My Favorite Rom-Com Reads
This is my first of two favorites lists of rom-coms and romantic reads. I was just talking to my friend Martha about rom-coms with weighty themes, and some of these titles fit that bill.
Others are more purely light, with happy endings you might see coming from a mile away--and likely won't mind at all.
If you've read any of these titles, I'd love to hear what you think! Have you read any other rom-com or romantic novels that you loved?
01 Betting on You by Lynn Painter
Lynn Painter delivers funny, charming banter and an opposites-attract tension in this heartwarming rom-com about divorce, trust, blended families, and vulnerability.
In Lynn Painter's rom-com Betting on You, rule-following seventeen-year-old Bailey and sarcastic, joking Charlie meet at a fraught moment--they're both leaving Alaska and coping with their parents' divorces. They're polar opposites, and they drive each other crazy.
Now they're living in the same hometown again, and, coincidentally, they're about to be working together at a bizarre hotel fun park.
When Bailey and Charlie fake date in order to try to thwart the new relationship between Bailey's mom and her always-around boyfriend, Bailey realizes she's got feelings for Charlie. And Charlie's emotionally immature, but he's never let his guard down the way he does with Bailey.

Painter delivers charming and funny banter, emotional growth, deep friendship, plausible missteps that keep the couple apart, heart-wrenching moments of vulnerability, and heartwarming looooove.
Please click here for my full review of Betting on You.
02 The Rule Book by Sarah Adams
This love story about an emotionally sensitive NFL player and his quirky, irresistible female agent is a sweet second-chance romance perfect for light summer reading.
Nora Mackenzie is a sports agent who's constantly fighting against misogyny and double standards as one of few women in the field. She's young and hungry--and thrilled that she's about to get her first really big client.
But Nora and the client, NFL tight end Derek Pender, were college sweethearts, and Nora abruptly broke things off years ago. They haven't seen each other since.
Derek is determined to make Nora so miserable, she'll quit her position as his agent, but Nora's never given up on anything in her life--except her youthful relationship with Derek. She's determined to look out for her career above all else.

I love Nora's passion for her career and the single-mindedness that has led to her success. In concept, I also love her quirkiness and refusal to bend to societal pressures--whether by behaving in a more tough manner because she's a woman in a career where fewer women exist, or by using her femininity as a tool in that career. But her silly language and childlike manner grated on me, and I found it distractingly corny.
I loved the fake marriage, the push and pull of career and love, and the second-chance romance.
Click here for my full review of The Rule Book.
03 Gwen & Art Are Not in Love by Lex Croucher
Lex Croucher's queer medieval rom-com--the author's debut young-adult novel--is an absolute gem; it's full of excellent banter and lots of heart. I smiled while reading this one.
“Nobody else is ever going to care as much as you do about the things that you want, Gwendoline. So it's up to you --you can put them aside forever, if you can live with that, or you can put on your big-girl girdle and demand more for yourself.”
It's hundreds of years after King Arthur's reign, and his descendant and namesake Arthur, a future lord and committed partier and social butterfly, has long been betrothed to the short-tempered princess Gwendoline.
But Gwendoline and Arthur detest each other. And when they're forced to spend the summer together at Camelot to prepare for their upcoming nuptials, it doesn't take long for them to realize that Art has been kissing a boy and that Gwen has a crush on the only female knight in the kingdom.

The premise of Lex Croucher's Gwen & Art Are Not in Love is irresistible, the pacing is great, and the banter is excellent--funny dialogue is a favorite element of mine. I adored the voices of the characters and witnessing their growth over the course of the story.
For my full review, please see Gwen & Art Are Not in Love.
04 Love, Lists and Fancy Ships by Sarah Grunder Ruiz
Sarah Grunder Ruiz serves up an irresistible rom-com with great banter and with interesting and difficult, complex issues of loss, grief, and responsibility at its heart.
Jo Walker is a yacht stewardess. She fell into the job years ago while trying to find herself--after a youth in which her father died, her mother fell apart, her older sister Beth became pregnant by (and married) her beloved high school sweetheart--and after Jo moved in with the young married couple while she finished high school.
But none of Jo's losses or disappointments or life experiences could have prepared her for the horrific, shocking loss of her young nephew Samson, Beth's youngest child (and Jo's birthday twin), in a biking accident.

The tension that keeps apart Jo and Alex (a handsome, charming man new to town) feels plausible, and I accepted the difficulties each faces when considering a commitment to the other. I loved the best-friendship with Nina, the messy path of grief, and the imperfect characters all doing their best. I welcomed with open arms the happy ending served up by Sarah Grunder Ruiz.
For my full review, please see Love, Lists and Fancy Ships.
05 I Hope This Doesn't Find You by Ann Liang
Ann Liang's newest young adult rom-com pits high school nemeses against each other: one relentless perfectionist and people-pleaser and her effortlessly successful classmate. But neither is as perfect as they seem...except in being perfect for each other.
In Ann Liang's I Hope This Doesn't Find You, Sadie Wren is perfect...on paper. She's valedictorian, school captain, and a model student.
Sadie's one vice is writing scathing, no-holds-barred email drafts. She never sends them, but crafting the furious hypothetical replies to anyone who is frustrating her is helpfully cathartic.
That is, until everyone--from her co-captain to her teachers to her classmates--knows how shockingly blunt the "real" Sadie is. And the only one who seems to embrace her accidental show of full honesty is her longtime nemesis, Julius.

This young adult story is sweet and fun; the pacing often feels somewhat slapstick and frantic--as is the relentlessly ambitious, over-the-top super-pleaser Sadie herself. The feeling settles down when she finally begins to explore her feelings for Julius in a wonderfully sweet and romantic set of exchanges that feels all too brief.
The vulnerability that Sadie and Julius allow each other to see at long last was lovely.
For my full review, check out I Hope This Doesn't Find You.
06 Just for the Summer by Abby Jimenez
Just for the Summer is another Jimenez story with wonderful banter and a romantic connection that's anchored in and shaped by incredibly complicated life circumstances.
Abby Jimenez is wonderful at crafting a satisfying romance that's anchored in serious issues, and in Just for the Summer, she offers up an irresistible rom-com premise with weighty, messy, real-life-imperfect conflicts galore.
Justin and Emma are strangers, but they both seem to have the same curse: after they break up with someone, the next person that person dates ends up being their soulmate. A Reddit thread and unlikely coincidences bring Justin and Emma into contact, and their initial spark is undeniable.
The conflicts that repeatedly keep Emma and Justin from their happy-ever-after feel plausibly limiting, yet their affection and banter are adorable, and their inability to overcome the obstacles in their way is heartbreaking.

I think Emma's best friend Maddy probably needs her own book (a la Christina Lauren's fantastic True Love Experiment spinoff for best friend Fizzy).
I listened to Just for the Summer as an audiobook. Jimenez is also the author of Part of Your World, Yours Truly, The Friend Zone, and The Happy-Ever-After Playlist.
For my full review, please see Just for the Summer.
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