Honeymoon Phase by Amy Daws

Amy Daws has carved out a delightful niche in contemporary romance with her Mountain Men Matchmaker series, and Honeymoon Phase, the third installment following Nine Month Contract and Seven Year Itch, delivers everything fans have come to expect: humor that lands with precision, emotional depth that sneaks up on you, and chemistry that practically ignites the pages. This friends-to-lovers, marriage-of-convenience romance featuring Luke Fletcher and Addison Monroe manages to feel both comfortably familiar and refreshingly original, though it occasionally stumbles under the weight of its own machinations.

A Setup Built on Desperation and Devotion

The premise hooks immediately with its delicious absurdity. Addison “Roe” Monroe faces an archaic ultimatum: marry before year’s end or watch her father sell Monroe Lumber and Building Center, the family business she’s poured her soul into running. The trust requirement, created by her great-grandfather, refuses to allow single ownership. When Roe announces her plan to find a husband at the local lumberjack competition, her best friend Luke Fletcher decides desperate times require desperate measures. Rather than watch Roe marry some “hulking ax wielder who might be a serial killer,” Luke transforms himself into Lumberjack Luke, complete with competition-level skills acquired through grueling training orchestrated by his matchmaking niece, Everly.

Daws structures this setup with impressive efficiency, establishing both the external conflict (the inheritance requirement) and the internal one (Luke’s secret three-year pining) within the opening chapters. The dual timeline format—jumping between their marriage ceremony and flashbacks to how they arrived there—creates immediate tension while allowing readers to witness both the planning and execution of their scheme.

Character Dynamics: Friendship as Foundation

Luke Fletcher emerges as the series’ most emotionally complex protagonist thus far. Unlike his brothers Wyatt and Calder, who found love almost despite themselves, Luke enters this arrangement fully aware of his feelings. His journey isn’t about discovering love but about finding the courage to pursue it after grief has taught him that losing someone hurts worse than never trying. The death of his father three years prior haunts Luke’s every romantic decision, creating a psychological barrier that feels authentic rather than manufactured for plot convenience.

Daws excels at portraying Luke’s internal struggle. He’s simultaneously the most emotionally available Fletcher brother and the most emotionally constrained, a paradox that manifests in beautiful small gestures—the perfect Cartier ring that matches Roe’s aesthetic, remembering her sourdough bread preferences, creating a sleeping sanctuary in his arms. These moments showcase a man who’s been loving Addison for years in the quiet, unacknowledged ways that best friends do.

Addison proves more complex and occasionally more frustrating than her characterization initially suggests. Daws crafts her as a woman comfortable in traditionally masculine spaces—running a lumberyard, driving forklifts, preferring work boots to heels—while still allowing her feminine vulnerabilities. Her backstory carries substantial emotional weight: a brother who died at eight from a drunk driver, a mother who chose alcohol over her daughter, and a father whose conditional love revolves around outdated gender expectations.

However, Roe’s trust issues sometimes veer toward the frustrating. Her knee-jerk retreat when she discovers Everly’s matchmaking involvement—treating Luke’s orchestrated lumberjack training as an unforgivable betrayal rather than an elaborate grand gesture—strains believability given their years of friendship. The pacing here suffers as Daws extends the third-act conflict longer than the story can sustain, particularly when resolution requires Roe simply talking to Luke about her fears rather than fleeing to Boulder.

The Marriage of Convenience Trope: Familiar Yet Fresh

Daws navigates the marriage-of-convenience trope with awareness of its well-worn path while finding opportunities for innovation. The “Fact or Fiction?” chapter headings provide a clever framing device that mirrors Luke and Roe’s journey from pretense to authenticity. Each chapter begins with a statement—”Marriage of convenience is a thing,” “Best friends make good husbands,” “Grief can bring people together”—that the narrative then explores, challenges, or confirms.

The fake-marriage elements hit expected beats: the awkward first kiss at the county clerk’s office, sleeping arrangements that progress from separate rooms to shared bed, maintaining the charade for family members. Where Daws elevates the material is in the small moments of genuine connection that bloom within the artifice. Luke’s insistence on carrying Roe over the threshold “bride-over-the-back” style because it’s “much more her style” captures their dynamic perfectly—he sees her completely and loves what he sees.

The sexual tension builds with admirable restraint before combusting magnificently. Their shower scene carries genuine heat while maintaining emotional authenticity, as does their decision to forego protection because Roe “wants to feel” Luke. Daws writes intimacy that feels earned rather than gratuitous, though readers seeking extensive steam should note that while the scenes deliver quality, they’re relatively sparse compared to other contemporary romances.

Supporting Cast: The Fletcher Family Ecosystem

One of the series’ greatest strengths lies in its interconnected family dynamics, and Honeymoon Phase benefits enormously from the established Fletcher ecosystem. Wyatt and Trista (from Nine Month Contract) and Calder and Dakota (from Seven Year Itch) provide both comic relief and relationship models that Luke measures himself against. Their presence reminds readers that Fletcher Mountain represents more than geography—it’s a philosophy about love, family, and building something lasting.

Everly Fletcher deserves particular mention as perhaps the series’ most entertaining character. The nineteen-year-old self-proclaimed matchmaker orchestrates Luke’s transformation with the confidence of someone who’s successfully paired her father (Max from Last on the List) and both uncles. Her scenes crackle with energy, and her upcoming book (Bad Boy Era, scheduled for May 2026) promises to be a highlight of the series based on the glimpses Daws provides here.

John Monroe, Roe’s father, walks a difficult line between antagonist and well-meaning parent. His insistence on the marriage requirement stems from a combination of traditional values and genuine concern that Roe will exhaust herself running the business alone as he did. Daws mostly succeeds in making him sympathetic despite his outdated views, though his gun-cleaning introduction scene tips into caricature.

Grief as Character and Theme

What distinguishes Honeymoon Phase from lighter contemporary romances is Daws’s willingness to sit with grief and examine how it shapes romantic choices. Both Luke and Roe carry substantial losses—his father, her brother Aaron, her mother’s abandonment—and these absences inform their present in ways both obvious and subtle.

The scene where Roe shares Aaron’s story at his gravestone hits with particular power. Her description of watching her mother drive away without saying goodbye eight years after the accident that killed Aaron captures childhood trauma with devastating clarity. Luke’s response—simply holding her and saying “she missed out”—provides the validation Roe needed without trying to fix what cannot be fixed.

Similarly, Luke’s fear of loving and losing someone after holding his father during his final moments creates a psychological barrier that feels earned rather than constructed for drama. Daws handles the “Dead Dad Club” (to whom the book is dedicated) with respect and emotional honesty, acknowledging that grief doesn’t resolve neatly but learning to love despite it represents its own courage.

Where the Story Stumbles

Despite its considerable charms, Honeymoon Phase suffers from structural issues that occasionally drag momentum. The third-act conflict, where Roe discovers Everly’s matchmaking scheme and immediately retreats, feels both inevitable and frustrating. Daws extends this separation longer than necessary, and Roe’s refusal to simply talk to Luke about her feelings tests reader patience.

The lumberjack competition itself—built up as the inciting incident for Luke’s transformation—occupies surprisingly little page time relative to its importance in the setup. Readers expecting extensive competition scenes may feel shortchanged when the actual event serves primarily as backdrop for relationship development.

Additionally, while Daws generally balances the ensemble cast well, certain secondary characters feel underutilized. Johanna Fletcher, Luke’s mother, plays a significant role in wedding planning but remains thinly sketched compared to the vibrant presences of Trista, Dakota, and Cozy.

Dialogue and Voice: Where Daws Excels

Daws’s greatest strength lies in her ear for dialogue and her ability to create distinct character voices. Luke and Roe’s banter feels authentic to long-term friendship, mixing inside jokes, gentle teasing, and the kind of shorthand that develops over years of knowing someone. Their conversations flow naturally even during heightened emotional moments, avoiding the stilted quality that sometimes plagues romance dialogue.

The recurring “babe” that Luke uses for Roe carries weight precisely because it emerges organically from their relationship rather than being imposed as an artificial endearment. Similarly, Luke’s nickname “Roe” (derivative of Monroe) serves as both armor—keeping her in the friend zone—and intimacy, a name only he uses.

Series Integration and Standalone Quality

While Honeymoon Phase functions as a standalone romance, readers will derive maximum enjoyment from reading the series in order. References to Wyatt’s surrogacy arrangement with Trista and Calder’s slow-burn romance with Dakota provide context that enriches Luke and Roe’s story. The compound living situation on Fletcher Mountain makes more sense when readers understand how each couple arrived there.

That said, Daws provides sufficient background that new readers won’t feel lost, and the central romance arc resolves satisfyingly without requiring knowledge of previous books. The epilogue promises that Everly’s story (Bad Boy Era) will complete the series, though the door remains open for Max’s brothers or other characters.

Final Verdict

Honeymoon Phase delivers exactly what contemporary romance readers crave: a friends-to-lovers romance with genuine emotional stakes, characters worth investing in, and enough heat to satisfy without overwhelming the love story. Amy Daws proves once again why the Mountain Men Matchmaker series has developed such devoted readership—she understands that the best romances balance laugh-out-loud moments with quiet intimacy, that grand gestures matter less than daily devotion, and that happy endings feel earned when characters do the hard work of healing.

The novel’s greatest achievement lies in making readers believe that Luke and Roe belong together not despite their friendship but because of it. They know each other’s flaws, fears, and dreams, and choose each other anyway. That foundation—friendship as the basis for lasting romantic love—elevates Honeymoon Phase above typical marriage-of-convenience stories.

While the third-act conflict overstays its welcome and certain plot threads could use tightening, these issues pale beside the novel’s considerable strengths. Daws writes with warmth, humor, and emotional intelligence, creating characters readers want to spend time with long after the final page. Luke and Roe’s journey from best friends to husband and wife to actual partners feels authentic, satisfying, and ultimately hopeful—a reminder that sometimes the person we need has been beside us all along, we just needed the courage to reach for them.

For readers seeking a contemporary romance that combines laugh-out-loud humor with genuine emotional depth, that honors friendship as the foundation for lasting love, and that demonstrates how grief and joy can coexist in building something beautiful, Honeymoon Phase delivers with heart, heat, and a whole lot of mountain man charm.

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