Quick Synopsis

Christina Lauren, the instant New York Times bestselling and “reigning romance queens” (PopSugar), returns with a delicious new romance between the buttoned-up heir of a grocery chain and his free-spirited artist ex as they fake their relationship in order to receive a massive inheritance.

Publisher’s Synopsis

Anna Green thought she was marrying Liam “West” Weston for access to subsidized family housing while at UCLA. She also thought she’d signed divorce papers when the graduation caps were tossed, and they both went on their merry ways.

Three years later, Anna is a starving artist living paycheck to paycheck while West is a Stanford professor. He may be one of four heirs to the Weston Foods conglomerate, but he has little interest in working for the heartless corporation his family built from the ground up. He is interested, however, in his one-hundred-million-dollar inheritance. There’s just one catch.

Due to an antiquated clause in his grandfather’s will, Liam won’t see a penny until he’s been happily married for five years. Just when Liam thinks he’s in the home stretch, pressure mounts from his family to see this mysterious spouse, and he has no choice but to turn to the one person he’s afraid to introduce to his one-percenter parents—his unpolished, not-so-ex-wife.

But in the presence of his family, Liam’s fears quickly shift from whether the feisty, foul-mouthed, paint-splattered Anna can play the part to whether the toxic world of wealth will corrupt someone as pure of heart as his surprisingly grounded and loyal wife. Liam will have to ask himself if the price tag on his flimsy cover story is worth losing true love that sprouted from a lie.

Book Review

It has been a bit since I read a Christina Lauren book. I took a break after reading and being quite disappointed by Something Wilder. So I had some pretty high hopes for The Paradise Problem and was pleased for those hopes to be met.

The Paradise Problem is fake marriage, opposites attract romance that primarily takes place on a private island during wedding festivities. Anna Green is a struggling, pink haired artist who agreed to marry her best friend’s brother, Liam “West” Weston, five years ago to get cheaper student housing. After Liam graduated, the two signed divorce papers and went their separate ways. Three years later, Liam randomly shows up on Anna’s doorstep to ask her to play wife in order for him to access his trust fund, which requires him to be happily married for five years.

I quite adored The Paradise Problem. I thought both Anna and West are well-fleshed out characters with believable back stories. Anna is an easy character to champion. While she is not perfect, Anna sticks to her passion for painting and is a devoted daughter. Similarly, West has stuck to his principles and become a professor, rather than joining the C-suite of his family’s grocery store chain. I found that this automatically endeared him to me. And the rest of his actions made me like him even more. The most hard to swallow part of Anna & West’s story is the marriage of convenience that happened five years ago and the fact they lived together for two years without getting to know one another even the slightest bit.

One thing in The Paradise Problem that really shined was the complex family dynamics. I think Christina Lauren did an excellent job portraying a realistic family that has issues. However, there was one choice that the writing duo made that I found absolutely awful. In place of using any of the usual words for 🍆 , they used “Goddamn” which I found beyond cringey. I have no idea what possessed them to make this choice, but it took me out of the story every single time it was used.

Overall, The Paradise Problem is a cute romcom with easy-to-root-for protagonists and feelings that grow. For me, this was a return to the magic that made me a Christina Lauren fan: realistic characters, rich feelings, and a satisfying HEA. I definitely recommend this novel for contemporary romance fans.

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