Hollis Beckwith isn’t trying to get a girl—she’s just trying to get by. For a fat, broke girl with anxiety, the start of senior year brings enough to worry about. And besides, she already has a boyfriend: Chris. Their relationship isn’t particularly exciting, but it’s comfortable and familiar, and Hollis wants it to survive beyond senior year. To prove she’s a girlfriend worth keeping, Hollis decides to learn Chris’s favorite tabletop roleplaying game, Secrets & Sorcery—but his unfortunate “No Girlfriends at the Table” rule means she’ll need to find her own group if she wants in.
Enter: Gloria Castañeda and her all-girls game of S&S! Crowded at the table in Gloria’s cozy Ohio apartment, the six girls battle twisted magic in-game and become fast friends outside it. With her character as armor, Hollis starts to believe that maybe she can be more than just fat, anxious, and a little lost.
But then an in-game crush develops between Hollis’s character and the bard played by charismatic Aini Amin-Shaw, whose wide, cocky grin makes Hollis’s stomach flutter. As their gentle flirting sparks into something deeper, Hollis is no longer sure what she wants…or if she’s content to just play pretend.
We've all seen the movie. (No, not that one.) The slightly geeky guy is hunched over his desk, painting a little figure or playing with dice, when his mom tells him to bring the trash out. On the way, he meets the cute new neighbour, and the real story begins. Almost without exception, D&D is used in media as shorthand for a particular type of nerdy character; between the recent Chris Pine movie and now this novel, it's great to see it being used as a source of power instead.
I know only the basics of D&D - or, as it's rendered here, S&S - but I was able to follow what was happening as it's written in an easy to follow way. Hollis' growing confidence is amazing (also, that panic attack was scary real) and I loved watching the other girls build each other up. I would have liked to see more of Maggie, but that's literally the only thing I didn't like.
Oh, well, apart from Chris, who's a jerk, and Landon, who's worse. Nothing more to say there.
I can't wait to start selling this, I think it's going to do really well. A fabulous, fun read.
The No-Girlfriend Rule publishes on the 5th of March, 2024. I received a free copy and am giving an honest review.
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