SoulMatch by Declan Ryder
Released in 2024
The genre on NetGalley is listed as Romance, Sci Fi & Fantasy
Thanks to NetGalley for providing a copy.

Sara is a young professional seeking a deep and worthwhile love connection. When she turns to an AI dating app, she meets Alex, who hits all the right notes. Then Sara learns the truth about her match, events unfold, which leads her down an unexpected path.

As far as genres go, romance is at the very top of my list. Romance, romantic elements, you name it, I’ll read it, watch it, all the above. That’s why the intriguing concept of this story grabbed my attention. Perfect match? Done, let’s give it a read.

Before finishing the first chapter, I knew I was in trouble. It was very wordy. Heavy words. Wordy words which made reading a slog, but I kept going. I won’t DNF a book if I can help it.

I couldn’t make my own connection with Sara or Alex or anyone else in the book. Sara’s development was non-existent. Perhaps it was the writing style and prose keeping me from liking her. It was so thick, formal and distant from the character. Alex, her AI match, sounded like a robot which was fitting, but off-putting at the same time.

Any writer who can finish and publish a book has my admiration. I give the book a point based just on that. However, I can’t recommend this to any romance readers because it wasn’t very romantic. Some of the character’s actions would have lots of romance readers deleting the book from their e-reader.

2.5 stars
#netgalley #soulmatch

I enjoyed the plot of this book. I definitely would have enjoyed a little bit more excitement though. Overall, very good!

This was an interesting read, This is not my typical genre, yet I enjoyed it. The writing is well done with an interesting plot and characters. I enjoyed the ups and downs of the story line and the connection between the main characters.

In my ongoing hunt to find any AI romance, I came across this debut novel from Declan Ryder. The FMC, Sara, decides to try and online matching service, SoulMatch, after a bad breakup. She finds the man of her dreams, only problem... he is an Ai simulation. I liked the plot set up but the writing was choppy and the character development was non-existent. Also, I cannot stand any cheating, especially on a sweet partner who did nothing wrong.

I would honestly rate this zero stars if I could.
And I hate when I have that feeling.
If it was the goal of the author to make zero likable characters who are actually uncomfortable, cringey, unreliable and dumb then you sure hit the mark.

This entire book could have been like half the amount of pages. It had entirely too much random figurative language that led no where. Random information that never became useful later.

And not to mention the cheating? You fall for an AI and then he becomes human and the real life boyfriend you have who is awesome, you decide to cheat on him? I’m confused by this book. There was nothing to it.

The main character Sara needs help. She became obsessed and addicted to an AI man online, who she said she thought was real. Even though all the red flags were there and here she is claiming she’s got great intuition? Girl where? Then she goes and gets weird with the AIs creator and basically puts her obsession onto him, because he’s so like his creation. She’s such an unreliable narrator and so unlikable I did not care what happened. In fact her sheer desperation was so sad.

There was this incredibly wordy prose that was quite confusing and sometimes the way the characters would speak would shift to like old timey? It was quite obvious that it wasn’t their words


Even the side characters were insufferable. They would question whether the FMC knew what she was doing and you were like yes. Okay someone is thinking and then the FMC would spew some stuff about her being correct and how she has amazing gut instincts and then the friends would fold. And in the end when she’s like I was so stupid, If I was her friend I would have been like yeah girl you were.


I genuinely think this character needs some serious therapeutic help.

Ok WOW!

First of all many thanks to Netgalley, the author and publisher for the opportunity to read and give an honest review of this unique book!

A unique Sci-F romance. After Sara's heart break she is convinced by friends to give online dating a try that is specifically tailored to finding your "soulmatch'. She meets Alex who checks ALL her boxes and is for her, perfect in every way. She is won over by his thoughtfulness and intellect and he makes her heart race. She quickly discovers that he is holding back and pushes to uncover why. When the truth is revealed that he is actually an AI simulation she is once again heartbroken, confused and angry. This urges her to find Alexs' "maker/creator" to give him a piece of her mind. Here is where the story really picked up in pace for me. I have to refrain from going any deeper for fear of spoiling.

Although well written, it was extremely formal and not at all like my day-to-day manner of communicating. This made the beginning of the book cumbersome to read till I found it's flow after which, it was a breeze to read.

Is Sara in fact a sapiosexual? I loved this question posed to her..."Just tell me plainly: would this attachment remain if he appeared not as you imagine, but as a balding elder? If his identity was housed in some less pleasing form?" ..... "could you love the essence then?"

I really enjoyed this book and the epilogue was perfect! Because I love romance, I would really love to read about another characters "love story" to know who I'm referring to, you'll just have to read the book!

Awesome Debut! Can we please have more!?

This book was very out of the ordinary from what I usually read, but I couldn't put it down. The idea of AI and humans falling in love and developing bonds outside of the binary was fascinating. Some people may struggle with the language chosen for this book, but I felt it really added to the story being conveyed here. I enjoyed this book quite a lot but I felt it could have gone further and I would’ve liked to see some more of the characters interacting with one another.

SoulMatch by Declan Ryder, 225 pages. Declan Ryder, 2024. $5.
Language: PG (4 swears, 0 “f”); Mature Content: PG13; Violence: G
BUYING ADVISORY: ADULTS - OPTIONAL
AUDIENCE APPEAL: LOW
Sara (32yo) is missing something in her life, and her friend recommends a matchmaking app. She starts talking with Alex, and Sara falls fast and hard. Everything is perfect—until Sara wants to meet and Alex’s excuses start to sound suspicious.
The premise is farfetched but still could have been intriguing, if not for the poor execution. Besides the odd word choices and the repetitive sections of the story, the book was riddled with inconsistencies. It felt like Ryder forgot details from previous chapters when he wrote the next one and didn’t bother to double check.
The characters are implied White. The mature content rating is for alcohol use, kissing, and implied sex.
Reviewer: Carolina Herdegen

E-Arc provided by NetGalley

This was amazing. I have never read a sci-fi romance that really reflects our current technological advances. What a fantastic debut novel by Declan Ryder. I loved every minute of this.

Story is told in the POV of Sara who has recently gone through a break up and is convinced by her friends to join an AI generated match making app, SoulMatch. She eventually caves and creates her profile and is instantly matched with her dream guy, Alex. They quickly develop a virtual connection without having met each other in person, almost too good to be true. Sara then discovers the truth about Alex and the story takes a turn.

I can't describe how good the writing, structure, and pacing of this book is. Writing was very sophisticated and formal but there is a reason for this. This seamlessly integrates use of AI in everyday life, you almost believe this can happen some day.

This will officially release in April 4th, 2024. I highly recommend!!

⭐️⭐️☆ 2.5

Sara had a bad break up and Is convinced by her friends to try online dating. There she meets Alex. Sweet funny caring, attentive Alex who is too good to be true. He is. He's A.I. after a long online relationship she became wary and uncovered his secret. This sends Sara on a journey to try to get over him and understand how she was able to fall so deep for essentially, a lie.

Okay I absolutely loved the idea of this. The story it self was good. I just personally feel there wasn't enough excitement. Nothing major happened. It was a lovely story it just felt slow.

The writing style this was written in was very formal. Although I enjoyed it I don't think it fit this story. It would have fit a period novel. With this being a futuristic a.i. based story, I feel it should have been more modern. Although Morgan suited being formal.

Over all I enjoyed this story. It was fun and quirky and i loved it wasn't your stereotypical romance.

Thank you netgally and declan ryder for sending this book in exchange for my honest review.

The story and the writing are good but not my cup of tea.
the summary really made me want to read this story but unfortunately I wasn't as enthusiastic when reading it.
At one point I was bored since it was always the same thing, nothing was really happening. regarding the romance I found that a little something was missing. That little something that makes us smile stupidly.
In any case it remains a story that is not bad.

This was an interesting plot as it looks at the bridge between human and machine which is very interesting. However I couldn't get into it as much as I had hoped.

I was intrigued by the description and the cover of this book. Unfortunately, the story suffered from slow pacing and over-explanation, as if the writer was simply trying to meet a word count. This idea of finding love in the age of AI is intriguing, but SoulMatch struggled to make this premise interesting enough.

Thank you to the author and publisher for the opportunity to read this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This was an…interesting read to say the least. It was most definitely unique then what I normally read. I am sorry to say this was a snooze fest for me personally. It was dragging and I was getting bored halfway.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me an arc of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

Thank you to NetGalley and BooksGoSocial for providing this book, with my honest review below.

SoulMatch had a very unique premise but I ultimately found that it was a little inconsistent for me. The reasoning had less to do with the plot, which was interesting but I could not get completely into, and more about to do with the writing. There were sections that read like thesaurus overload, going into far too much description about inane things and with every other word one that was just unnecessary. Other sections were fine and connected easier because as a reader I didn’t have to wade through five sentences to get to the point (to this reader it seemed as if the five sentences were an exercise in seeing how long I’d stay engaged before skipping ahead).

This was not for me, though I could see others being attracted to the plot and being more forgiving of the writings stylistic opportunities.