[Book Review] First Comes Like by Alisha Rai

Meet the book that kept me up till 2am because I couldn’t put it down. I was so caught up in Jia and Dev’s story, it was so sweet and enticing! I’ve realized I’m a sucker for a good story that shows strong family ties and really enjoyed how the family relationships play out.

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Release date: 2.16.21

My Review: Alisha Rai does it again! The latest in her Modern Love series absolutely hooked me from the start. I really love how her characters have dimension and what I would consider real life issues. I think a lot of us can relate to having a close family that is always occupying a piece of your mind. There was a variety of topics that were woven into the story in a respectful and interesting way, such as mental health, grief, anxiety, and even a touch of religion.

I definitely chuckled at all of the influencer lingo and descriptions. As someone who works with a lot of influencers on behalf of her clients, I can attest that Rai got pretty much everything spot on. Yes, there are actually several notable luxury apartment buildings scattered around L.A. that are home to clusters of influencers. A lot of them live there most of the time but it’s also not uncommon to do what Jia did and share a space as a studio.

Dev was certainly an interesting character to watch develop throughout the book. I like that he had his own work drama but that the focus seemed to be more on his family drama and relationship development with Jia.

I obviously don’t want to spoil too much but safe to say that I very much enjoyed this book and loved the way everything turned out in the end.

Publisher description: The author of The Right Swipe and Girl Gone Viral returns with a story about finding love in all the wrong inboxes...

Beauty expert and influencer Jia Ahmed has her eye on the prize: conquering the internet today, the entire makeup industry tomorrow, and finally, finally proving herself to her big opinionated family. She has little time for love, and even less time for the men in her private messages--until the day a certain international superstar slides into her DMs, and she falls hard and fast.

There's just one wrinkle: he has no idea who she is.

The son of a powerful Bollywood family, soap opera star Dev Dixit is used to drama, but a strange woman who accuses him of wooing her online, well, that's a new one. As much as he'd like to focus on his Hollywood fresh start, he can't get Jia out of his head. Especially once he starts to suspect who might have used his famous name to catfish her...

When paparazzi blast their private business into the public eye, Dev is happy to engage in some friendly fake dating to calm the gossips and to dazzle her family. But as the whole world swoons over their relationship, Jia can't help but wonder: Can an online romance-turned-offline-fauxmance ever become love in real life?

Note: I received an early copy from the publisher but opinions are entirely my own.