Reviews with content warning for Car accident - How to End a Love Story

Helen’s kind of an uptight dick (but I guess that’s kinda the point, no?) who’s a challenge to root for for most of the book, but dannnng do I ever love Grant, and that he’s *emotional* yet still *manly* 🫶🫶

Funny coincidence (?)/overlap with another recent novel I’ve read - Abby Jimenez’s Just For the Summer - in the pre-date Google survey offering choices for “level of fancy” 😃💕

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bookscatsandtats's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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itschelseaw's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This was really cute in a way I wasn’t fully expecting given the premise. I loved seeing Helen and Grant get more comfortable with each other. Their chemistry felt real, and I believed that they were in love by the time they broke up (not tagging as a spoiler because come on, the third act breakup is a well known trope!).
Both of the characters had angst, but it felt well balanced with their current lives and aspirations. It was believable in a way that I struggled to find in Abby Jimenez’s books. It felt earned in a way? And not the only aspect about the characters.
Everyone felt real and balanced, which I love to see!
Overall a great debut and I’m so excited to see what Kuang writes next.

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bookishbrenbren's review against another edition

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emotional fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

Um what. This book make no fking sense. Bc the characters are underdeveloped and have no internal arc/growth. So their decisions and choices make no sense and are not connected to who they supposedly are as people. The story is all plot *things are happening and there is sex!* but I need something deeper to believe true love is real lmao this book made me feel nothing except these two horndogs have sexual chemistry.

The very icky premise is laid out in the first chapter: the pair is a woman whose sister committed suicide and the man who was driving the car when she ran into traffic. Um why??? Why did that need to be a couple?!?! so anyway, i go on reading because it's so highly hyped, waiting for the ickiness to smooth itself out and for all these characters to like work through their collective, shared trauma and like let that emotional work bring them closer lol no none of that happens. For some reason, the main character is not turned off enough by her own grief and her partner's role in that grief - or at least his connection to it - to not have sex with him. And it's very weird like all around like have any of the people on the production side of this book ever lost a family member and/or experienced grief?? Like I know they must have, but I'm just wondering how this book ends up the book that it is. Idk call me crazy but grief is not a huge turn on for me. Much less grief by suicide! Were there sensitivity readers? I'm dying to know because some of the language used in this book seems very yeah I'm just gonna say it again icky.

If this was real like and the girl you ran over's sister asked you to fuck off their show's adaptation writing team, why would you say No!? Obviously he's not hurting for opportunities. And why would you EVER forgive him for saying no???? Can I not just suffer once, you want me to suffer every day I show up to work? Again I return to the idea that none of these editors, agents, writer, have ever actually lost anyone close to them.

Anyways. Ultimately the biggest issue here is that there is no character development. The pair has sexual chemistry as I mentioned before, but we have no idea why they do the things they do. Like it's clear, given their shared trauma, why they would *not* want to get together but what is making them ignore all of that self preservation? We'll never know because these characters are like an inch deep.

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ali_is_a_panda's review against another edition

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emotional funny lighthearted sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I wish that the romance was a slower pace, but the book was good and I finished it in two sittings.

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liamliayaum's review against another edition

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emotional lighthearted reflective fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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neatoburrito's review against another edition

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The premise of this book was believable- it just really isn't for me. I listened to the book for 1 hr 50 minutes and at this point the book wasn't comical or romical. Just a bummer. I could just about see around the bend about what would be forced proximity narrative and realized I just didn't care at all about these characters.

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