If your taste in rom-com books tends towards the smutty (like mine does), then your ears will prick up when you hear the premise of Happy Endings (like mine did). A sex toy salesperson has to team up with her restaurateur ex-boyfriend to make her dream of opening her own shop come true. But will their chemistry bubble over and spell disaster for them both? It’s a steamy, second-chances romance about unfinished business, good food, and homemade orgasms.
(When you buy something through an affiliate link, I earn a small commission, so it’s happy endings for all of us!)
Meet the players: Trixie Nguyen, sex toy salesperson extraordinaire with a passion for empowering women to own their Os and a desire to prove herself to her traditional Vietnamese parents, and Andre Walker, who has recently inherited a flailing soul food restaurant from his mother and is struggling to keep the wolf from the door.
Years ago, when they were both living in New Orleans, they had an intense romance… until Andre left Trixie, with just a “I’m sorry, I can’t, don’t hate me” Post-it note by way of explanation. (What a guy!)
Now they’re both living in Washington DC, and (of course) they unexpectedly run into each other when Trixie is selling vibrators at a party hosted in Andre’s restaurant. The night is a smashing success for both of them, and there the (brilliant!) idea of pop-up sex toy shops alongside soul food buffets is born.
Both Trixie and Andre feel the weight of others’ expectations, albeit in different ways. Both are desperate for business success, believing it to be the key to their happiness. Both of them feel they have something to prove to their parents. And both of them are hot-hot-HOT for each other, even though they know it’s a mistake to mix business with pleasure. It makes for a very, very steamy novel, just like I like ’em. Now, that’s just my personal taste; if you’re liable to clutch your pearls at an exposed breast, this is not the book for you.
(Or, actually, maybe it is. Happy Endings is sex-positive, pro-pleasure, and full of encouragement for those who might need it. Lam clearly believes, as does Trixie, that pleasure is for everyone, regardless of gender, size, age, or inclination. So, you know, maybe don’t write it off completely, even if that’s not usually your jam.)
It may seem like I’m revealing a lot here, but the first few chapters of Happy Endings (well, most of them, if I’m honest) are exposition-heavy. You don’t need to read between the lines one bit.
Another bummer: as a Coeliac, I couldn’t help but cringe at the fairly frequent jibes about gluten-free restaurants. Lam used them throughout Happy Endings as a symbol of the evil gentrification that Andre was so desperate to defeat. I tried not to let it bother me, but I’d be lying if I said it didn’t. His fried chicken sounds delicious, but would it really be worth days in a sick bed or hunched over a toilet bowl (not to mention a shortened lifespan), when I could get a decent GF feed up the road? Hmph.
But other than that, Happy Endings was a delight to read. The blurb maybe overstates the stakes a little (they’re comfortingly low), and there’s a cast of supportive, empowering characters that keep the mood up. All told, it’s a fun second-chance romance with a sweet message and (as the title suggests) a happy ending for all involved.
P.S. Lam is clearly an awesome lady, too. As well as writing books herself, she founded Bawdy Bookworms, a subscription service that “pairs sexy romances with erotic toys”. I checked immediately whether they deliver to Australia (they do!) and immediately put a subscription of my own at the top of my wishlist.
My favourite Amazon reviews of Happy Endings:
- “Happy Endings was the perfect book for my Vegas trip. It held my attention over all the noise of a pool party.” – Kendra Pierson
- “The only downside? There is a lot of talk about food and it made me hungry. Other than that, it was an excellent read.” – Tegan H.
- “Andre is kind of a stick but he will grow on you.” – kathleen g
Leave a Reply