A “romance” with very little romance…
Romantic Comedy is a serious romance that is not at all what it is advertised as.
SYNOPSIS
Sally Milz is a sketch writer for The Night Owls, a late-night live comedy show that airs every Saturday. With a couple of heartbreaks under her belt, she’s long abandoned the search for love, settling instead for the occasional hook-up, career success, and a close relationship with her stepfather to round out a satisfying life.
But when Sally’s friend and fellow writer Danny Horst begins dating Annabel, a glamorous actress who guest-hosted the show, he joins the not-so-exclusive group of talented but average-looking and even dorky men at the show—and in society at large—who’ve gotten romantically involved with incredibly beautiful and accomplished women. Sally channels her annoyance into a sketch called The Danny Horst Rule, poking fun at this phenomenon while underscoring how unlikely it is that the reverse would ever happen for a woman.
Enter Noah Brewster, a pop music sensation with a reputation for dating models, who signed on as both host and musical guest for this week’s show. Dazzled by his charms, Sally hits it off with Noah instantly, and as they collaborate on one sketch after another, she begins to wonder if there might actually be sparks flying. But this isn’t a romantic comedy—it’s real life. And in real life, someone like him would never date someone like her . . . right?
A Strange Format…
The book was very unique in its formatting. First, the book consists of only three very long chapters.
Chapter one follows the main character, Sally, who is a writer for a comedy sketch show, so basically SNL with a different name. Chapter one is 128 pages. I thought the fatigue of not having small chapters would get to me, but luckily there are timestamps that split the chapter into sections with the day of the week and the time.
Chapter two is where it is truly strange because the second chapter which consists of 70 pages is entirely emails exchanged between the two main characters. There is no narrative throughout this entire section, only the emails with the subject line above them.
A Story Difficult to Enjoy…
Now for a book called “Romantic Comedy” with a plot description of a girl who thinks sparks are flying with a celebrity, my expectations were that this book would be bubbly, funny, and cute. The reality was it was more like reading the fictionalized memoir of a comedy writer. It was a lot of work schedules, meetings, and information dumps on the fictionalized world. There were several pages I skimmed because I honestly did not give a damn about the history of the sketch show or the world of a writer, at least not in so much detail. The narrator, Sally would constantly go into these long explanations that would make me lose interest. Meanwhile the romance is less a romance, and more some subtle flirting and a lot of Sally’s internal monologue of insecurities and doubts. That was the part that actually kept me reading.
Chapter two is the one I really want to talk about. Chapter two takes place during the pandemic. That was surprise number one, when what I thought would be a bubbly romantic comedy turned into a covid romance. The second surprise was of course the email format. At first, it was intriguing reading a chapter of emails. The problem is this is the moment in the story where the character’s begin to truly get to know each other. Reading their emails began to feel impersonal and even dull at times. I found myself missing the beautiful narratives and internal monologues which usually make written work beautiful. The emails began to feel lazy rather than interesting as I struggled to feel the connection between Sally and Noah.
MORE DETAILS
Word Count (rounded)~ ?
Page Count: 320
Genres: Contemporary Romance
Reading their emails began to feel impersonal and even dull at times. I found myself missing the beautiful narratives and internal monologues which usually make written work beautiful. The emails began to feel lazy rather than interesting as I struggled to feel the connection between Sally and Noah.
Chapter three is back to the first person narrative, still during the lockdown but when face to face interactions started. This is the chapter I actually enjoyed more because the romance felt real, but the thing is, it’s not at all what the plot description advertised and that’s just something I want to make very clear.
The plot description didn’t properly convey the tone of the book. This book is much more serious. It’s not a comedy, either that or my sense of humor didn’t match it because I don’t think I laughed once. As for romance, it’s very mild. There aren’t a lot of interactions between the characters so I wasn’t entirely sold on this cosmic connection, but at the same time it felt more real because the romance seemed to be based on how much these two wanted to continue to interact with each other, which might not be what you’re looking for in fiction.
My Rating…
I personally never felt captivated by this book, and although there wasn’t much I disliked, there also wasn’t anything I loved which is why I’m giving this book one star for my personal score meaning it just wasn’t for me.
The next book I’ll be reading is “Back from the Dead” by Andre Spiteri, an indie author who sent me his book link on Threads.
Jasmin De Anda 