The Pairing

• Author: Casey McQuiston
• Genre: Romance
• Publication Date: August 6, 2024 
• Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin/Macmillan Audio

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin’s Griffin, and Macmillan Audio for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

In #1 New York Times bestselling author Casey McQuiston’s latest romantic comedy, two bisexual exes accidentally book the same European food and wine tour and challenge each other to a hookup competition to prove they’re over each other—except they’re definitely not.

Theo and Kit have been a lot of things: childhood best friends, crushes, in love, and now estranged exes. After a brutal breakup on the transatlantic flight to their dream European food and wine tour, they exited each other’s lives once and for all.

Time apart has done them good. Theo has found confidence as a hustling bartender by night and aspiring sommelier by day, with a long roster of casual lovers. Kit, who never returned to America, graduated as the reigning sex god of his pastry school class and now bakes at one of the finest restaurants in Paris. Sure, nothing really compares to what they had, and life stretches out long and lonely ahead of them, but—yeah. It’s in the past.

All that remains is the unused voucher for the European tour that never happened, good for 48 months after its original date and about to expire. Four years later, it seems like a great idea to finally take the trip. Solo. Separately.

It’s not until they board the tour bus that they discover they’ve both accidentally had the exact same idea, and now they’re trapped with each other for three weeks of stunning views, luscious flavors, and the most romantic cities of France, Spain, and Italy. It’s fine. There’s nothing left between them. So much nothing that, when Theo suggests a friendly wager to see who can sleep with their hot Italian tour guide first, Kit is totally game. And why stop there? Why not a full-on European hookup competition?

But sometimes a taste of everything only makes you crave what you can’t have.

I’ve been a fan of Casey McQuiston’s books for a while now, and know that her books are guaranteed to give off some witty banter, laughs, and a great romance. Naturally, I leaped at the opportunity to read the ARC, and then NetGalley sweetened the pot by providing access to the audiobook version as well!

The audiobook was narrated by Emma Galvin and Max Meyers, and both did a good job with the characters. I was surprised at how the POV chapters were divided, with the first half of the book being told from Theo’s perspective, and then the second half being told through Kit’s eyes. The structure didn’t work as well for me, since it didn’t really allow me, as a reader, to connect with Kit for half the book, so by the time his chapters started, I was already not feeling his character. 

Maybe this is my own internalized gender bias showing, but I thought the cover illustration was of two guys, until through the reading I realized that Theo was short for Theodora, and for a lot of the book, I was confused about Theo’s gender identity. Kit and others refer to Theo as a girl for significant portions of the book, but then McQuiston does a great job with exploring Theo’s journey of their own gender identity. While the gender identity subject was discussed well, I thought the bisexual representation played heavily into the slutty bisexual stereotype—with the central premise of the story being a hookup competition. The romance takes a long time to kick in, probably because they’re so focused on avoiding feelings by getting naked with someone else.

I would have loved seeing more of the travel aspects of the story—the characters go to some really interesting cities and I’m sure they do a lot of cool stuff, but everything started to feel so repetitive that the cities blended together and got lost in the shuffle. It was overly formulaic—travel to new place, eat, drink, have a casual hookup, lather, rinse, repeat. The characters all came across at petty and immature, and I really struggled with getting invested in their lives and their f*ck-your-way-across-Europe competition. However, I found it incredibly fascinating to see how differently sommeliers (even ones in training) experience flavors. But this book might be a better fit for you if you enjoy second-chance romance in clueless characters, raunchy competitions, and if you’re all about foodies and winies (is that even a word? Well, it should be!).

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