Thankful Reads Day 5: The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang

Title: The Kiss Quotient
Author: Helen Hoang
Page Count: 336
Format Read: Hardcover
Genre: Romance
Keywords: Autism, Love, Career
Kid Appropriate: No

Synopsis from Goodreads:

A heartwarming and refreshing debut novel that proves one thing: there's not enough data in the world to predict what will make your heart tick.

Stella Lane thinks math is the only thing that unites the universe. She comes up with algorithms to predict customer purchases — a job that has given her more money than she knows what to do with, and way less experience in the dating department than the average thirty-year-old.

It doesn't help that Stella has Asperger's and French kissing reminds her of a shark getting its teeth cleaned by pilot fish. Her conclusion: she needs lots of practice — with a professional. Which is why she hires escort Michael Phan. The Vietnamese and Swedish stunner can't afford to turn down Stella's offer, and agrees to help her check off all the boxes on her lesson plan — from foreplay to more-than-missionary position...

Before long, Stella not only learns to appreciate his kisses, but to crave all the other things he's making her feel. Soon, their no-nonsense partnership starts making a strange kind of sense. And the pattern that emerges will convince Stella that love is the best kind of logic...

Why I'm thankful:

First off, this is by far one of my all time favorite romance novels. It is funny, sweet, and just so lovable! All of the characters are incredibly well done and the story keeps at a great pace throughout. One thing that I will say, this book is very NSFW (not safe for work). I am glad that I did not read this in front of young cousins or bring it as my lunch read to work because the sex scenes are frequent and explicit. You have been warned!

Now, why I am grateful for this book is that I related quite a bit to the struggles that Stella has interacting with the world and understanding social ques and norms. I am not on the spectrum but I did suffer from severe anxiety as a kid, specifically social anxiety. I couldn't look strangers in the eye, nearly fainted having to give presentations at school, suffered from panic attacks. It was rough. With a lot of hard work and support from my family I have been able to largely overcome the issues I had as a young child and teenager, but to see someone else unsure of what is right in different social situations and not necessarily understanding why what they did was wrong made me tear up a few times as I remembered similar feelings when I was a preteen and teenager.

I wish I had read a character like Stella when I was a bit younger and had the opportunity to see the things I struggled with in fiction. It was a great representation of autism and I recognize that it isn't the same as anxiety. But, this is also an important book for those that struggle with anxiety as they can relate to a lot of the situations that Stella finds herself in.