The Soulmate Equation by Christina Lauren
Single mom Jess Davis is a data and statistics wizard, but no amount of number crunching can convince her to step back into the dating world. Raised by her grandparents— who now help raise her seven-year-old daughter, Juno — Jess has been left behind too often to feel comfortable letting anyone in. After all, her father’s never been around, her hard-partying mother disappeared when she was six, and her ex decided he wasn’t “father material” before Juno was even born. Jess holds her loved ones close, but working constantly to stay afloat is hard… and lonely. But then Jess hears about GeneticAlly, a buzzy new DNA-based matchmaking company that’s predicted to change dating forever. Finding a soulmate through DNA? The reliability of numbers: This Jess understands. At least she thought she did, until her test shows an unheard-of 98% compatibility with another subject in the database: GeneticAlly’s founder, Dr. River Pena. this is one number she can’t wrap her head around, because she already knows Dr. Pena. The stuck-up stubborn man is without a doubt not her soulmate. But GeneticAlly has a proposition: Get to know him and we’ll pay you.
Jess - who is barely making ends meet - is in no position to turn it down, despite her skepticism about the project and her dislike for River. As the pair are dragged from one event to the next as the “Diamond” pairing that could make GeneticAlly a mint in stock prices, Jess begins to realize that there might be more to the scientist - and the science behind a soulmate - than she thought. Funny, warm, and full of heart, The Soulmate Equation proves that the delicate balance between fate and choice can never be calculated.
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This book had a lot of promise and I was very excited for it. Christina Lauren (two friends who write romance novels together aka living the dream) books are ones that are highly recommended whenever a new one comes out but I’d never read one before. This being my first, I had very high expectations…. which unfortunately weren’t quite met. The premise was great if not a bit cheesy, soulmates in real life (not some fantasy novel) based off of a dating genetic code. I thought it was so cool to bring that “magical” romance to contemporary literature with a reasonable science based solution to soulmates behind it. Unfortunately, there just wasn’t enough time in this book to fully explore the “data” and explanations behind soulmates AND have a fully developed plot. I did enjoy it, and I liked the characters, it just ended up being a lot more bland than I expected.
This book is from a first person narrative following Jess, a young single mom who is also sort of a genius and in the midst of swearing off dating after many failed Tinder dinners. Unfortunately for her, her best friend is a hopeless romantic (and a romance novelist) and will not let the subject rest. Queue the meet-cute with the grumpy, high-class, beautiful man who gets coffee at exactly 8:24amevery morning. The bonus? He just happens to be the scientist behind a new dating program based off of genetic code matching. Jess gives it a shot, and by pure serendipity, ends up matched with the highest score the company has ever seen….with her match being grumpy coffee house guy. We follow Jess and her struggles through the loneliness of single motherhood, a messed up family, and a tumultuous job market. This match seems too good to be true but it’s about time Jess had some luck in her life.
I was so frustrated with Jess and her unwillingness for anything, however, throughout the book I really loved her character, her and her daughter Juno were the highlights of this book. We got so deep into Jess’ life it was hard not to love her and empathize with her, Juno was the best kid in the world, I loved that she was a fully developed character and not just a prop character. All the other characters had such potential to be just as loveable, but we never got the chance to see enough of them to get there. Jess’ best friend was eccentric, but not very present, her grandparents were more of props than actually familial relationships within the book, and the love interest was great…. but we only got tidbits into his actual personality. He was a nerd who turned hot. Where’s the backstory there? His sisters are a huge part of his life but his parents are rarely mentioned. Why? We never get to know. There’s hints to him having a similar tragic backstory to Jess but we never actually get any explanations into it. I was very frustrated with the lack of depth to any character that was not the main protagonist.
The premise of soulmates is what originally got me interested in this book. The plot had such great potential and I did enjoy how it unfurled throughout the book, however it moved way too fast for me. We went from River and Jess hating each other, to grudgingly accepting this new “partnership” to IMMEDIATELY catching major feelings. There was literally nothing in between him acting like a dick and her falling for him that explains WHY she fell for him. Or how he went from thinking of her as an average Jane to being his whole world…. there was just… nothing! One minute they grudgingly go for supper, by the time they sit down the stars have aligned so they can have a perfect warm fuzzy date with no awkwardness. It was too much too fast and made it really hard to buy into the romance aspect of it. It was cute, but not very believable.
All in all, I did enjoy the read, but it just wasn’t the depth I was looking for in such a widely loved novel. I’ll definitely give these authors another try but, personally, this one just didn’t do it for me.