The Friend Zone Experiment: A Sweet, Second-Chance Friends-to-Lovers Romance from the Author of Spirits Abroad

'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

© 2024 Pan (Audiobook): 9781035046072

Release date

Audiobook: 8 August 2024