I love me a spicy cinnamon roll hero!

“𝙸’𝚟𝚎 𝚗𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚛 𝚌𝚛𝚊𝚟𝚎𝚍 𝚊𝚗𝚢𝚘𝚗𝚎 𝚊𝚜 𝚏𝚒𝚎𝚛𝚌𝚎𝚕𝚢 𝚊𝚜 𝙸 𝚊𝚖 𝚌𝚛𝚊𝚟𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚖𝚢 𝚋𝚎𝚜𝚝 𝚏𝚛𝚒𝚎𝚗𝚍 𝚛𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝚗𝚘𝚠.”

Ivy Rivenbark is living her best life in college. Surrounded by a close knit crew of best friends, she’s living a happy, albeit efficiently planned, life.

Kelley Pierce has been in love with Ivy ever since the day he first met her back in the 9th grade. But the one time he tried to shoot his shot—she ghosted him for a year. The worst year of his life.

Now they’re both attending Butler University and while Ivy seems happy to rekindle their friendship, Kelley is still hoping for more.

Will Kelley risk a second shot at failure? Or will Ivy finally see the love that’s been waiting for her all along?

What I loved:
1. Bring on the steam!! This is a weeee bit of a slower burn, BUT there are SO MANY tasty little morsels of steamy scenes that lead us up to The Deed. And when these two finally get it on, we get all the goods! Dirty talk ✔️ Variety ✔️ Connection ✔️ SOO GOOD. A solid 🔥🔥🔥🔥/5.
2. How cohesive the story felt. This might be a debut novel, but it reads like it’s written by a seasoned romance writer.
3. This book has so many hallmarks of a much beloved romance read: a marshmallow male with a filthy mouth, a strong heroine who overcomes her past to embrace her future, an incredibly intimate connection between the MCs that pulls you into the story, and finally a ragtag group of pals that add some pizazz to the storyline. I can’t wait to read more from this author!

If you’re looking for a romance read with heart, heat, and the best kind of hero/heroine—look no further. You’ve found it!

As for the performances, they were utter perfection! This was my first time listening to the female narrator, but it certainly won't be my last! Both narrators artfully voiced the multiple characters from the story and made the spicy scenes feel HOT and not a bit awkward. I loved every minute!

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I’m now a fan!

I enjoyed this book very much (even though new adult romances usually give me anxiety!). The performances are stunning. The story is solid. The twist is twisty!

5 Star Friends-Lovers Story! 5 Star Performances!

I absolutely could not put this audiobook down! It was a beautiful story about two best friends since high school, where he fell hard and fast, but she couldn't see it yet. Now at the end of college, their friendship starts to change into so much more. Kelley is an amazing best friend who loves Ivy unconditionally.

Kelli Tager is a new narrator to me, and I enjoyed her performance very much. She gave a lot of emotion that felt connected to the work. I also really enjoyed her male voice- it wasn't too deep and didn't sound forced/fake. Joe Arden was fantastic. He always gives an emotional performance that feels real and raw. He also did an incredible job with changing his voice just enough to fit the very young characters in the flashbacks.

I will absolutely pick up more books by this author and audiobooks narrated by these actors.

5 Stars / 3 Peppers (even though it is a very slow burn and doesn't have many spicy scenes- the dirty talk is pretty intense).

TW- The listener knows that there is history of sexual assault that happens to Ivy, but we don't know when or how for most of the story.

Love!

Great story made even better by excellent narrating! Joe and Kelli killed it!!
Bravo!!
Cannot wait to listen to the rest of this series!

Top audio performances ever

I absolutely loved this debut novel by Brit Benson. It was written so beautifully. There were a couple things going on throughout the story and things were not revealed right away but layers were slowly peeled back. Ivy and Kelley were best friends in high school but had a fight at the end of their senior year that caused them to lose touch for over a year but then rekindled their friendship. Now at the end of their senior year of college, Kelley is still hiding his feelings for Ivy, afraid that doing something about these feelings would lead to another fight. Ivy was such a fun character. I loved her so much. She was a blast that loved to have fun but was fiercely loyal to her friends, but she was hiding a secret of something that happened to her in the past. Kelley was more low key and relaxed and had a heart of gold. He made a connection with Ivy’s younger brother and he has daily lunches with one of his students. When Ivy and Kelley finally get together, they love each other hard. There are years of pent up feelings and they can’t get enough of each other. Kelley understands Ivy and what she needs and I love how he gets her and makes plans around her school work and LSAT. Ivy and Kelley also have a close friendship with Bailey and Jesse and I love their strong bond and can’t wait to hear more about them.

“Let me love you, Ivy, I’ll do it better than anyone else can. I swear it.”

Okay I was already in love with this book enough that I became an official Brit Benson stalker. But this audio… BLEW. ME. AWAY. I am pretty new to Kelli Tager but I am now adding her to my list of absolute favorites. You can tell she really enjoyed the book because there was a passion in her voice that she really connected to the book. Joe Arden is amazing as always and definitely brought Kelley to life. I knew once I hit the chapter where Ivy was having some flashback memories to the “event” that this was going to be one of the best audios I have ever listened to.

Mountain Lion of Greatness

I fell in love the first time I read it with my eyes.
I didn't imagine I could love it more...
That was until I read it with my ears.
Kelli and Joe did such an incredible job bring Kelley and Ivy to life.
I couldn't have imagined how great this turned out in audio.
This audio brought me to tears on more than one occasion.
Kelli, Joe, thank you so much for doing Brit's words justice. I had very high hopes and set my standards high, and you guys blew them out of the water.
Brit, I am so proud of the work you do and the words you write. Thank YOU for choosing these incredible narrators to bring your babies to life. <3

Obsessed with this book/Audio experience

I had already read and adored this book. It was amazing to hear (see) these characters come to life. The narrators did an amazing job, and made me even more obsessed with the story. This is one of my favorites by one of my favorite authors.

Friends to lovers but make it spicy af

This book is absolutely fantastic! I love these characters, the dynamic, the all our friends to lovers discovery was *chefs kiss*.

I’ve read it in physical form before, so listening to the audio was a really awesome way to experience it. I think the audio narrators did a fantastic job in setting the tone for all scenes, and kept me so engaged in the story. I generally get distracted during audios, but the performance for this one had me binging in 8 hours flat!

Amazing friends to lovers story

I loved this book! The story line is great. The spice is great and the narrators are so good. I search for Joe Arden so if that tells you anything, his voice is perfection along with the fact it isn’t just a hot voice reading text, you can feel the character and their actions. He makes it an experience.
All around 5 stars.

Best friends to lovers

🅻🅾🆅🅴 🆈🅾🆄 🅱🅴🆃🆃🅴🆁 by Brit Benson is a best friends to lovers story with Kelley Pierce and Ivy Rivenbach.
Kelley is the dirty talking bedroom, love whipped best friend who is an absolute patient, sweetheart guy. Ivy is a fierce, smart, cautious female. These two characters and this book possesses beautifully woven words by Brit to make their love story flawlessly done and my heart ached for both Ivy and Kelley throughout the book.

Joe Arden and Kelli Tager do such a fantastic job of being these characters and their love story to life. I’m so ready to move onto the next audio book in this series ‘Better with You’ showcasing Ivy’s roommate and friend, Bailey.