I really, really loved this novel. Genuinely funny, fast-moving, and a tender love story between two characters I believed in and rooted for. Its dialogue fizzes and it executes romance tropes stylishly, balancing cinematic set-pieces with moments of sweet domesticity.
With its setting of rival filmmakers trying to green light a love story and falling for each other in the process, there’s definitely comparisons to other creative-industry/celebrity romcoms here: if you’re a fan of Emily Henry or Nora Ephron films, I think you’ll enjoy its smart humour and warmth. I was interested to see that in Monaghan’s acknowledgements she credited Jennette McCurdy’s memoir I’m Glad My Mom Died, which makes sense for its exploration of the impact of child stardom (though this is a lot cosier and has broadly positive familial relationships). Similarly, I kept thinking that with its setting of famous sitcom stars years later, once they’ve grown up and are now on the outskirts of Hollywood, there’s even a touch of Bojack Horseman, but through a sunnier lens, more in a major key. Definitely a compliment!
From the USA Today bestselling author of Nora Goes Off Script, a novel about a former adolescent TV punch line who has left her awkwardness in the rearview mirror thanks to a fake-it-till-you-make-it mantra that has her on the cusp of success, until she tells a lie that sets her on a crash course with her past, spending a week on Long Island with the last man she thinks might make her believe in love.
Rules for growing up in Hollywood: Love is a lie. Laughter is the only truth.
Jane Jackson spent her adolescence as "Poor Janey Jakes," the barbecue-sauce-in-her-braces punch line on America's fifth-favorite sitcom. Now she's trying to be taken seriously as a Hollywood studio executive by embracing a new mantra: Fake it till you make it.
Except she might have faked it too far. Desperate to get her first project green-lit and riled up by pompous cinematographer and onetime crush Dan Finnegan, she claimed that she could get mega popstar Jack Quinlan to write a song for the movie. Jack may have been her first kiss-and greatest source of shame-but she hasn't spoken to him in twenty years.
Now Jane must turn to the last man she'd ever want to owe: Dan Finnegan. Because Jack is playing a festival in Dan's hometown, and Dan has an in. A week in close quarters with Dan as she faces down her past is Jane's idea of hell, but he just might surprise her. While covering up her lie, can they find something true?
"Poignant, funny, and bingeable, Annabel Monaghan writes five star reads." -Abby Jimenez
Author
About Annabel Monaghan
Annabel Monaghan is the USA Today bestselling and Library Reads Hall of Fame author of Summer Romance, Same Time Next Summer, and Nora Goes Off Script, as well as two young adult novels and Does This Volvo Make My Butt Look Big?, a selection of laugh-out-loud columns that appeared in The Huffington Post, The Week, and The Rye Record. She lives in Connecticut with her family.
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