Review: You’re the Problem, It’s You by Emma R. Alban

Title: You’re the Problem, It’s You

Series: Mischief & Matchmaking: Book Two

Author: Emma R. Alban

Publisher: Avon

Length: 396 Pages

Category: Historical Romance

Rating: 5 Stars

At a Glance: If you’re looking for a historically immaculate novel, You’re the Problem, It’s You isn’t that book. If, however, you want a book that celebrates queer love and joy and happily-ever-afters, you’ll find all of that and more in its pages.

Reviewed By: Lisa

Blurb: “That man is, without a doubt, the absolute most obnoxious…

Bobby Mason is sick of being second best: born the spare, never trusted with family responsibility, never expected to amount to much. He’s hungry to contribute something that matters, while all around him his peers are squandering their political and financial power, coasting through life. Which is exactly why he can’t stand the new Viscount Demeroven.

…insufferable…

James Demeroven, just come of age and into the Viscountcy, knows that he’s a disappointment. Keeping his head down and never raising anyone’s expectations is how he’s survived life with his stepfather. To quiet, careful James, Bobby Mason is a blazing comet in his endless night, even more alive than he was at Oxford when James crushed on him from afar. But Mason is also brash and recklessly unapologetic, destined to shatter the fragile safety of James’s world. Worst of all, he keeps rubbing James’s failures in his face.

…hottest man to ever walk the ton.”

They can barely get through a single conversation without tensions boiling over. Neither Bobby nor James has ever met a more intriguing, infuriating, infatuating man.

If only they could avoid each other entirely. Bad enough their (wonderful but determined) cousins Beth and Gwen keep conveniently setting up group outings. But when an extortionist starts targeting their families, threatening their reputations, Bobby and James must find a way to work together, without pushing each other’s buttons (or tearing them off) in the process…

Review: If you’re looking for a historically immaculate novel, You’re the Problem, It’s You isn’t that book. Emma R. Alban’s mid-19th century setting blends the time period with a modern sensibility, adding to its charm while giving readers not one but two happily-ever-afters at a time when society and laws made it difficult, if not impossible, for queer folks to live as their true selves.

James Demeroven and Bobby Mason aren’t dire enemies as much as they simply find each other beyond insufferable. James is aloof and arrogant—for reasons which gradually become clear—while Bobby is a second son who hasn’t established his role in the world yet. There’s no small amount of envy thrown into their dynamic, but, of course, there’s also lust and attraction that makes them even more prickly and annoyed when they’re forced to be in each other’s company, let alone acknowledge each other’s existence. Which is far too often for their liking.

Cue: The Villain.

No, it’s neither Bobby nor James but someone with whom they are both unfortunately, intimately associated. When they aren’t busy insulting and running away from each other, they have time to realize the only solution to being blackmailed is to put their animosity aside, for the sake of themselves and their families, and cut off their mutual extortionist’s ammunition against them. Bobby and James don’t work alone, either, which offers the story so much of its sincerity and hope within the love and respect and acceptance they find from all sides of their blended families, and more than a few outside allies too.

Warmth and kindness go hand-in-hand with trouble and threats in You’re the Problem, It’s You, which serves to draw a close-knit family closer and makes love and a future together possible for James and Bobby, and Gwen and Beth. This novel is about queer joy, pure and simple and uplifting.