Blurb: When it comes to romance, sometimes it doesn't hurt to play games. A fun YA romcom full of fake dating hijinks!
Musical lover Riley has big aspirations to become a director on Broadway. Crucial to this plan is to bring back her high school’s spring musical, but when Riley takes her mom’s car without permission, she's grounded and stuck with the worst punishment: spending her after-school hours working at her dad’s game shop.
Riley can't waste her time working when she has a musical to save, so she convinces Nathan—a nerdy teen employee—to cover her shifts and, in exchange, she’ll flirt with him to make his gamer-girl crush jealous.
But Riley didn’t realize that meant joining Nathan's Dungeons & Dragons game…or that role playing would be so fun. Soon, Riley starts to think that flirting with Nathan doesn't require as much acting as she would've thought...
Review: Riley loves musicals so much that she drove her mom's car without a license to go with a friend to see a show and she was caught! As punishment, she must work in her father's gaming store, and there will be no extra-curricular activities. Except she is desperately trying to bring back her school's musical. Plus her ex is flaunting his new relationship in her face, so Riley pretends to be dating a nerdy boy at her dad's shop. It helps her deal with her ex and gives Nathan a chance to make the girl he likes jealous, but soon Riley develops feelings for him beyond their friendship. Yet is he just acting or does he like her too?
This book was a nominee for Goodreads Favorite Young Adult Fiction award in 2024. It called to me particularly because it involved a gaming store and DnD. It's a fun and light-hearted YA contemporary romance. Riley is super obsessed with musicals and her future career directing them, and it's wonderful to see how she grows in the story. I think she blooms from being a selfish child to a caring young woman who can be admired. I love the main setting being in the gaming store, and seeing the community with her new friends and her father. It was a realistic portrayal of teens playing DnD. Heck, I'm an adult and the player in my group who always plays a bard sings often too! There's a nice slow build in the romance, and I could see from the start how good Nathan would be for Riley.
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