Name: always, annej 〄's review of Dating Makes Perfect by Pintip Dunn
Item: Dating Makes Perfect
Rating: 5
Author: always, annej 〄

Pintip Dunn

The Tech sisters don’t date in high school. Not because they’re not asked. Not because they’re not interested. Not even because no one can pronounce their long, Thai last name—hence the shortened, awkward moniker. But simply because they’re not allowed. Until now. In a move that other Asian American girls know all too well, six months after the older Tech twins got to college, their parents asked, “Why aren’t you engaged yet?” The sisters retaliated by vowing that they won’t marry for ten (maybe even twenty!) years, not until they’ve had lots of dating practice. In a shocking war on the status quo, her parents now insist that their youngest daughter, Orrawin (aka “Winnie”), must date in high school. Under their watchful eyes, of course — and on dates they organize based on their favorite rom-coms. The first candidate? The son of their longtime friends, Mat Songsomboon—arrogant, dreamy, and infuriating. Winnie’s known him since they were toddlers throwing sticky rice balls at each other. Her parents love him, so naturally he’s the perfect person for her to pretend date. If only he weren’t her sworn enemy.

Dating Makes Perfect

iris

always, annej 〄

https://trappedinsidestoriesonline.wo...

⬆ link to my full review, bookstagram and books as outfits posts.

This feels like reading To All The Boys I've Loved Before again with a mix of friends-to-haters-to-lovers and fake dating tropes. The sentences are on point and feels surreal and true. The delicious foods and culture of these characters hooked me. There's also the light atmosphere that makes it so easy to read. There's the cute contemporary vibes with hints of romance (hot) from the gorgeous guys.

Then here comes the Asian parents - too strict that it seems funny sometimes. What if in this fake dating scheme of their parents, their feelings became real? How will they be able to suppress or hide that?

There's also the laugh out loud moments hidden behind every inside joke. It takes me back that cute teenager feels of enjoying the high school life, crushing on guys - the first times. Nothing compares to that bliss, I think - so innocent, pure, and everything seems possible. This read is so light while also blissful. I love it.

Before I forgot, I haven't mentioned the unique twists in this story. Aside from the delicious foods and rich culture of the characters, there's also the artsy things plus the sweet bond of Asian families. In this book, I love Winnie's relationship with her twin sisters Bunny and Ari. On the artsy side, there's the dressing up of a car and obsession with cat print. I love the development of the characters as well as the exciting transition of events. And oh, how cute is that header? I couldn't get enough of this book. Now I'm hoping that it is paet of a trilogy (just like TATBILB) because I can't wait to be immersed in their world again. Oy tai, I almost forgot! It's a standalone. More please!

The Tech sisters don’t date in high school. Not because they’re not asked. Not because they’re not interested. Not even because no one can pronounce their long, Thai last name—hence the shortened, awkward moniker. But simply because they’re not allowed. Until now. In a move that other Asian American girls know all too well, six months after the older Tech twins got to college, their parents asked, “Why aren’t you engaged yet?” The sisters retaliated by vowing that they won’t marry for ten (maybe even twenty!) years, not until they’ve had lots of the dating practice that they didn’t get in high school. In a shocking war on the status quo, her parents now insist that their youngest daughter, Orrawin (aka “Winnie”), must practice fake dating in high school. Under their watchful eyes, of course—and organized based on their favorite rom-coms. ’Cause that won’t end in disaster. The first candidate? The son of their longtime friends, Mat Songsomboon—arrogant, infuriating, and way too good-looking. Winnie’s known him since they were toddlers throwing sticky rice balls at each other. And her parents love him. If only he weren’t her sworn enemy.

Chrissy

I received an eArc of this book via Netgalley for an honest review

An Own Voices YA novel about a Thai American teenager being suddenly allowed to "date" in high school so that she can gain experience in regards to finding a suitable spouse in her near future. This is a privilege her older twin sisters did not have. The catch is that Winnie's parents have all of the control, who it is she goes on her dates and where, with a notebook in which she is graded and details of the date are noted. And her parents know the perfect person to practice dating with, Mat. Her ex-best friend now enemy. 

This is Enemies to Lovers but I can see how it can possibly remind you of To All The Boys I've Loved Before with the fake dating element. 

This book gives you a Thai American perspective. Winnie loves all Thai food and it is thoroughly described throughout the book giving readers knowledge of all her favorite dishes. As a reader we get to experience Thai culture as they attend an event in which she brings her best friends who is not Thai and spends time explaining it to her. 

What I enjoyed most about this book was the relationships. Winnie is the youngest of three but her older sisters are twins and throughout the book the twins share a lot of moments only twins can have but not once do they make Winnie feel left out. This book shows a healthy sister relationship and that has got to be one of the best parts of the book. The twins happen to be in their first year of college while Winnie is in her Senior year of high school. But the sisters talk regularly and the twins more than once express to Winnie how important she is to them and how her feelings and what she has to say matters. There was a moment where Winnie calls her sisters but tries to rush the call to end because she feels as though she is bothering them but they tell her otherwise. Its lines like those that made my heart happy. 
This book also did a great job of holding people accountable for their actions. I have to admit there was a something that was said to Winnie that she didn't like and took offense to it and at the moment I personally didn't see it the way she did but when the situation was brought up again I was able to understand why she felt the way she did, I like that a book made me experience that.

I think one of the biggest take aways from this book is communication. Owning up to where you may have played a part in the series of events that have happened in your life, owning up to when you have said or did something unkind/unfair, as well as speaking up for yourself and not letting yourself stay in the shadows when you yourself put you there. 

Now, I know I have rambled on about everything but the dating/love interest for a book that has dating in the title. This is because even though that is 90% of this book, everything else I have mentioned meant so much more to me. I have to say for a long time throughout the book I didn't like Mat's character or Taran (a boy Winnie develops a bit of a crush on). I didn't like their attitudes or the things they said. I felt sometimes some of the things that were said were far too harsh and I don't believe their is an excuse for that. As with many enemies to lovers books we tend to forgive the mean when we understand where it stems from or we understand the character more and I have definitely been guilty of this. For some reason I felt as though Mat really messed with my emotions and felt he crossed the line too many times. Which is the reason why I couldn't give this a 5 stars. I understand this can definitely be a "personal problem" because I don't all together dislike Mat as a character I just feel he deserved a little more push back. 

In the end I am completely satisfied with the ending and thoroughly enjoyed Winnie as a character. She is cute and innocent and sweet and lovable with a bit of feisty.

Tiffanie Dang

I was given an ARC of this by a friend who had an extra copy.

Oh, where to even begin? I loved everything about this book, from beginning to end, especially the individual nuances of each character. Although I’m not Thai (I’m Chinese), I wish this book existed over a decade ago when I was in high school with my own insecurities. My parents were also traditional in the sense that they wouldn’t let me date until college, so I had to secretly date (which was rare anyways). I found it refreshing that Winnie and her sisters had such a loving relationship with one another, instead of a constant, bickering sibling rivalry that other books constantly portray. And though Winnie’s parents’ rules seemed a bit extreme, I did understand their reasoning and admired them for being more progressive than my parents were. This book definitely gave me To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before vibes, especially since it even references the movie as a device for one of the fake dates. Overall, this book was so charming and full of heart that I couldn’t put it down and read it in one day. Definitely recommend for everyone to read, whether you have the same cultural background or not!

Heather Harrington

Growing up in a strict Thai household, Winnie and her sisters had quite a few rules. Namely, they weren't allowed to date. But when her sisters leave for college and their parents start pressuring them for grandkids, the pair tell them it may be years until then since they have so much dating time to make up for. This doesn't sit well with Winnie's parents, so they decide things are going to be different for her. She's going to spend her senior year of high school going on dates planned by her parents based on various rom-coms, and with a suitor of their choosing. Too bad the guy they picked is Winnie's ex-best friend turned sworn enemy.

This mixed all the tropes that I love: fake dating, hate to love, and friends to lovers, so I really thought I'd love this. While I did think it was super cute, it just fell flat. I enjoyed Winnie and Mat's relationship, and I loved the idea of them going on all these rom-com inspired dates, but I felt that I had seen these scenes play out in tons of other books. I did like learning more about the Thai culture and there were definitely some cute moments, but unfortunately, I don't think this will be that memorable for me.

Leelynn Brady

Full review and post on my blog  Sometimes Leelynn Reads 


  Disclaimer: I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. Thank you to Hear Our Voices Book Tours and Entangled Teen for this free copy. All quotes in this review are taken from the Advanced Reader Copy and may change in final publication.




Oh my gosh! I really hope that Pintip continues to write more #ownvoices YA Contemporary Romances with Thai characters, because this just felt freaking perfect! I could her the same voice that I heard from the first Sci-Fi novel that I read from her – MALICE – and with the genre change it just felt like I was watching a Thai Drama on Netflix where I could not get enough of what was happening! Just absolutely amazing.

For starters, the sisterhood and close relationship between the elder Tech twins – Ari and Bunny – and their baby sister Winnie (our MC) was so adorable! Even though the twins had their own special connection being twins and being older in college, they still were very much involved in Winnie’s life, and they were a sense of support for her despite the distance. I know there were times where Winnie felt like she was more alone than ever because her sisters were gone, and it really messed with her psyche and I felt super bad for her because I could see where she was coming from. But I’m just so glad that her sisters, both Ari and Bunny since they are two separate people and I really should stop referring to them as a unit like that but I digress – anyway I’m so glad that Ari and Bunny were able to do what they needed to do to help Winnie, and remind her of just how capable she really was even when she didn’t think so. It was just the kind of sister relationship that I wish I had if I had any sisters, you know?



In addition, do you know how much I loved that Winnie was so proud of her heritage and being Thai in a world that makes people feel bad for being anything other than white? I was so freaking proud! And even the other Thai-American kids in the neighborhood were pretty proud to be Thai too! I was just so freaking happy, and it made me think about how proud I am to be Chamorro, especially because a lot of people may not know about Chamorro culture or where Chamorro people come from (Guam, by the way!) so of course I gotta represent as best as I can. I’m really glad that Pintip didn’t ever have any of her characters have some sort of crisis about their heritage, and didn’t make any of them truly ashamed to be what they are, even if people didn’t know what they were or mistook them for someone else. I really appreciated that, and this is the same type of pride that I saw in MALICE and I am so glad that it stayed in this book as well.



Then Winnie dealing with two totally different types of loves, or crushes maybe. We have Mat, her childhood best friend that she had a really bad falling out with to the point that they loathe one another… that was sad actually, and you’ll see what I mean when you read it. Then we have Taran, the new boy that moved to the neighborhood who is not only Thai, but also super dreamy and is super intrigued by Winnie and wants to get to know her better. So really, she’s not lacking in the boy department technically, but since her mother wants her to have a practice boyfriend – now how could I have gotten my mom to do this for me when I was in high school – since Ari and Bunny flat out told their parents that they refuse to get married or date for thirty years since they weren’t able to date back in high school. That was a brilliant plan, by the way. I’m telling you, the Tech girls are damn smart.

Do you know how proud I am of Winnie for standing her ground on not being touched or touching anyone without consent? I mean, she got hella PISSED at someone who touched her hair without her permission and she did not have any thoughts about being up in his face and telling him THAT’S NOT OKAY. I was so damn proud because I know even I’m afraid to speak up for myself sometimes because I don’t know how the other person is going to react and I just don’t want to get hurt from that person. But I was so proud of her for not even thinking that, and making sure that she did make him damn aware that she was not okay with that. Very, very happy about that.

In other words: I loved this book so much. I could go back to this book over and over again because it was just that amazing to me. Pintip did such an amazing job as usual, and again I really hope that she will consider writing another YA Contemporary Romance novel in the future. I’ll be reading that and all her future books ASAP.

Aubrey Erskine

Winnie was such a fun character to follow. She’s a total klutz, a loving sister, a good Thai girl and the opposite of smooth. While the main plot was romance and fake dating, it was also about Winnie and what it means to be apart of a Thai family. She was so scared of upsetting her parents and trying to be this perfect Thai daughter. We even got to see what it was like for her to be Asian American and unsure how to combine the Thai and American cultures. Luckily she has some amazing people in her life like her best friend and sisters to help her stay true to herself and fight for what she wants.

One of my favorite parts of this book was Winnie’s relationship with her older twin sisters Bunny and Ari. She gets teased a bit for not being as perfect as them or hiding in their shadows but that wasn’t how she viewed it at all and neither did her sisters. They all lifted each other up, helping the others to shine in their own ways. It was such a close knit relationship that was just incredibly positive with no resentment when one was better at something than the other or when the twins were praised more by their parents.

I’m obviously not a Own Voices reviewer so I can’t speak on the Thai representation too much. What I can say is that I loved learning about it through Winnie; from the traditional foods, to Songkran (Thai water festival) and just what was expected of a her culturally. It was really interesting and eye-opening. I’m really glad Dunn shared all of this with us readers and I hope others find the representation they deserve in this book. 

Romance was the focal point of this book obviously and who doesn’t love the whole fake dating trope? Plus the fake dates were based off of classic American rom-coms planned by Winnie’s mom. It was the cutest. Oh but the actual boy, the enemy, Matt was a mix of swoon and straight hottie. I liked that I never knew the direction the romance was going and that Winnie had possibilities but that it all cake down to what her mom had planned and then to her fighting for what she wanted. But back to my true love Matt. He was so sweet and I had him dialed in from the first introduction. Boy wasn’t as smooth as he was led to believe but of course naive Winnie had some learning to do which was such a fun journey. 

If you’re a fan of To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, My Best Friend’s Wedding, When Harry Met Sally or any other rom-com I highly suggest adding this to your TBR. Dating Makes Perfect was the perfect mix of rom-com, sisterly love, Thai culture and the ultimate struggle of trying to figure out what is worth fighting for.

Shannon Jade

Fake dating? Check! Enemies to lovers? Check! Dating Makes Perfect by Pintip Dunn is all of YA's best rom-com tropes rolled into one. Romance, family, and culture intersect as main character Winnie navigates a romance like something from a movie!
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In Dating Makes Perfect, Winnie's world is heavily influenced by her Thai culture, which author Pintip Dunn describes in rich detail. This book offers some great representation that we don't often see on the YA scene! When Winnie's elder sisters head off to college and fail to leap straight into engagements, the trio's parents decide to try a different tactic for their youngest daughter, setting her up on a series of fake dates with none other than her archnemesis, Mat Songsomboon.
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Winnie's story is a lot of fun, but at its core is plenty of room for important character development. For the first time, Winnie has the opportunity to step out from her sisters' shadows, embrace her culture and identity, and decide what she wants for her future. This opens her up to plenty of inner turmoil and maybe even an at first reluctant acceptance that Mat Songsomboon might not be quite as terrible as she thought.
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Dating Makes Perfect tackles themes of culture, identity, love, family, friendship, and more. If you liked Jenny Han's To All the Boys I've Loved Before, you might like Dating Makes Perfect too!

Hannah Adamson

Have you ever read a book at exactly the right time? Thats what happened with 'Dating Makes Perfect'. This was exactly the light-hearted, funny rom-com I was looking for! I absolutely adored Mat and Winnie's relationship. The tension between them was *chefs kiss* and I was desperate for them to just kiss already!!! I also really loved the family dynamics in this book. Winnie's relationship with her sisters was wonderful to read. I would definitely recommend this book to any rom-com fan!

 *thank you so much to entangled teen for sending me a finished copy of this book. this in no way affects my ability to provide an honest review*

iris &
Dating Makes Perfect by Pintip Dunn

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