[Review] Stranger Things Have Happened - Kasie West

Summary: Sutton knows she needs therapy. After all, she’s managing her newly opened restaurant remotely while taking care of her ungrateful sick mother. Plus, her boyfriend of two years just dumped her over the phone. But does therapy with a handsome stranger, who she has to pretend to be engaged to, in order to help her friend’s struggling relationship count? Probably not. Then why did she just agree to go? Because she’s had a few too many drinks? Because this stranger, Elijah, is smug and annoying and really, really handsome? Because she feels guilty that she abandoned her best friend, Tara, after high school and this might just make up for it? Whatever the reason, she has committed to this unhinged plan.

What the hell is Sutton doing?

Helping Tara prove a point: a good therapist can tell the difference between real love and fake love. That’s what she’s doing. But as they attend their sessions, Sutton and Elijah only seem to be proving one thing—the lines between pretend desire and real desire are very blurry. This true connection forming between them is threatening to unravel everything Sutton thought she knew about family, friendship, and her own heart. (Pub Date: Apr 14 2026)

Sutton needs to go back home to help her mother after a car accident and as a consequence, her boyfriend ends things with her. That same night she finds her childhood friend and her fiancé at a bar and ends up in a bet with the fiancé's brother in other the prove the importance of therapy: they need to fake being a couple about to get married and she wins if the therapist realizes they're actually two strangers. 

3.5 rounded up to 4.

It's funny that almost at the same time I started reading another book about a couple who needs to pretend they're married to attend marriage counseling but this time because of the woman's job, but each book goes for a very different take of this premise of two strangers fooling a therapist. And I definitely liked Kasie West's.

Usually for West's books the guy is the perfectionist one, but I think she tried to change the dynamic this time, although Elijah is very far from being a bad boy. On the contrary, it's impossible not to like him, even when he's not on one of his best days. You'll definitely like the couple scenes. And again this is a West thing that any fan will expect, but if this is your first book, she never forgets how important family is in molding who we are. For this one, I think she went a step further and made such a situation with how Sutton's mom and dad are separated even though they're still officially married. I've known a couple living that very situation, and it can be such a mess I almost wished we had had a little more focus on this, even if the conclusion to this subplot was probably the best one.

This was my second adult romance book I've read by Kasie West, and this one really felt like one. Like a very entertaining one. I love her voice and her book boyfriends and her conclusions. It's that kind of safe read if you need a fun romance. I hope you'll also like it!

Honest review based on an ARC provided by Netgalley. Many thanks to the publisher for this opportunity.

Rating: 3 out of 5.