The Rom-Commers by Katherine Center

I don’t think I’ve read a romance this epically swoony in a long time. The Rom-Commers was such a perfect end-of-summer read. The tone was light and funny and kind of over-the-top, in a way that made me feel like I was really in the narrator, Emma’s, head. This story was a beautiful commentary on the importance and power of love.

Emma is an aspiring screenwriter who put her career on hold to take care of her dad, who is paralyzed and has severe balance issues. She gave up her future to ensure that her little sister can follow her dreams. Emma is given the opportunity of a lifetime–she gets to go to L.A. and help her favorite screenwriter, Charlie Yates, write a rom-com.

Emma struggles to leave her dad in her sister’s care, and Charlie the person is a lot more complicated than Charlie the writer. He’s cynical, he doesn’t believe in love, and he keeps all his awards in a drawer out of sight. Through her efforts to make Charlie appreciate his success and believe in love, the two grow closer and closer. They finally admit their feelings for each other in a cinematic, unrealistic, rom-com way. Emma and Charlie get their happily ever after–not a perfect life, but a real one, where they can love each other fully.

I wish I could bottle how this story made me feel. It was electrifying, and it made me both wish I was in love and fully feel like I was. The Rom-Commers goes deeper than a lot of romance, beautifully exploring grief and guilt and the various complexities of life. I especially liked the repeated sentiment that life is the stories we tell. If we only share/write about the negative parts of life, our life will only be negative. We have to tell stories about love–we have to keep love active in our lives. I absolutely devoured The Rom-Commers, and I’m definitely adding Katherine Center’s other books to my TBR.

Thanks for reading with me,
Katie