undeniable chemistry…

Leesha McCoy has created a world of hilarious characters. The close knit group of women surrounding Nikki are supportive but able to give her a kick in the pants when she needs some tough love. The camaraderie really made the book a winner! Fingers crossed that we get a book 2 telling Alicia’s story!