RATING (BASED ON PERSONAL SCALE): 4.00/5 — A great book I'd happily revisit or re-read! → Characters feel vivid, present, and emotionally resonant.

AUDIOBOOK EXPERIENCE: 4.50/5 — Exceptional → Elevated the story and made the audiobook shine.

MY TAKE: NOTES, NIGHT SHIFTS, AND NOW I'M SWOONING

THOUGHTS & FEELS: Maybe, just maybe, I'm rating this a little higher because I've recently read several "rom-coms" that were absolute busts, but MAN, this romance was exactly what I needed. 😂

The premise immediately got me: Tiffy Moore and Leon Twomey share a one-bedroom flat, and even the same bed, but have never met. Leon works nights as a nurse and uses the flat during the day, while Tiffy has it at night. It's basically the one-bed trope, but make it SHIFT WORK. 😂

And then came THE NOTES.

What starts as practical communication around the flat slowly becomes jokes, encouragement, personal conversations, and genuine emotional intimacy. Tiffy and Leon are getting to know each other through the little pieces of themselves they leave behind before they've even really spent time together in person.

Talk about swoon.

The humor was there. The chemistry was there. The steam was there. BUT SO WAS THE ROMANCE. I actually got to watch these two build trust, friendship, and feelings instead of being told they had chemistry and expected to go along with it. But this isn't all sunshine and Post-it notes either.

Tiffy's relationship with her ex, Justin, gradually reveals itself to have been emotionally abusive and controlling, and I thought the book handled that with tremendous care. Her journey isn't simply about getting over an ex and finding a better boyfriend. It's about recognizing what happened to her and learning to trust herself again.

And I appreciated that Leon doesn't magically fix her. He's simply patient, respectful, and gives her the space to heal, which is such an important contrast to Justin.

Leon also has his own life outside the romance. He's trying to help his brother, Richie, who he believes was wrongfully imprisoned, while working an emotionally demanding job and slowly learning to let Tiffy into the life he's kept pretty contained. I also really enjoyed Gerty and Mo as Tiffy's support system and how they helped her confront things she wasn't ready to see on her own.

At its heart, I think this book is really about making space for someone without asking them to become smaller to fit into it. Tiffy is learning that she's allowed to take up space again, while Leon is learning to let someone into his.

And the flat itself becomes the perfect little metaphor for that.

My only real gripe was the ending... LEON. SIR. WHY WERE YOU NOT PRESENT AT YOUR OWN PROPOSAL?! 😂

I understand why the proposal was done through notes and a scavenger hunt, it brings their relationship full circle, and it's very them. But after an entire book of these two communicating without physically being together, I wanted this man THERE when he asked her to marry him! Tiffy having to go find him to say yes?! Attend your own proposal, sir. 😂

BOTTOM LINE: A genuinely charming slow-burn, strangers-to-friends-to-lovers, opposites-attract flatmate romance with one bed (technically 😂), adorable notes, actual chemistry, heavier emotional themes handled with care, and characters I genuinely cared about. After several romance disappointments, The Flatshare reminded me what I've been missing: humor + chemistry + steam + emotional intimacy + ACTUAL ROMANCE.

RATING (BASED ON PERSONAL SCALE): 3.50/5 — A well-written book, just missing that extra something for me. → If someone reminded me of these characters, I’d go, “Oh yeah, them!”

AUDIOBOOK EXPERIENCE: 4.00/5 — Really Enjoyed → Added to the experience and kept me engaged from start to finish.

MY TAKE: I CAME FOR HAYMITCH, APPARENTLY EVERYONE ELSE DID TOO 😂

THOUGHTS & FEELS: I really wanted to love this because I love The Hunger Games, and while this was definitely a good book, I don’t think I’d ever reread it.

What worked best for me was Haymitch Abernathy himself. We already know him as Katniss and Peeta’s sarcastic, alcoholic, deeply traumatized mentor, but here we get to meet the boy he was before the Capitol took nearly everything from him.

And gosh, that hurt.

Haymitch is already clever, observant, rebellious, and good at reading people, so you can absolutely see the foundations of the man he becomes. But he also has a family, a future, and Lenore Dove Baird, the girl he loves. He isn’t dreaming about revolution. He just wants to survive the day and go home to the people he cares about.

Then the Second Quarter Quell happens, and District 12 sends four tributes instead of two: Haymitch, Maysilee Donner, Wyatt Callow, and Louella McCoy.

The Games themselves worked for me because the suspense was never really “Does Haymitch survive?” We already know he does. The real question is: What does surviving cost him?

And apparently the answer is EVERYTHING. 😭

I really liked Maysilee and Ampert, and honestly, characters like them made my biggest complaint stand out even more: I didn’t need this many familiar faces from the original series woven into Haymitch’s story.

Seeing Mags, Beetee, Wiress, Plutarch, Effie, and others pop up was fun at first, but after a while it started feeling less like organic world-building and more like everyone in Panem had somehow RSVP’d to Haymitch’s Games 😂 Individually, a lot of those connections make sense. Collectively, they made the world feel smaller.

I also liked getting more context for some of those characters and seeing how earlier Games shaped them, but I still think Collins leaned a little too hard into connecting everything back to people we already know.

Emotionally, though, this book absolutely worked.

I already knew what happened to Haymitch’s family and to Lenore Dove because of the original trilogy, but knowing something happened and actually watching it happen are two very different things.

That’s where this prequel was strongest for me.

The book also does a great job showing why Haymitch later becomes so good at understanding the Games. He recognizes that the arena isn’t just about survival, it’s about performance, propaganda, roles, and controlling the story. The Capitol wants tributes to play the part they’ve been assigned and Haymitch keeps looking for ways to break the script. That created such a strong parallel between him and Katniss.

Both of them survive by seeing through the Capitol’s rules. Both embarrass the system by using its own tools against it. And both eventually learn that winning the Games does not mean the Capitol is done with you.

At its heart, I think this book is less about how Haymitch won the 50th Hunger Games and more about how the Capitol created the Haymitch we eventually meet. It’s also about who gets to control history.

The Capitol controls the cameras, the story, the punishment, and what Panem is allowed to remember. Haymitch’s resistance matters because he refuses to fully become the character they want him to be.

And that’s probably the biggest thing this book adds to the series: Katniss wasn’t the beginning of the rebellion. She was part of something people had been resisting long before her.

The ending with Katniss and Peeta gave me exactly the emotional relief I needed after everything Haymitch lost.

And Peeta? GOSH, I LOVE THAT MAN 😂

Seeing Haymitch eventually become part of their strange little found family made the ending feel a little less devastating.

BOTTOM LINE: This was an emotional and worthwhile prequel with a fantastic younger Haymitch, meaningful new characters, strong themes of grief, propaganda, resistance, trauma, first love, survival, and who gets to control the story. My biggest issue was how many familiar characters were woven into Haymitch’s Games. Some connections worked, but others felt forced enough that I could practically see the fan-service strings being pulled. I still think the original trilogy is stronger, but I would absolutely recommend this to Hunger Games fans.

I knew Haymitch’s story was tragic. Apparently I still needed Suzanne Collins to emotionally demonstrate it. 😭