Book Review: Five Dates with the Billionaire by Alyssa J Montgomery
I was pretty excited with this book at first. It showed great promise for the first couple of chapters. But…
The original premise is that Connor’s grandmother, Violet, is great friends with Mia and, after she has a heart turn, refuses to have corrective surgery until Connor and Mia go on five dates together. Violet is certain Connor and Mia are a perfect match and they’ll realise as soon as they start dating.
Sounded okay. But… It all went downhill rather quickly.
Mia is, of course, a 26 year old virgin. *eye roll* And even if I could get past that point we get cliche/trope number 2, which is that they agree on a brief affair so that she can lose her virginity to Connor, an expert at loving and leaving them. *eye roll*
Then there is cliche number 3. Mia works for Connor and, up until this point, he hadn’t looked at her twice because of her dowdy appearance. Suddenly, after a makeover from Violet, apparently Connor ‘sees’ the real Mia. Yeah, really? There’s too much botox and false eyelashes in the world now, so do we really have to perpetuate the idea that the only way a woman can still get noticed by a man in 2021 is from her appearance (and I mean noticed in a ‘you’re great at your job’ way as well as in a ‘let’s date’ way). Oh, Montgomery tries to explain away some of this plot point but it still comes down to the idea that a rich intelligent billionaire could only find worth in a hot woman, regardless of her intelligence or competence in her chosen career or sparkling personality. Blah.
There is a mystery plot thrown in too. Overall though, it’s completely unbelievable. The most interesting aspect of it was Violet and her old friend’s spy life but this wasn’t explored. Instead, we got just more about how Mia wearing dowdy clothes and unflattering glasses should never be an option for her again… (Do you sense how mad this storyline made me at all?)
There’s also the ‘other woman/ex wife is such a conniving bitch’ cliche, the ‘must kiss to avoid the baddie’ cliche, and the ‘you must be trying to get my grandmother’s money’ cliche. They are all tolerable but I don’t really understand why Montgomery didn’t just go with the original premise. If we had the book without the virgin and ugly duckling idiocy at least, it might have worked. Such a shame.
2 out of 5
readwritewish 