April Whittier has secrets of her own. A hardcore Lavinia fan, she’s hidden her fanfiction and cosplay hobby from her “real life” for years—but not anymore. When she decides to post her latest Lavinia creation on Twitter, her photo goes viral. Trolls and supporters alike are commenting on her plus-size take, but when Marcus, one half of her OTP, sees her pic and asks her out on a date to spite her critics, she realizes life is really stranger than fanfiction.
Even though their first date is a disaster, Marcus quickly realizes that he wants much more from April than a one-time publicity stunt. And when he discovers she’s actually Unapologetic Lavinia Stan, his closest fandom friend, he has one more huge secret to hide from her.
With love and Marcus’s career on the line, can the two of them stop hiding once and for all, or will a match made in fandom end up prematurely cancelled?
Hands up, this was my fault. I read the description, saw 'fandom' and 'fanfiction' and thought it was YA, even though I'm somewhere vaguely in the region of the ages of these characters and I write fanfiction. It's actually an adult romcom, not for teens at all. I'm so glad I made the mistake, though, because I would have missed out on this funny, heartfelt, touching novel.
Although this features one of my least favourite tropes – Character Keeps Secret That Damages Relationship – it's done in such a clever, engaging way, I found I didn't care at all. The characters were so clearly drawn, flawed but trying their best, that I really loved reading about them. Even the side characters were brilliant – and Olivia, I'm still waiting to find out what happened to Alex at the end! He wasn't mentioned in the round up, which was excellently done. I'm also very angry at various parents; one seemed to be doing it out of love, but the others can go jump in a lake. They were awful.
All the nods to fandom were amazing. Olivia has clearly spent time there. Although there are, of course, trolls and bad people in fandoms, as there are everywhere, on the whole fandoms are warm and accepting places and I have made some of my best friends in them, as April has in this novel. It's lovely to see a novel that celebrates and loves fandom and fanfiction; so many 'proper' writers seem to turn up their noses at it (though I know a lot of authors support it, and I'm very happy about that.)
I'm really glad I accidentally fell over this book, and I can't wait to see what else Ms Dade comes up with. I'm sure it'll be great.
Spoiler Alert publishes on the 6th October, 2020.
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