Tansy Adams’ greatest love is her family’s bookstore, passed down from her late father. But when it comes to actual romance… Tansy can’t get past the first chapter. Tired of her stepfamily’s questions about her love life, Tansy invents Gemma, a fake girlfriend inspired by the stunning cover model on a bestselling book. They’ll never actually meet, so what’s the harm in a little fib? Yet when real-life Gemma crosses Tansy’s path, her white lie nearly implodes.
Gemma van Dalen is a wild child, the outcast of her wealthy family, and now the latest heir to Van Dalen Publishing. But the title comes with one tiny condition: she must be married in order to inherit. When Gemma discovers a beautiful stranger has been pretending to date her for months, she decides to take the charade one step further—and announces their engagement.
Gemma needs a wife to meet the terms of her grandfather’s will and Tansy needs money to save her struggling bookstore. A marriage could be mutually beneficial, if they can fool everyone into thinking it’s a love match. Unexpected sparks fly as Tansy and Gemma play the role of affectionate fiancées, and suddenly the line between convenient arrangement and real feelings begins to blur. But the scheming Van Dalen family won’t give up the company without a fight, and Gemma and Tansy’s newfound happiness might get caught in the fallout…
- Title: The Fiancée Farce
- Author: Alexandria Bellefleur
- Publisher: Avon
- Publication Date: Date of Publication
- Genre: April 18, 2023
- Targeted Age Range: Adult
- Content Warnings: death of parents (past), grief, revenge porn (past), blackmail, family tension
- Rating: ★★★
I absolutely loved Alexandria Bellefleur’s Written in the Stars series, and couldn’t have been more excited for The Fiancée Farce — I haven’t read a lot of marriage of convenience romances, but I am a sucker for fake dating, and was excited to see Bellefleur’s twist on both tropes. While I did enjoy The Fiancée Farce, I didn’t enjoy it as much as I was hoping to.
The Fiancée Farce drops you straight into the drama — I picked it up, and went “Oh this … went from 0 to 100”, except I had made that statement on the second page of the book. Right away, we find out that Tansy has been lying about dating Gemma for six months, only for Gemma to show up in person, and say that they’re engaged. Gemma, who has been recently named as the heir of Van Dalen Publishing must be married in order to inherit. Seeing as how all the pieces have already fallen into place, Gemma decides to take their lie a step further, and say that the two of them are engaged. With Tansy’s family bookstore in danger, and Gemma needing to be married by December, the two of them decide to team up. But their happy marriage gets tangled in the complicated web that is the Van Dalens, and Tansy and Gemma have to decide what’s worth fighting for.
I’m not sure what it was about The Fiancée Farce that fell flat for me, as I really adored Bellefleur’s past works. I’ve been thinking it over, and I think it’s boiled down to the fact that it’s missing some of the things I love most about fake dating. While there was quite a bit of external conflict with the Van Dalens, there wasn’t a lot of internal conflict for Tansy and Gemma. The two of them fell for one another quite quickly, and there wasn’t a lot of pining or angsty yearning. Tansy and Gemma are simply dating — there’s no circumstances preventing them from being together, there’s no pining over what the other one is feeling. The only lie they’ve told to their families is about how they met, and how long they’ve been together. The Fiancée Farce simply lacks tension.
In hindsight, I also just wish that we’d gotten more set up before dropping us in the thick of it. I spent the first few chapters confused about who the Van Dalens were and why they mattered. I had a hard time initially distinguishing the side characters from one another. The side characters in Bellefleur’s other novels are usually some of my favorites, and so it just felt a little bit like a let down.
What I did love about The Fiancée Farce was how Gemma and Tansy learned how to stand up for not just each other, but also themselves. Throughout the novel, Gemma and Tansy both have tumultuous relationships with their family (more so Gemma than Tansy), and end up making strides towards healing, and being their own advocates. Something that I can always count on in Bellefleur novels is wonderful Seattle nods! As someone who lives in Seattle, I know that I can always look to Bellefleur for food recommendations. Bellefleur always has such vivid imagery that makes it easy for me to imagine I’m right there with her characters.
Overall, I didn’t love The Fiancée Farce as much as I was hoping to, but I’m sure other readers will absolutely adore it!
Links for The Fiancée Farce: Goodreads | StoryGraph | Bookshop.org | IndieBound
Alexandria Bellefleur is a bestselling and award-winning author of swoony contemporary romance often featuring loveable grumps and the sunshine characters who bring them to their knees. Her debut novel, Written in the Stars, was a 2021 Lambda Literary Award winner and a 2020 winner of The Ripped Bodice Awards for Excellence in Romantic Fiction.
