#the pairing spoilers

[industryhbo]

THE PAIRING by Casey McQuiston published August 6ᵗʰ, 2024

I look up to find handsome, enduring Theo thumbing the same knuckles they bruised for me when we were children. I know them. I know this person better than I know anything, better than Bernini or Middle-earth or the importance of good butter. And they know me, and they're still looking.

[lucifers-favorite-child]

Casey your writing has GOT to stop being so relatable

[potato-jem]

kit fairfield, you are so fucking pathetic. are you free friday

[justalittlechocolatemilkshake]

Oh my god I’m reading The Pairing and did not know we would get dual POVS.

Kit is breaking my fucking heart rn.

[inthefaceofadaffodil]

Finished The Pairing and honestly? Need a prequel novel about Fabrizio and Valentina’s love story and a book about Orla’s life in Ireland because oh. my. GOD.

[amscraypunk]

"Ralph Macchio and the bully from The Karate Kid" as a couple's costume... they get it they just always get it

[sheisraging]

Finished The Pairing last night and trying to formulate coherent thoughts about it. Overall, I loved it a whole bunch. Of CMQ's books, I've only read RWRB, so I have no basis for comparison against the others, but I am pretty sure, based on synopsis alone, that this one would still be my second fave behind RWRB.

Would love to hear from anyone else who got the ARC!

Some spoilery thoughts beneath the cut for anyone who's interested...

I already suffer from insatiable wanderlust and this book just pinged it over and over again to the point that literally all I wanna do now is travel and eat.

Regarding the latter, if I could actually gain weight from reading, I would have from this book. I have never been so hungry just from reading about food, despite having read many books by actual chefs about their cooking.

I enjoyed Theo's POV more than Kit's, primarily because Theo is funnier and that almost always gets me. Kit is also funny, but in a much more quiet way. I don't think I've ever highlighted so many lines in a book and probably 90% of them are things I cackled at from Theo's POV. I would screenshot them and post them all here, but it's gonna be more fun for people to discover them in context.

I have no idea why it happened, but the image of Will Gao as Kit popped into my head while reading and that is now all I can see.

I love Fabrizio a lot and would like to go live with him in Naples. Orla is also the best.

The ending was fairly predictable. I would pretty much always assume CMQ is going to go with a happy ending, so that part was kind of a given for me, but there's a real specific giveaway at one of the travel destinations that is made even more specific not too long after and you just kind of know where it's going. I wouldn't deduct any stars for it, because I did very much like the ending and it's also life goals, but it's very neat and unsurprising.

I need to go back to Barcelona immediately.

[sincenewyorks]

theo screenshotted the wrong ticket

[lacroixbabe]

Diving in! See y’all on the flip side 💋

[solarwreathe]

in another universe they could have been playing at the beach

[insecuregodcomplex]

the petals stayed😭😭😭😭

[lucifers-favorite-child]

Either Casey's writing needs to be less relatable or I need to up my meds

[potato-jem]

only critique for the pairing so far (under the cut)

if you have two calums, and they are both australian, and one has red hair, that calum no longer will be called calum. he would be called ranga or blue for the rest of his days.

[starcurtain]

Please someone redraw this with Dr. Ratio and Aventurine because this is the exact vibe they have in my head post-Penacony.

[cowboythewizard726]

THE TOUDEN SIBLINGS, THE TOUDEN SIBLINGS!!!!1!!!11!!!!!2!1!!! REJOICE REJOICE EVERYONE GATHER AROUND THE TOUDEN SIBLINGS OH HEAVENLY TOUDEN SIBLINGS!!!!!!1!!!!!!1!!!!11!!

TOUDENS TOUDENS TOUDENS!!!!!!! YEAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[purrassicjet]

Kristen meeting up with her parents in Krom's Diner is funny to me because it conjures the image of Sandra Lynn, Jawbone, and Lydia watching through a Mordred window with binoculars making sure that nothing bad happens