oh. oh this book is simply not the best </3 like its fine, dont get me wrong, but thats mostly because of the writing. i do enjoy emery lees writing, but the way e does plots and characterization...it leaves much to be desired. for instance, the plot for this book doesnt make much sense, and doesnt even play into the story all that much. why are a Puerto Rican bakery and Asian American café competing for customers in the first place??? thats never talked abt more than just mentioning that theyre both ethnic places which...is a bit of a stretch, in my opinion. and the whole competition thing is also not a strong point either because we come into these stories when BOTH places are starting to fail so the spirit of whatever competition there should be simply doesnt exist. the talk of tropes is also...well. they arent executed well at all. the biggest one is the 'enemies to lovers' trope but...theyre never really enemies. like...at all. gabi never really hates or even dislikes theo which makes it all very weak. and sure you could argue that theyre somewhat enemies because of the parents businesses, but its just not strong enough. it really isnt.

the supporting cast is also annoying. none of them are all that likeable and some are downright horrible. i dislike gabis parents the most (for obvious reasons) and most everyone else are just...there. justin is fine even if he doesnt really do anything, and vivi is alright, but meli is irritating. overall, not a lot of good characters!!!

oh, and just something that bugged me is that theo's parents didnt even know who gabi was when they went to pick theo up when he sprained his wrist. like...their families supposedly have this rivalry between each other because of the businesses, but they dont even know who their rivals son is...? that made no sense to me at all. shouldnt they have at least seen him ONCE?? very strange

i do appreciate what this book is trying to do, i do!!! and its a very good thing because we need books like this for teen readers today, but it would be so much better if this book was executed better.