
Member Reviews

I really wanted to love this, but unfortunately it didn't work for me.
I found the pacing to be really slow and I was quite bored throughout - especially as an ex-barista reading (in far too much detail) about a barista. Speaking of said barista (Ava), I really didn't like her character. I thought that I would like her because I can be quite grumpy too, but she was just so mean for so much of the book, it didn't make for a super pleasant reading experience and I couldn't understand why Finn put up with it.
Sad because I wanted to love it!

I loved everything about this from start to finish. I absolutely devoured this every time I had a minute to read.
This is a wonderful friends to lovers book because the friendship is so good and so strong. It really was the glue of the story.
I loved the banter in this book, all of Ava’s sarcastic remarks and come backs. She is wonderful and reminds me of me, the grumpy, sassy and sarcastic girl.
I loved Finn and how he managed to worm his way into Ava’s life and find a way to stay put inside her heart.

I love a good slow-burn, and The Friendship Fling had one of the slowest burns I've read in a while. I love being shown how the characters develop a great friendship, and then them fighting said feelings.
Ava and Finn, at first glance, are complete opposites. She's fluent in sarcasm and adept at keeping most people at a distance, while Finn is, as Ava says, "the human embodiment of pep." The chemistry between them throws sparks though, and despite them not being in a place for anything serious to happen, and trying to keep everything within boundaries of friendship, the attraction between them is undeniable and they eventually give in to it.
I really enjoyed this story: fantastic secondary characters, moments that are more heavy (please check content warnings), characters that have their struggles and find love among all of it. The Friendship Fling is an impressive debut!

Ava & Finn ❤️
☕️Ava’s a barista in a central London coffee shop. She has been at the same place for a while, and enjoys the order but could do without the customers and her useless manager.
☕️When three guys come in at closing time one evening, she can tell they work in the nearby offices. The tall guy with a hard to place accent, Finn, keeps coming back and is so chatty.
☕️Ava’s stuck in a hamster wheel of work and one night stands, but soon she and Finn have a plan to tackle the random things he’s added to his London bucket list before he moves away.
☕️Ava feels safe with Finn, knowing he’ll be leaving soon, but when the attraction between the two sparkles, they know they can’t have more.
✏️I read this charming grumpy-sunshine story with two characters who need each other in such a good way in one sitting, it was that good. Having just returned from a weeklong trip to London, the places that Ava and Finn are in felt super real, with the London backdrop almost a passive but important, anonymous part of the story. I loved the supporting characters in this story, Finn’s friends, Ava’s twin brother Max and her best friend and roommate. There’s a lot of layers in the story about past experiences and emotions, but it’s the sweet falling hopelessly in love that is the best part of the story.
My rating 4.5/5 - ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ 💫

Wow this was an absolute gem!
I loved the slowly blossoming friendship between Finn and Ava, two total opposites that just work so well together. Finn’s endearing charm and golden retriever energy against Ava’s grouchiness is just a delight to read. This is a slow book in the best way, where we just spend time with the two MC’s as they get to know each other and slowly fall in love. There’s some underlying heavier storyline (including illness of a sibling).
I adored this so much. What a beautiful book!

4.5
Ooohh my, what a book!
“The Friendship Fling” is one of the rare books where it is exactly what the marketing is promising it is and we love that.
Writing, pacing, characters and the development of the relationship were all *very* nicely done!
It has the perfect mix of funny and emotional.
Finn is sooooo nice, an actual ray of sunshine, and Ava is soooo grumpy. It’s like someone took me & my grumpy self and put them into a book.
The book is written in dual pov but I’d say about 80% were from Ava’s pov.
I do have to say I was missing Finn’s pov chapters on two occasions.
One, when he met his dad in London and then another later on in the book when he was in San Francisco. I do think both of those moments were pretty big parts of his character arc and development, so I would have loved to read about them as they were happening rather than being told in hindsight about them.
I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that this is supposed to be a series and if so, I have a good guess who the next book will be about and I’m excited to read it!
And if not, I’m still excited to read more from this author.

This book feels like sunshine after hibernation. If it were a pastry, it’d be a still-warm and gooey cinnamon roll with crispy edges and extra frosting, but only right at the middle.
If there’s one thing to know about me, it’s that I love an unreliable narrator. Ava is self-aware enough to know she’s avoidant but so content in that, that she hardly notices all of Finn’s noticing as they unravel together. And Finn, well…
I loved this book and I don’t want to be done.
The vibes: black cat and golden retriever, a city break in your favourite place, friends to lovers, sunshine and a perfect cup of coffee. A secret stash full of Kit Kat chunkies, and a sunny autumn day in London.

Friendship fling builds on the very title… it shows you how Ava and Finn become friends and to start with it feels like this will be all it will ever be but the banter between the two and deadpan wit particularly from our surly Ava is what races you towards the end of this ultimate slow burn.
Not being a huge fan of the guy being the ray of sunshine usually but there something about Finn being such a golden retriever that works for this debut from Georgia Stone that makes it such a fun happy emotional read.
I received this book as an ARC and provide an honest review.

If you're looking for a typical romcom then this is the book for you. It took me a while to warm to both Ava and Finn but after a few chapters, I ended up loving them both. I normally don't like friends to lovers but Finn was so loveable and Ava was so relatable that I flew through the book. It is a bit of a slow burn on the romance part but I think it made it better as it was spread over a summer so it didn't feel like it was all happening really quickly and you can see their relationship develop into something. The banter between Finn and Ava was so fun to read and did make me laugh. Is the book a bit predictable? Of course but isn't that what you want in a book like this? If you're looking for an easy read or a holiday book, I would highly recommend it. I can't wait to read another book by Georgia.
I was lucky enough to get this as an ARC so thank you Hodder & Stoughton and Georgia!
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/7493365585

Thank you NetGalley and Hodder and Stoughton for giving me the opportunity to read this eARC.
I loved this book. As much as it took a little bit of time for me to connect fully to both MCs, once I did they quickly became two of my favourite MCs. And I struggled to put the book down.
The opposites attract/ grumpy/sunshine aspect was a win for me with the deadpan witty banter between them having me laughing many times.
The reason I rated it as I did, was because this book made me cry and emote the whole way through and any book in my mind that can do that should be highly rated in my opinion.
I felt strongly for the characters and in each one I could see aspects of myself in them which helped me connect even better.
Overall this book is very well written and very much worth a read for anyone looking for a slow slow burn which pays off in spades.
This heartfelt friends to lovers romance will keep me coming back to read it again in the future and will be patiently waiting for more from this author.

Finally, some dry, deadpan, witty humour that's right up my alley.
Finn and Ava's dynamic was hilarious, his absolute warmth and sunshine personified, to her seemingly cold and mean self. I loved the London bucket list, that was fun.
But truthfully, I didn't find this romantic at all. It was just two people being friendly, without any chemistry. Maybe I would have enjoyed this more if there was true emotion behind it all, and it didn't feel like a conclusion just came out of nowhere? I also found the reasoning behind their reluctance silly, and as much as I wanted to love it, this book really missed the mark.

Thank you to Netgalley and Hodder & Stoughton for providing this eARC! 💖
This was so heartwarming and cute, but at the same time a bit sad and a lot relatable. Even though it took me a little to connect with both Ava and Finn, I ended up loving their story and their individual journeys. Particularly Ava, I think she will stay with me for a while, her inner struggles with her brother.. hit home a little too much 😭 I found interesting the concept of a fake friendship haha I'm so used to fake dating that this concept felt refreshing honestly, and also the bucket list was a fun way to have the book move forward. It is true that the pace was a bit slow but I enjoyed the story being spread out throughout late-spring to late-summer.
Also I loved the slow burn, it burned so good lol and the payoff... so worth it; and finally realistic heights!!! I don't need a man towering over the female main character all the time!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for giving me an earc for review.
So this was a 3 star for me. I really wanted to love if but somehow it just wasn’t hitting for me like I expected…
I feel like the writing is really good, however the plot felt too slow, the character’s felt like they weren’t really gel-ing together for me because they are leaning too much into the whole grumpy/sunshine trope that by 40% I honestly felt like they couldn’t turn this “friendship” into a relationship.
The FMC was the grumpy in this case and to be quite honest she felt way too grumpy and I feel like it took too long for us to discover why she is like that. The MMC is the sunshine and I really loved him and his personality, I just got annoyed that she was such a downer in the beginning on his happiness.
I also think that whilst both characters are getting to know each other there was a bit too much depth into these dates they went on when I wanted more focus on the characters rather than the places they went to. I do however understand that part of this whole locations is to maybe show off the cute places round London, however it didn’t hit for me.
Overall by the time they got together, I felt quite bored and not invested because of how slow the first half was.

This was such a fun uplifting book to read. Finn, the male main character, was full of energy and everything you need in a friend, especially a friend for Ava who is happy with her quite life.
I loved the banter between the two of them and Georgia's writing style.

Thank you NetGalley and Hodder & Stoughton for the e-arc of The Friendship Fling in exchange of an honest review!
Rom-com books are sooo back, and I couldn’t be more happy. The Friendship Fling is a debut adult romance about a grumpy x sunshine duo that develops a beautiful friendship (and maybe something more…) while exploring London, but only for the summer.
This book was sweet and so funny, but it was also extremely emotional. I laughed, I giggled, I cried, and I loved Ava and Finn’s friendship with all my heart. It’s honestly an amazing debut. Can’t wait for Georgia’s next book (I was really shipping two side characters from The Friendship Fling, but I’m not sure I’m on the right track haha)

WOW WOW WOW 😭 😭😭😭
I’m honestly lost for words at how amazing this book was!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR GIVING ME AN ARC!!! I AM SO SO GRATEFUL!!!!
Friends to lovers is my fav trope of all time and I’ve read HUNDREDS of books with that trope but this is definitely in the top3!!! I can’t believe this is a DEBUT NOVEL!!!!????
The writing was so beautiful and the characters were so lovable and it felt so real and natural and ughhhhh
The authors writing reminded me of Emily Henry and Sarah Adams in the BEST WAY POSSIBLE!!!
I’m so excited to see this book get the recognition it deserves when it’s finally published!!! This author has an extremely bright future ahead of her and I’ll be honoured to say that I was lucky enough to experience her writing before her first publication!!!

I adored this one. It felt so quintessentially British without being twee – just deeply relatable and real.
Ava and Finn had great chemistry from the beginning, even as Ava continues to deny it, but I love that we got to see their relationship develop as friends first and foremost. Finn is such a sweetheart and Ava is prickly but I loved delving into the why she keeps everyone at arm’s length and then seeing her open up to the possibility of love. A great cast of characters and an entertaining plot. A fantastic debut.

Oh I really enjoyed this book, made me laugh so many times (also cry at some point).
I loved the banter between the two main characters and how different they were from each other (opposites do really attrack each other). Loved the backstories too and all the side characters, such a great group of friends.
It was great that it wasnt instant love, we got to see them become friends (really good friends that care from each other) and see it change to true love. I couldn't reccomend this book enough, it was fantastic!
Can't wait to read more books of this author!
Thank you to NetGalley and Hodder and Stoughton for this e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was such a great slow burn, friends to lovers romance. I loved Ava and the way she grew throughout the story and Finn was a perfect counterpart to her. I really enjoyed all their friend dates and how they slowly led to more (and the fact that it was done against the backdrop of London). This was a fun, perfect for summer, read

The Friendship Fling is a rom-com esque romance that would interest those looking for a black cat x golden retriever trope!
I personally didn’t really like the story all that much, I couldn’t connect with the characters (Finn being a little too sweet while Ava had weird reasons for befriending him). The Dual POV is something I adore in romance novels but personally it fell flat on Finn’s side since there wasn’t really anything new