I will not lie, I struggled to get into this book and enjoy it. I found it to be quite far fetched and a bit unbelievable in the way the FMC character responds to the news of her fiancé’s infidelity and even a random man showing up at her door. The book was a good way for me to rest and reset my brain though after some back to back heavy reads

A fun read

I haven’t read anything by this author before and when I realised this was book 5 I was a tad hesitant, but boy am I glad I read this one. While you could tell there were other stories referenced in this, I didn’t feel I needed to read them to understand this story.

The characters are relatable and their romance was incredibly sweet. The friendship between Kate and Margot is one of the best vibes I’ve read.

I loved the romcom banter but some of the POV switching did confuse me at first but it didn’t take me out of the story, just needs defining more for clarity.

Overall I enjoyed this book and will be going back to read the rest in the series.

🛌 One bed
❎ Will they/won’t they
✅ Forced proximity
😈 Revenge plot
🛶Set in Amsterdam

Plot: 💜💜💜💜
Characters: 🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩
Spice: N/A
Writing: ✍🏼✍🏼✍🏼✍🏼
Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thank you NetGalley and Boldwood Books for the ARC.

I wanted to love this book, especially because it is set in Amsterdam and I recently moved here, but i wasn't even able to finish it. This book just didn't do it for me. I can't recommend it. Others may enjoy it but it wasn't my cup of tea.

I have never read a contemporary adult romance where there was little to no romance and the story was told from dual POV from two women who were NOT romantically involved. I do not understand why the author seemed to feel we needed to hear half the story from Poppy’s POV. This was a very, very odd choice.

I chose this book based on the title, but it was misleading. The only thing that was trouble in this situation was ME having to read this truly baffling and unromantic romance story. It apparently is #5 in a series, and honestly I do not feel that it can act as a stand alone. With the author continually throwing past characters into the main plot I felt lost and very confused. It was an unusual way to do this, as most authors tend to just drop past characters in as cameos and not 50% of the plot. If the other POV had been from the MMC’s perspective I think it could possibly be called a romance. As it stands I feel this book is best labeled as contemporary women’s fiction.

Thanks NetGalley and Boldwood books for the free ARC in exchange for my honest opinions.

Kate Whitaker discovers her fiancé's shocking betrayal—he's engaged to multiple women. Teaming up with Willem, the brother of one of his other fiancées, Kate embarks on a whirlwind journey across Europe, seeking revenge and perhaps finding unexpected romance along the way. This is a laugh-out-loud romantic comedy.

Going Dutch
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 9 April 2025
In this fifth Ever After Agency book, Poppy and the regular cameo cohort are on board to help Kate with something unusual; a revenge plot.
Kate has been with hi-flier Jon for six months and is recently engaged to him, despite the fact her cousin Margot detests him.
One evening, she has a stranger - an attractive one - Willem De Vries, turn up at her door.
She meets him at the pub and is faced with evidence that shows her long-distance fiance is also engaged to Willem's sister Adriana.
And Willem wants Kate to go to Amsterdam and help him prove Jon's duplicity to Adriana.
After much alcohol and sobbing with Margot, she agrees.
Though it wasn't Poppy that matched Kate with Jon, she wants her to know and that's how the agency gets involved.
This is a fun, international, city-hopping rom com that feels like a Shakespearean comedy of errors at times with all of the shenanigans and the amount of people who get involved in making sure Jon never treats a woman the same way again.
And of course, with Margot in tow, Kate spends more time with Willem and can't help but be attracted to him.
This one was great fun, it's of planning, regular characters like Marie and George on board as well as Tris and Saffy, whilst also moving the Poppy narrative along.
There's a HEA at the end a bunch of new potential clients for the agency.
The chemistry between Kate and Willem sizzles and I love the fact there are multiple LGBTQIA+ characters in this het rom com, not just the token couple.
I loved this as much, if not more, than the others

good romance and finding out that a guy ends up engaged to 3 women and how they all find love and end up catching him.

I Knew You Were Trouble by Sandy Barker

Polygamy actually happens today!!??

The story starts with a girl being informed that her fiance has another fiance!! She is shocked of course but doesn't know what to do about it. She blames herself for being lame enough to fall for a con man but then she rewinds and start seeing all the signs that she ignored earlier. Well, she has to come up with a plan to con the con man.

It sounds similar to the Hindi bollywood movie - Ladies Vs Ricky Bahl, but the difference is this guy is playing 3 girls at once!!

📚 Story highlights the fact that how girls are so much into charming guys that they often neglect the red flags.
📚 It is an amalgamation of mystery, suspense, love and tragedy.
📚 Plot flows smoothly between finding out about the other girls, notifying them, giving them support and playing the con man.
📚 However, the frequency with which the characters are flying from country to country, it looks like they are super rich!!
📚 Beautiful insights are shared about how a person needs to be cautious about relationships, how becoming vulnerable can harm them.

A beautiful and quick read. Do give it a try!!

Kate meets Willem when he delivers bad news to her - the man she is engaged to is also engaged to Alex's sister. Soon they are working together, but as she spends more time with Willem will it be a case of wrong time, right man? A great read.

This book was a fun read, with an interesting plot. The characters were well written, and I enjoyed the main characters of williem and Kate. How they came together was so interesting. This is the fifth book in this series, but the first one I have read and it was impossible to put down.

When a stranger knocks at Kate's door on a Friday night telling her that he has something important to tell her she is immediately wary. There is no way she is going to let him into her flat, so she runs a quick google search to check if the name he has given her is legit or associated with any scams, and then when the search is clear goes to meet him at the local pub. The news that the Dutchman, Willem de Vries, gives her turns her world upside down. Her pilot fiance, Jon, is also engaged to Willem's sister Adriana, and he needs her help to get his sister to believe it. He therefore asks Kate to come to Amsterdam with him to prove that they have both been duped.

Kate had met Jon through a matchmaking agency. She had registered with two agencies. The other agency was the Ever After Agency where she met matchmaker Poppy Dean. Soon, Kate is putting together a plan to get revenge on Jon, a plan that will need Adriana and Poppy to be involved. But first, she needs to know if there are any other fiancees out there.

Willem has done a good job of investigating Jon, but Poppy has other resources at her disposal, in the form of grumpy French detective Marie. Soon, Willem and Kate are crisscrossing Europe, putting the plan in place to bring Jon back down to earth with a thud.

This is the fifth book in the Ever After series, featuring Poppy, and this one was interesting because here Poppy isn't acting as the matchmaker, even though she can quite clearly see that Kate and Willem have some serious chemistry going on! Instead, she becomes more and more involved in the plot to snare Jon in the honey trap, which could be quite awkward with her husband, Tristan.

I loved the Amsterdam setting, and the other places that are visited throughout the book too! I also definitely appreciated the Dutch hero! I have one of those myself. My husband was born and raised in South Africa, but his parents are both Dutch so he is 100% Dutch blood with a touch of South African accent, and an Australian passport! And I have one of the difficult to pronounce Dutch surnames!

I am really sad to see the end of the Happy Ever After series featuring Poppy and her friends and colleagues. It has been an enjoyable series. I am going to a readers retreat in May where Sandy Barker is one of the attending authors and I am really hoping that we will hear about what comes next! I will be reading it!

I am sharing this review with the New Release Challenge hosted by The Chocolate Lady's Book Reviews. Be sure to check out other stops on the tour shown below. Thanks to the publisher, Netgalley and Rachel's Random Resources for the review copy.

Rating 4/5

I had a fun time with this book. At the beginning I wasn't aware that it was part of a series, but simply wondered about different parts. It was as if I was supposed to already know something from the past - but now I understand.

I really laughed out loud several times, and the attraction between Willem and Kate was the highlight of the book. Other parts seemed a bit repetitive, however.

Sandy Barker’s “I Knew You Were Trouble” is a fun, witty read with great humor and a charming romance. Kate, the lead woman, is relatable and likable, and her connection with the *Thor*, Willem is both playful and heartwarming. There gradually understanding of each other is fun to read along with.

The book cleverly flips the “other woman” trope by focusing on women supporting each other, which added a refreshing layer to the story. The inclusion of dating services as a subplot was also a nice touch, giving the narrative a modern twist.

Overall, *I Knew You Were Trouble* is a delightful rom-com with strong characters and a fun, empowering message. Highly recommend for anyone looking for a light, enjoyable read.

First, thank you to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for the arc in exchange for an honest review.
I'll start by saying when I first received this arc I didn't' realize it was book 5 in a series, however, with most romance series I've read, the books can be read separately and you may just miss a couple of Easter eggs, so I wasn't really worried.
And for the most part, I did follow the story fine without the others in the series except when it came to the second POV. I was very thrown off that the second POV wasn't the love interest of the story, but a character from a previous book. Ultimately for a romance, I definitely would have preferred it to be Willem or if the author didn't want to do that then just to keep it in the one POV because I felt like I didn't get to know him before we were supposed to be rooting for him and Kate together.
Overall, this book was fine. I feel like this book gave off more of a contemporary, John Tucker Must Die feel with a romance subplot vibe than a traditional romance feel. I did really enjoy the international settings and it made me long for some travel of my own and the characters were fun, but the structure of the book just didn't work for me and the lack of getting to really know Willem made me not as invested in the story.

Everything in this book was so shallow and unrealistic, to me.
Someone hiring TWO matchmakers, there being two matchmakers in one city. The rivalry between them. The 6 month engagement after spening less than a few weekends together? And the revenge plot. So weird. I didn't connect to anyone in the story.

Thank you to Boldwood Books and NetGalley for providing me with this ARC in exchange for an unbiased review. All opinions are my own.

I really wanted to like this, I really tried, but honestly I was kind of put off by the first “hallo” lol. The writing isn’t my cup of tea and honestly the story moved pretty slow for me. It didn’t grab my attention or make me eager to keep reading. It reads very “new author” for me and I’d like to think they’re still finding their voice and improving. The premise had me very intrigued but it definitely fell short.

Some actions didn’t feel fully justified, and it felt like there were half-hearted explanations just to keep the plot moving, without any solid logic behind them. There were also a lot of typos and mistakes, which I get are common in ARCs, but this felt like a bit too many, even for an early draft.

Unfortunately the book is not for me, but that’s not to say others wouldn’t enjoy it.

I won't be posting a public review of this until at least a month after the pub date, due to the low rating and out of respect for the author. I will edit the feedback once I've posted the reviews.

Thank you to NetGalley and Boldwood Books for an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book had a sweet and funny concept–who doesn't love romantic partners coming together via a revenge plot on a vile, cheating ex? I unfortunately had trouble connecting with the love story in this one. I found it strange that the alternate POV chapters were from the matchmaker's point of view (I didn't know it was part of a series, so that was really strange to me as. someone reading this as a standalone). I also wish the character development and romantic chemistry was a bit more fleshed out (again, I'm not sure if this is something I missed having not read the other books in this series because I was reading this as a standalone). I think other readers will enjoy this rom-com, but unfortunately I had a hard time getting into it and did not finish this book.

‘I Knew You Were Trouble’ by Sandy Barker is the fifth (and apparently final, boo!) novel in a fabulously fun series which describes the loves and laughs surrounding the Ever After Agency - London’s premier matchmakers. This book focuses on Kate, who learns early in the novel that her fiancé has another fiancée! When she follows the handsome messenger Willem to Amsterdam to tell her fiancé’s fiancée (and Willem’s sister) Adriana the shocking news, the pair begin to dream of payback. Poppy and her matchmaking colleagues get involved, and broken trust becomes revenge… and possibly a second chance at finding love!

I loved how empowering this book was, and how the women banded together rather than blaming each other. I adore the style of this series, with Poppy always having a key role, allowing us to glimpse into her idyllic marriage and joyful, if sometimes difficult, career.

The romance between Kate and Willem was slow to blossom but beautiful to witness, like a Dutch tulip, and the epilogue was perfect…

I’d definitely recommend this book, and it left me wanting more from Poppy and co. Giving this a loveable, joyful, laugh-out-loud five stars!

I received an advance Digital Review Copy of this book from the publisher Boldwood Books via NetGalley. The opinions expressed in this review are my own.

thank you to netgalley and the publisher for an early copy in return for my review!

so did i go into this one knowing full well it was book five of the ever after agency series??? yes....but hear me out...

i was slightly lost with the name drops here and there but actually, i really enjoyed it so im going to fall book into the series a bit more to learn the universe of their lives. basically, it was like reading the ending of the book before purchasing from the store...makes sense to me right?! ANYWAY

i fell in love with the fun, light-hearted moments that just made me smile. give me a romance with all the funny moments, the strong female friendships, and the references all added charm to the story and the characters i really started to develop in my mind and enjoy them!

if you're looking for a fun and fluffy read, a cheeky revenge plot and a great focus on female bonds...look no further!! and if you've ready books one two tree and four...what else are you reading if not this one???????

I didn't end up finishing this one, I had some issues with it. So I just did a promo post for the blog tour. Here are my thoughts for why I didn't finish.

I’ve read one other book by this author and did enjoy it, so I signed up for this one. While it is in a series, it should be a standalone for the most part. However, the matchmaker has part of the book in their POV, which I didn’t care for. If it is a romance, I want the two love interests’ POVs, not someone outside of that couple. So that was weird for me. Then, the attraction/leading to more between Kate and Willem seemed a bit forced or just all of a sudden without anything really leading to why they liked each other? That could be just me. I only got about a third of the way through.