The Friend Zone Experiment

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What to expect

'A witty and heartwarming exploration of friendship and romance. This is a succession style K-drama that is perfect for a beach read.' - Glamour

'The romance buzzes like a live wire' - The New York Times

From the renowned, award-winning author Zen Cho comes a delightfully funny romance about family, class and love in modern London. For fans of the TV show Succession and Crazy Rich Asians.

From the outside, Renee Goh’s life looks perfect. She’s thirty and beautiful, running a glamorous–and successful–fashion company in London, and dating a hot pop star.

Until she’s dumped. Estranged from her family in Singapore, too, happiness soon feels a world away. A chance encounter with her first love, Yap Ket Siong, makes her question what she really wants. Then Renee’s father calls from Singapore and offers her the chance to become the successor of the family business, one of the largest conglomerates in Southeast Asia. Her father’s approval would mean everything - if she can fight off the competition of her unpredictable older brothers.

Just as she’s focusing on her future and a possible move back to Singapore, sparks seriously start to fly with Ket Siong, shaking her resolve to keep him in the friend zone. But he left her heartbroken at university - will either of them dare to share their feelings the second time around? Or will family business mean they can’t bank on each other . . .

Praise for The Friend Zone Experiment:

'Mixes light and dark topics. There’s generational pain and the difficulty of being a woman in a male-dominated industry and culture, but there’s also diasporic joy, the power of female friendships, and above all, hope for Renee and Ket Siong' - My Weekly

'A story so intensely real that you’ll wonder later if it happened to someone you knew.' - Shelley Parker-Chan, author of She Who Became the Sun

‘A lovely, tender romance, beautifully threaded through real world concerns that had me engrossed. I savoured every delicately written moment.’ - Charlotte Stein, author of When Grumpy Met Sunshine

'Reminiscent of classic K-dramas with a touch more reality . . . Easily one of my top reads of the year!' - Simone Soltani, author of Cross the Line

Critics Review

Zen Cho’s The Friend Zone Experiment is a witty and heartwarming exploration of friendship and romance. This is a succession style K-drama that is perfect for a beach read . . . Cho’s humour and observations on modern relationships offers a fun and easy read.
Glamour
A sweet slow-burning romance.
Heat
The Friend Zone Experiment mixes light and dark topics. There’s generational pain and the difficulty of being a woman in a male-dominated industry and culture, but there’s also diasporic joy, the power of female friendships, and above all, hope for Renee and Ket Siong
My Weekly
A beautifully soapy second-chance romance set in modern-day London. The romance buzzes like a live wire. Ket Siong’s quiet care gives weight to Renee’s drive, and her quickness lightens the emotional burdens he’s been concealing
The New York Times
Cho is a marvel. Her deft observations go down like a charm, but their emotional power will leave you deeply moved . . . The Friend Zone Experiment is a story so intensely real that you’ll wonder later if it happened to someone you knew
Shelley Parker-Chan, author of She Who Became the Sun
This book has it all; a touch of glam, romance and a bit of sibling rivalry - all slotted into an vibrant love letter to London!
Lola Jaye, author of The Attic Child
Renee Goh has joined the ranks of my favourite romance heroines; I was sucked into her story immediately and cheered for her the whole way through. This is a romance that celebrates its tropes while not being afraid to show its teeth, all delivered in Cho's assured and lively authorial voice. I can't wait to see where she takes us next in this genre!
Freya Marske, Sunday Times bestselling author of A Marvellous Light
A lovely, tender romance, beautifully threaded through real world concerns that had me engrossed. I savored every delicately written moment
Charlotte Stein, author of When Grumpy Met Sunshine
Reminiscent of classic Kdramas with a touch more reality, Cho perfectly balances a friends-to-lovers romance with familial tensions and business-world intrigue. Easily one of my top reads of the year!
Simone Soltani, author of Cross the Line
Renee and Ket Siong lose and find each other in an emotionally intense love story set against a dramatic backdrop of corporate greed, class and family. Lovers of Zen Cho’s fabulous fantasy stories will be thrilled by her first contemporary romance
Lily Chu, author of The Stand In
I thoroughly enjoyed my time with The Friend Zone Experiment, a book that surprised me in many ways. I haven’t seen an author weave romantic comedy and corporate complexity together quite this flawlessly. It was giving “Succession with swooning” vibes, which I LOVED! . . . Cho skilfully implemented broader social and environmental issues into the storyline, specifically deforestation and gender inequality. This added relevance was the cherry on top of an already fantastic novel. Hilarious, insightful and hard to put down, I highly recommend this book for its engaging plot, complex characters and thoughtful integration of important themes
J. F. Murray, author of Hitched and Fling
I'm absolutely here for it . . . It's a compelling read, doing something distinctly different in the romance field
K J Charles, author of The Duke at Hazard
Come visit Zen Cho’s London – sometimes glittering, often grey – where expats, activists and entrepreneurs discover how love complicates life and life complicates love. Pragmatic, yet deeply satisfying, The Friend Zone Experiment is for every person who believes they can fight for a happy-ever-after on their own terms.
Karen Lord, author of the Women's Prize for Fiction 2024-Longlisted The Blue, Beautiful World
A really fun and escapist read – I'm sure fans of Lauren Ho or Beth O'Leary will love this second-chance romance!
Niamh Hargan, author of The Break-Up Clause
A messy – yet beautiful – second-chance romance. Zen Cho writes vivid characters in difficult situations, and the hero and heroine’s history is deftly woven into their present-day interactions. It’s a compelling read, and I devoured it
Jackie Lau, author of Love, Lies, and Cherry Pie
A heart-warming second-chance romance, written with a sometimes-sly sense of humour. With complicated family relationships, ominous shadows from the past and the cameos of Southeast Asian food and beverages which are delectably familiar to me. A sparkling read
Eve Shi
The Friend Zone Experiment was a captivating read that I simply couldn’t put down. Mixing romcom leanings with political rumblings and family hierarchy - that we can all related to in some form - it was one of the best books I have read in 2024.
Ben Pechey, author of The Gender Book and The Book of Non-Binary Joy

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