I've never read a CoHo book, but I've watched so many reviews and my favorite analysis is "Colleen's books would be great if she were a horror or thriller author, not a romance author"
some straight romance books are so weird... it's always kinda toxic, sexist and/or abusive. And the spice scenes are also super uncomfortable, very dominant and kinda brutal. I thought im Bi for a long time, even dated men and still could not read straight romance
I hated It Happened One Summer so much. The gender essentialism was so icky. He started belittling her and trying to dirty talk her about her body the first time they had intercourse with no discussion, it was truly awful.
YES!!! i hated this book so badly. the romance was so boring and both characters were so immature (especially the main female character) it was infuriating. every time the love interest was mentioned it had to emphasize his “rugged masculine maleness😍” or how his “chiseled masculine fisherman frame dwarfed piper’s feeble female one” (exaggerating but you get what i mean)
@lilacfields "He touched me with his giant manly hands that cut wood and I sniffed his manly masculine scent while he smiled a manly smile. I'm so small and tiny." It drove me insane!!!!
god lesbians moving fast is so true. my fiance and i were long distance and it was so awkward on the first date until i accidentally said i love you and we both laughed at it because we were so scared to say it. definitely say i love you when you feel it, it helps so much to get on the same page. also my fiance's name is Anastasia so i had whiplash hearing her name and pronounced correctly lol
Adding on to this (as a bi trans guy who has had multiple boyfriends (ok 2) tell me they loved me on the first date), don't feel obligated to say it back if you're not there yet. Just be honest and say that you're not quite at that point yet, but that you appreciate them being honest and upfront with their feelings!
For a healthy romance I really recommend Get a Life, Chloe Brown!! The author manages to have the characters actually COMMUNICATE, they have a personality and their personalities complement each other wonderfully. Like, it makes sense for them specifically to be together (beyond being two straight people in the same age group forced to spend time together, LIKE MANY romance stories do)
That sounds like heaven, can you tell me more about the book? the next book has to be the absolute best because I'm broke and whatever I buy will be the last book I get until Christmas
@@yeshagoyal2966 i usually buy books secondhand or lend them from the library, like with this one! I usually don't read romance and with this one I also personally found some of the dialogs cringe, but way less than what I'm used to. But apart from that, I really loved it! I even teared up at some moments when Red (the love interest) really adapted to Chloe's needs (who is chronically ill) without belittling or blaming her for anything. Really wholesome. The third act conflict was also bearable to me, it made sense for the characters and was built up/foreshadowed throughout the story.
"This book doesn't mention showers anywhere near as often as I would've liked it to." 😂THAT's exactly the kind of thing I notice in books and it's why I so appreciate this channel. Also, Icebreakers's plot sounds curiously similar to a '90s movie called The Cutting Edge.
Hey champion, If you want a truly insane read, try out "the stars and stripes between us." It's about a bisexual guy with dyed hair and a conservative girl falling in love.
Whenever a character is described as an ice queen, I think of early 2010s Drarry fanfiction. Draco used to always be described as the ice king of slytherin house 😂
I am also reading Icebreaker, going in fully knowing the plot was going to mid at best and so far, it's really mid. BUT, it's so refreshing to have a silly frivolous romance book where the main male interest and his friends are not walking red flags, I can't wait to read the 3rd book about Henry!
I LOVE your book reviews and as a straight woman, your analysis of straight romance cracks me up!! :D It makes me feel normal though because I always wondered if other people were really like this and I'm just the weird one. Thanks for a great laugh!!!
7:15 I really wanted to get into reading romance novels after seeing so much hype online, and lemme tell you when I started reading Icebreaker, I could NOT handle reading in the pov of the female lead cos the bitchiness was giving me severe cringe and second-hand embarrassment.
who knew that all i needed was a yt video of a lesbian reviewing straight romance books???????? seriously i haven't been this entertained by a yt video in well forever. pls keep them coming i laughed so much my belly hurts
Negative reviews are so important!! It helps readers like you make informed decisions about their next read and it can help people who KNOW that they are your reading opposite. I've read books because I saw negative reviews and knew that I was the intended audience, not them. As long as those reviews don't tag the authors (a crime tbh) then I think they're super helpful.
I would love to know what you think of the fifty shades series! I'm a hetro woman who started reading it before the hype (sadly clueless to what it was at the time!) and I HATED the submissive nature of the female lead. How she was constantly dominated by this controlling man. I got quarter way through and called it a day 😂 yet everyone loved it! Maybe it got better I just never found out. I've not actually found someone else who it infuriated... Potentially you (or your comment section) will be my best shot ha!
50 shades is a bad twilight fanfic masquerading as a serious book 😭 the toxic relationship, doormat female protag, unhealthy dom-sub dynamics and just generally bad portrayal of bdsm really portrayed the kink community as an evil thing in the public consciousness for a while the only people who i've seen like it are straight men who think they're christian grey and older women who've never read an erotic novel before
Dominic Noble on TH-cam has a series about 50 shades, in which he becomes so angry, he sometimes starts to yell, so if you're interested I recommend that
Girl I thought you must have at least 100k subscribers with how insightful and articulate you are, so let me tell you I was shocked that you don't even have 10k! Definitely subscribing so I can watch your channel's inevitable growth!!!
17:25 We should stop the “I can fix him/her” kinda of story People are not objects to be fixed If they want, they can change. For better or worst I would actually find funny a story of romance between a perfectionist and a humble person to show how that “fixing” is just meeting a cuota. A cuota that not always is realistic I like both men and women and I still feel like we are still to see more complex characters in romance. Not all men are misogynistic bastards, nor they are perfect beings. And not all women are the saviors, nor they are the snakes some books makes them look to be For likes, colors. And for romance, better to make healthy relationships or showcase healthy messages
So glad I have found someone else that didn’t see the hype in book lovers. I swear I couldn’t remember anything about that book even as I was reading it. So boring and 1 dimensional. The only thing I can remember about this book was the bookshop in the small town.
@@storieswithgeorgiamarie I must admit I have beach read but I don’t know if I can face it. B.K Borison is a better romance author. Emily Henry is over hyped. All tho since I read John Gwynnes shadow of the gods I’ve been on a really high fantasy binge.
two straight romances i would love to see you read (although maybe you already have; i'm new here) but for very different reasons are act your age, eve brown by talia hibbert and anything you can do by r.s. grey
Icebreaker is such a shitty book, but i rlly enjoyed it for some reason, tho the plot is just based on them having sex. uhm *cough cough* the uber sex scene.... that scene was...uh..interesting, it was one of those moments that i had to put the book down & take a lap around my room. but i do like how they actually communicate unlike 99% of the romance books i have read lmao. tho i rlly hate how at the end there was a time skip to Anastasia being pregnant, it feels like the author was fetishizing pregnancy which is a little disturbing.. i also personally think that the proposal at the end of the book was not needed, i mean isnt it a bit too early? i don't like how Anastasia just blamed Nate for the rink problem when she had no evidence (sry this comment was so long & kinda an info dump lmao i have a lot to say)
I think my favorite straight book is "attachments", by... rainbow Rowell I think? I think it's my favorite book by them, even tho I remember enjoying most as a teen. Attachments is a lil more grown.
i’m so surprised you liked icebreaker, i thought it was horrendous!!!!!! anastasia was so unnecessarily mean to nate, i felt like all of the major plot points (like anastasia’s eating disorder) were dealt with very very poorly and not given anywhere near enough attention, and the characters were insanely underdeveloped. i read this book months and months ago and i still get incredibly angry when i think about the epilogue. i don’t understand why hannah grace would make anastasia pregnant when she wanted to adopt a child?????? that part was very gross to me and it made me hate it even more than i already did.
I know I’m super late on this one, but I’m on TH-cam binge! But anyway, Book Lovers was terrible in my opinion. So so predictable, didn’t particularly like any of the characters. I don’t even think I finished I, I think I was about 4 pages away from the end and just stopped reading it. Not for me at all!
The first book. If a guy had women prepared kits at his house Id be so turned off. Id be like wow so you have women over alot then? Its like that one weird movie with Reese Witherspoon and Paul Rudd and Owen Wilson "How dobyou know?". Reese stays at Owens house ( they are both famous athletes) and he has everything ready for women guests like toothbrushes, robes, pjs. That would make me want to leave so quick. It makes the interaction feel manipulated even if it wasn't like he was trying to lure you to his place and he already had everything around because he knew you'd come because women always do when he wants them to.
Thank u for reading these (& even suffering a lil) for all our benefit! Always helps when I’m picking my next book to what to completely avoid and what’ll be worth the time 🩵
"you're gonna hate this book you have to read it" is my fav type of book recs
it's definitely a way to get my attention
"Dear GOD! Send the author to a therapist, this book is absolutely MISERABLE and DEPRESSING!"
Co Ho must have a disastrous dating history based on what she writes!
honestly, like does she need therapy?? maybe we should start a gofundme
@@storieswithgeorgiamarie I think she might 😂😂
Co Ho must be stopped
The worst thing is that she was a social worker. She was a social worker and she can’t identify an abusive relationship when she writes it herself?
Either that, or her kinks are bizarre as hell
“The praise for Coho could also end with us”
- a random commenter
ARCANE
I've never read a CoHo book, but I've watched so many reviews and my favorite analysis is "Colleen's books would be great if she were a horror or thriller author, not a romance author"
Mine is something like “Colleen’s books would be great if they were written by anyone else”
Reading straight romance novels literally made me realize i wasnt straight 😂 theyre so rotted
Reading sapphic romance for the first time was eye opening
Same. I had thought that I had fell out of love with reading, turns out I hate reading straight romances
I cannot stand third act breakups! They often seem so pointless
like you always know they're going to get back together so what's the point????
some straight romance books are so weird... it's always kinda toxic, sexist and/or abusive. And the spice scenes are also super uncomfortable, very dominant and kinda brutal. I thought im Bi for a long time, even dated men and still could not read straight romance
I hated It Happened One Summer so much. The gender essentialism was so icky. He started belittling her and trying to dirty talk her about her body the first time they had intercourse with no discussion, it was truly awful.
YES!!! i hated this book so badly. the romance was so boring and both characters were so immature (especially the main female character) it was infuriating. every time the love interest was mentioned it had to emphasize his “rugged masculine maleness😍” or how his “chiseled masculine fisherman frame dwarfed piper’s feeble female one” (exaggerating but you get what i mean)
@lilacfields "He touched me with his giant manly hands that cut wood and I sniffed his manly masculine scent while he smiled a manly smile. I'm so small and tiny." It drove me insane!!!!
I agree you should be honest when it comes to books. Also No romance novel should be over 400 pages.
god lesbians moving fast is so true. my fiance and i were long distance and it was so awkward on the first date until i accidentally said i love you and we both laughed at it because we were so scared to say it. definitely say i love you when you feel it, it helps so much to get on the same page. also my fiance's name is Anastasia so i had whiplash hearing her name and pronounced correctly lol
Adding on to this (as a bi trans guy who has had multiple boyfriends (ok 2) tell me they loved me on the first date), don't feel obligated to say it back if you're not there yet. Just be honest and say that you're not quite at that point yet, but that you appreciate them being honest and upfront with their feelings!
Memes aside, I think "are the straights OK?" is sometimes a very valid question to ask.
For a healthy romance I really recommend Get a Life, Chloe Brown!! The author manages to have the characters actually COMMUNICATE, they have a personality and their personalities complement each other wonderfully. Like, it makes sense for them specifically to be together (beyond being two straight people in the same age group forced to spend time together, LIKE MANY romance stories do)
That sounds like heaven, can you tell me more about the book? the next book has to be the absolute best because I'm broke and whatever I buy will be the last book I get until Christmas
@@yeshagoyal2966 i usually buy books secondhand or lend them from the library, like with this one! I usually don't read romance and with this one I also personally found some of the dialogs cringe, but way less than what I'm used to. But apart from that, I really loved it! I even teared up at some moments when Red (the love interest) really adapted to Chloe's needs (who is chronically ill) without belittling or blaming her for anything. Really wholesome. The third act conflict was also bearable to me, it made sense for the characters and was built up/foreshadowed throughout the story.
"This book doesn't mention showers anywhere near as often as I would've liked it to." 😂THAT's exactly the kind of thing I notice in books and it's why I so appreciate this channel. Also, Icebreakers's plot sounds curiously similar to a '90s movie called The Cutting Edge.
hahahah I just need ALL the plot holes explained otherwise I cannot focus on anything else
I was thinking the same thing about Icebreakers and The Cutting Edge (the original 1992 movie). That was a great movie.
Hey champion, If you want a truly insane read, try out "the stars and stripes between us." It's about a bisexual guy with dyed hair and a conservative girl falling in love.
Omg that sounds like a crazy ride, poor queer guy
Whenever a character is described as an ice queen, I think of early 2010s Drarry fanfiction. Draco used to always be described as the ice king of slytherin house 😂
The ice prince of leather pants 🤌
Ah yes, my favourite straight romance booktok raccomendation: drarry fanfic
I am also reading Icebreaker, going in fully knowing the plot was going to mid at best and so far, it's really mid. BUT, it's so refreshing to have a silly frivolous romance book where the main male interest and his friends are not walking red flags, I can't wait to read the 3rd book about Henry!
I LOVE your book reviews and as a straight woman, your analysis of straight romance cracks me up!! :D It makes me feel normal though because I always wondered if other people were really like this and I'm just the weird one. Thanks for a great laugh!!!
36:19 Ugh, that just SCREAMS transphobia.
7:15 I really wanted to get into reading romance novels after seeing so much hype online, and lemme tell you when I started reading Icebreaker, I could NOT handle reading in the pov of the female lead cos the bitchiness was giving me severe cringe and second-hand embarrassment.
who knew that all i needed was a yt video of a lesbian reviewing straight romance books???????? seriously i haven't been this entertained by a yt video in well forever. pls keep them coming i laughed so much my belly hurts
Negative reviews are so important!! It helps readers like you make informed decisions about their next read and it can help people who KNOW that they are your reading opposite. I've read books because I saw negative reviews and knew that I was the intended audience, not them. As long as those reviews don't tag the authors (a crime tbh) then I think they're super helpful.
I would love to know what you think of the fifty shades series!
I'm a hetro woman who started reading it before the hype (sadly clueless to what it was at the time!) and I HATED the submissive nature of the female lead. How she was constantly dominated by this controlling man. I got quarter way through and called it a day 😂 yet everyone loved it! Maybe it got better I just never found out.
I've not actually found someone else who it infuriated... Potentially you (or your comment section) will be my best shot ha!
Omg i was also so bothered by that, but everybody seemed to loved the book, especially the man !
50 shades is a bad twilight fanfic masquerading as a serious book 😭 the toxic relationship, doormat female protag, unhealthy dom-sub dynamics and just generally bad portrayal of bdsm really portrayed the kink community as an evil thing in the public consciousness for a while
the only people who i've seen like it are straight men who think they're christian grey and older women who've never read an erotic novel before
Dominic Noble on TH-cam has a series about 50 shades, in which he becomes so angry, he sometimes starts to yell, so if you're interested I recommend that
Icebreaker is the only straight book I've read, and I couldn't finish it. I'm never trusting booktok again 😭
Girl I thought you must have at least 100k subscribers with how insightful and articulate you are, so let me tell you I was shocked that you don't even have 10k! Definitely subscribing so I can watch your channel's inevitable growth!!!
2:35 I’m predicting that she’s going to like Book Lovers
Icebreaker is so good Henry and Nate are my babies. Icebreaker makes me have faith for my straight friends
thank you for your service and biscuit is adorable!
I literally laugh out loud at these videos. Hilarious 😂
as a very unfunny person this fills me with joy
17:25
We should stop the “I can fix him/her” kinda of story
People are not objects to be fixed
If they want, they can change. For better or worst
I would actually find funny a story of romance between a perfectionist and a humble person to show how that “fixing” is just meeting a cuota. A cuota that not always is realistic
I like both men and women and I still feel like we are still to see more complex characters in romance. Not all men are misogynistic bastards, nor they are perfect beings.
And not all women are the saviors, nor they are the snakes some books makes them look to be
For likes, colors. And for romance, better to make healthy relationships or showcase healthy messages
Smelly and sweaty and gross CAN be hot, but really not if you smell like fish.
god if you think coho is bad you should read twisted love - ana huang, genuinely the worst book ever wrutten and no one talks about it
So glad I have found someone else that didn’t see the hype in book lovers. I swear I couldn’t remember anything about that book even as I was reading it. So boring and 1 dimensional. The only thing I can remember about this book was the bookshop in the small town.
SO DULL, I'm being told Beach Reads is better but honestly I think I'm done with Emily Henry for the moment
@@storieswithgeorgiamarie I must admit I have beach read but I don’t know if I can face it. B.K Borison is a better romance author. Emily Henry is over hyped. All tho since I read John Gwynnes shadow of the gods I’ve been on a really high fantasy binge.
girl i felt the same way about book lovers... everyone was raving about the book and i was so confused bc i just found everyone so boring lol
I read It Ends With Us and thought it was good but im CERTAIN ill be leaving CoHo books there...💀
honestly it's for the best
So you’re saying it ended with It Ends With Us?
im glad to hear you say all that about icebreaker because ive had it on my TBR stack for months! 😂
37:42 Reminds me of “Caleb was out doing woods”
two straight romances i would love to see you read (although maybe you already have; i'm new here) but for very different reasons are act your age, eve brown by talia hibbert and anything you can do by r.s. grey
Icebreaker is such a shitty book, but i rlly enjoyed it for some reason, tho the plot is just based on them having sex. uhm *cough cough* the uber sex scene.... that scene was...uh..interesting, it was one of those moments that i had to put the book down & take a lap around my room. but i do like how they actually communicate unlike 99% of the romance books i have read lmao. tho i rlly hate how at the end there was a time skip to Anastasia being pregnant, it feels like the author was fetishizing pregnancy which is a little disturbing.. i also personally think that the proposal at the end of the book was not needed, i mean isnt it a bit too early? i don't like how Anastasia just blamed Nate for the rink problem when she had no evidence (sry this comment was so long & kinda an info dump lmao i have a lot to say)
I think my favorite straight book is "attachments", by... rainbow Rowell I think? I think it's my favorite book by them, even tho I remember enjoying most as a teen. Attachments is a lil more grown.
I just discovered your videos and I absolutely love them! Your reviews are top notch.
i’m so surprised you liked icebreaker, i thought it was horrendous!!!!!!
anastasia was so unnecessarily mean to nate, i felt like all of the major plot points (like anastasia’s eating disorder) were dealt with very very poorly and not given anywhere near enough attention, and the characters were insanely underdeveloped.
i read this book months and months ago and i still get incredibly angry when i think about the epilogue. i don’t understand why hannah grace would make anastasia pregnant when she wanted to adopt a child?????? that part was very gross to me and it made me hate it even more than i already did.
Book lovers having zero chemistry is crazy. Like ya it sounds did not want to like this book and that’s OK but wow.
I GOT A SHOUT OUT WOOOO
don't let it go to your head
I need more from this series, lol! I love it.
I wish there would be more videos like this
you NEED to do this for the Zodiac Academy books. Absolutely awful
where do you get your book tabs from!!!
I know I’m super late on this one, but I’m on TH-cam binge! But anyway, Book Lovers was terrible in my opinion. So so predictable, didn’t particularly like any of the characters. I don’t even think I finished I, I think I was about 4 pages away from the end and just stopped reading it. Not for me at all!
38:09 NOOOOOO!!!!!!!
28:50 that’s what her dad was like…
Queer romance >> Straight romance
At least as the primary genre
The first book. If a guy had women prepared kits at his house Id be so turned off. Id be like wow so you have women over alot then? Its like that one weird movie with Reese Witherspoon and Paul Rudd and Owen Wilson "How dobyou know?". Reese stays at Owens house ( they are both famous athletes) and he has everything ready for women guests like toothbrushes, robes, pjs. That would make me want to leave so quick. It makes the interaction feel manipulated even if it wasn't like he was trying to lure you to his place and he already had everything around because he knew you'd come because women always do when he wants them to.
Or like… he has friends or family that are girls… 😭
Thank u for reading these (& even suffering a lil) for all our benefit! Always helps when I’m picking my next book to what to completely avoid and what’ll be worth the time 🩵
Icebreaker sounds like it was based off the plot of The Cutting Edge, a 1992 film. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cutting_Edge
Omg it does! This needs to be shared more 😂