Kiss Me, Maybe by Gabriella Gamez: Review

Welcome to my review of Kiss Me, Maybe by Gabriella Gamez! If there’s an ace protagonist, I’m there, so I’m so glad I was sent a copy of this from Forever.

Cover of Kiss Me Maybe by Gabriella Gamez

Title: Kiss Me, Maybe
Author: Gabriella Gamez
Genre: Romance
Publisher: Forever
Pub Date: 05/06/25

Description

When a late bloomer goes viral for coming out, she decides to use her newfound fame to get her first kiss—with the help of a sexy bartender—in this “funny, smart, and spicy” romance (Abby Jimenez).

Librarian Angela Gutierrez has never been kissed. But after posting a video about her late bloomer status and ace identity, she’s finally ready to get some firsts out of the way. Using her new influencer status to come up with a scavenger hunt idea in which the winner earns her first kiss, Angela realizes she may need some help to pull off the event.

Enter Krystal Ramirez, hot bartender and Angela’s unrequited crush of five years. Despite vowing that romantic love isn’t for her, Krystal seems awfully determined to help Angela pull off the scavenger hunt and find true love.

There’s just one problem: the connection between Angela and Krystal is getting stronger and stronger the more they hang out, until Angela isn’t sure she wants to go through with the scavenger hunt after all. But Krystal is convinced that she isn’t capable of love and before long, Angela realizes she’s falling head over heels for a woman who may never love her back.

Review

Kiss Me, Maybe was so much messier than I thought it was going to be, in a good way. I should have expected it though because grappling with your identity is never clean-cut. But even beyond Angela’s questions about herself and what she truly wants out of life, the family drama was intense. I was gagged and shocked multiple times as family and friends clashed in the most unexpected of ways.

I really loved the premise being centered around a twenty-seven-year-old who’s never been kissed and the woman she’s been pining over for years being the one to help her try to fulfill her mission. This book was a great example of how chemistry should be done. Sometimes writing can harp on telling the reader how much chemistry two characters have without actually showing it, but Angela and Krystal’s every interaction showed the way two of them fit beyond just being friends.

While it’d be easy to paint Krystal as a sort of villain based on her past relationship, I understood her struggles of trying even when you know you shouldn’t and wishing things would click into place but not knowing how to voice it when they don’t. She and Angela really opened each other up to seeing things in a different light. Though the book was more about Angela’s journey than the scavenger hunt itself, the end felt a little anticlimactic for me as everything went by so quickly, and I wished we’d gotten to relish in the realizations for a bit longer.

This book was such a good dive into figuring out being ace, and I think it’s helpful for those who don’t know much about the identity or have a wrong opinion of it while also being relevant and relatable to those sure of themselves. I also never get tired of found family and loved the message surrounding the fact that some people will always be set on misunderstanding you, and there’s nothing you can do to change their mind.

Although I haven’t read the first book in this series, I thought it was a great standalone because I didn’t feel like I was missing anything vital not knowing about the makings of Marcela and Theo’s relationship, but the tidbits we did see in this book makes me want to go back and read their story. Overall, I had a good time with this one and think it’s a fitting read for those in their twenties and thirties still trying to find themselves and separate society’s expectations from their own desires.

*Thank you to the publisher for the gifted finished copy of the book. All opinions are my own.*

Author

Gabriella Gamez is a Mexican American author from South Texas. She writes about incredibly messy, well-meaning women trying their best and accidentally falling in love. When she’s not writing, she can be found drinking copious amounts of coffee, wasting too much time playing video games, and obsessing over other people’s books.