Romeo Falling

By: Jesse H Reign

Narrated by: Zachary Zaba

Is it really cheating if he was yours first?

Romeo and I were friends long before we were lovers. Best friends. Ride or die. What started as an innocent kiss slowly unraveled and shattered, giving way to years of tears and total obsession.

Now I’m back in the small town I call home, staring straight into the face of the only man I’ve ever loved…or hated. To make matters worse, his wife stands at his side, smiling sweetly as my heart breaks all over again.

When life throws us back together, cracks quickly start to appear in the perfect façade of their marriage, and I’m left fighting the unstoppable force that is my attraction to Romeo.

My enemy.

My lover.

My life.

Some say fate is written in the stars and once something is done, it can’t be undone.

But what if that isn’t true?

If you could rewrite the stars and unbreak your heart, would you?


Romeo Falling is an angsty, obsessive, possessive MM romance that contains cheating (not between MC's). It is not a retelling of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.

Please use the 'look inside' feature and scroll up to the copyright page to see if this is the book for you.

©2024 Jesse H Reign (P)2024 Jesse H Reign

The story and narration were excellent

Since 2025 just started it seems funny to say this is the best of 2025 for me. If I put it in 2024 it would definitely be in the top 5 or 10 and I read over 120 books last year. Oleander by Scarlett Drake was the best and I would say the best for years. Now Romeo falling... Such beautiful stories of their life growing up together. Romeo is just a mystical soul. His tiger the love and protector. Wound into decades of loss, regret, happiness and love. An especially beautiful book. Very highly recommended.

Falling in love all over again!

I read this book as soon as it came out and ADORED it - and that's saying something coming from someone who doesn't usually vibe with the friends to lovers trope! Jesse's writing shines beautifully in this story, and you can't help but fall for Romeo and Jude and root for their HEA. As I was reading, I actually imagined Zachary Zaba's voice as the narrator, so finding out that he had been cast was a fantastic surprise! His narration is excellent as always, and I'm thrilled to be able to reread this one on audio over and over!

Incredible book brought to life!

Romeo Falling is one of my favorite books of all time. It is such a beautiful and heartwarming love story. Jude and Romeo have imbedded themselves into my heart. I read the book twice because I just couldn’t leave them. I’m pretty hard to please when it comes to audiobooks in general but even more so with stories that mean so much to me. The narration of this book is absolutely perfect. Zachary Zaba has a voice that IS Jude and Romeo. I really really love his Romeo voice. His performance is stellar. It’s so good that I’m going to start listening to it all over again tomorrow. This is absolutely positively a 5 star read. It gets ALL the stars! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Tiger Whelmed

1st person, present tense, single PoV (Jude)
Jude, lawyer
Romeo, school teacher

Audiobook Narration (7h31m) - Zachary Zaba - 4.5 stars
I've now listened to several audiobooks narrated by Zachary Zaba and have to admit that it usually takes me a chapter or two to adjust to his narration style as he speaks with a unique cadence, but once I get sucked into the story and his storytelling I am fully immersed. I think he worked especially well in this case because of the flowery, lyrical writing and although I listen to audio exclusively in my car, I found myself tempted to open the app while at home.

I was incredibly disappointed to find that the bonus chapter was not included in the audio version of the book. I hate that authors make readers jump though engagement hoops to get the whole story anyway, but it's extra annoying with an audio version as I now have to remember to track down the bonus content when I am not driving down the highway at 100km/hr, and worse, when I am no longer in the thrall of the book, which is supremely unsatisfying.


Story - 4.5 stars
I'm sad it took me so long to listen to this one. In my defense, I downloaded it near the end of October and was deep into Christmas reading by November 1st. I honestly have no idea why this worked so well for me, but it did. Almost all the tropes - second chance, miscommunication, cheating, flashbacks, high angst - are ones I'm particular about and don't usually love, but they just worked for me here.

I adored the single PoV with alternating past/present perspective. It felt very coming of age in a grand way, almost as though the narrative was actually being told from a present/future perspective since all the answers were in the past it felt like more of the focus point, answering the question of "how did we get here?" in a slow, deliberate way, since in the present Jude and Romeo are about as far from one and other as they can get and the chasm doesn't feel like it can be crossed.

Through Jude's recollections of the turning points of their youth we see the evolution of a friendship, boys turning into men, and watched horrified as everything goes awry. Of course, from the outside, hindsight is 20/20 perspective, it's easy to see how it could have all be avoided and while I generally don't enjoy miscommunication, specifically when it was something small and easily rectified as in the situation presented in the book, it felt realistic. Once it is brought to light it is easy to fix, the hurt caused needs a little time to heal but it feels possible and inevitable that these two will forge ahead as they were always meant to do.

The author was able to write Romeo in such a way that even though we never really get his PoV and he doesn't say a whole lot, we all know what he was thinking/feeling. I thought Romeo's wife, Selby, was done a little dirty, though it's too be expected a little considering the narrative is being told from the PoV of someone who basically hates her, but I'm glad the author didn't make her too villainous in a piss-poor attempt to rationalize cheating on her, and I like that it didn't carry on over long before she was told.

I can easily see how this could be hit or miss with people, and after reading some of the lower starred reviews I was a little worried, but, I just loved it from start to finish.

Loved it!

I think this is the best thing Jesse has written. It included tropes I don’t normally love or even like, top most being miscommunication, but also cheating, second chance romance, and friends to lovers. But the way Jesse wrote this rang so true to me that I couldn’t help but love it, even when it hurt. This story, the characters, the emotions… all of it was so well written and memorable.

This is the first audio that I listened to by Zachary Zaba and he was fantastic! I can definitely tell why he keeps popping up so much. I can’t wait to listen to more from him. Maybe the teased at hockey romance that’s coming up?