One Rom, one Romcom

Finished two quick reads this weekend, one romance and one romcom.

Love, Comment, Subscribe (by Cathy Yardley) 

Romance isn't my favorite genre, but I enjoyed the social media hook on this one and so I selected it as my free book for September. (In case I haven't mentioned it before, Amazon gives Prime members one free book per month, which is a fun little perk.) Childhood friends Lily Wang (type A beauty influencer) and Tobin Bui (happy-go-lucky prankster) are social media influencers and end up back in each others' orbit when they start collaborating on videos for their respective channels. I find all the explicit sex somewhat awkward (especially with fanfiction tropes, why the "blown pupils" every time, why)  but these are believable characters with realistic conflict and plenty of chemistry; if you like romance, you could do worse.

Better Than the Movies (by Lynn Painter) 

A young adult romantic comedy that's in part about romantic comedies, which our main character loves (in part because her late mother loved them).  Due to a bet over a parking spot, her neighbor (again with the childhood friend, this time the boy next door) tries to set her up with happily ever after after another childhood friend comes back to town.  The "best friend" character feels quite sidelined but that's my only nitpick. Overall the main characters are delightful, their banter is hilarious and cute, and Elizabeth's inner conflict stemming from the death of her mother is handled sensitively. And of course the meta-layer is delightful as I love both romcoms and meta-ness. This is a definite thumbs up from me. (And of these two books, this is definitely the one I wish I owned so I could read it again sometime.)