Blog Post
8.15.21
What makes it a rom-com? Seriously? Do you buy books with fun covers and good names and discover you’re reading something painfully staid and wooden? Yeah. Me, too.
I’ve been reading a BUNCH of what Amazon is willing to say are rom-coms. It’s not Amazon’s fault that I’ve read a list of NOT FUNNY books. After all, humor is so very subjective. What I think is funny might not tickle you at all. How can Amazon insist on a Six Minimum Giggles rule? They can’t; they have to allow the authors or publishers to tell them what category their book should be in (and sometimes authors and publishers LIE, man! Like, some serious pants on fire!)
When I started my research about two weeks ago, I went to Amazon’s top ten best romantic comedies and found—just as an example—a boxed set of books about men who transformed into dragons. This is not your typical entry on a rom-com list, but perhaps they were very, very funny dragons.
Anyway, I started reading (but not the dragons). I read a full dozen books. One so deeply annoyed me that I had a nightmare about it. (No, I won’t tell you which one. Good luck out there.) Six left me wooden-faced. (By about book four, I was a tough sell, so this is perhaps not the MOST objective survey.) One got a smile. (Yes, I kept count.) One got a chuckle. Two inspired several giggles.
I wouldn’t have characterized any of them as a rom-com. (What were they doing there? It’s because rom-coms are “hot” in the publishing world. We’re all stretched thin by COVID and climate change and political terrorism and we all long for a gigglefest. Rom-coms, theoretically, to the rescue.)
And then came Lucy Score’s book, RILEY THORN AND THE DEAD GUY NEXT DOOR. Thank God! To the rescue, man!
This book actually made me laugh out loud. Repeatedly. It was written to make me laugh, and it succeeded. It lifted my mood and brightened my outlook and gave me hope to go on. TWO BIG THUMBS UP. Want your own link to buy a copy? Sure you do; here you go:
There’s a sequel, too. It’s my next one-click.
I looked into Lucy Score. She’s written about a million books, and she is the queen of romcom-style titles. Just look at this list and admire how clever her titles are:
Riley Thorn and the Dead Guy Next Door
Riley Thorn and the Corpse in the Closet
By A Thread
Forever Never
Worst Best Man (but not the one by Mia Sosa, which made me chuckle repeatedly)
No More Secrets
Pretend You’re Mine
Whiskey Chaser
Highball Rush
Gin Fling
Bourbon Bliss
Moonshine Kiss
Sidecar Crush
Rock Bottom Girl
Fall Into Temptation
The Last Second Chance
Protecting What’s Mine
The Price of Scandal
The Mistletoe Kisser
The Christmas Fix
Finally Mine
Mr. Fixer Upper
Under Cover Love
So I’m delighted with her, and with my future reading. Thought you might like to know of some good rom-coms in your future, too!
