I was SO impressed with the writing and storytelling in this heartbreaking but swoony Hollywood romance. I can't wait to read more from Wilder.

I liked the idea of How To Fake It In Hollywood, and enjoyed the first part of the book more than the last. The second half had more drama and wasn't quite what I was expecting. I appreciated the characters growth by the end of the book, but there were times that their relationship seemed a bit toxic to me. I'm honestly not sure if I was even rooting for Grey and Ethan as a couple by the end. Overall, there were things I liked about the book, but it just wasn't the one for me.

Thank you to Random House for the NetGalley ARC!

Prior to reading this, I had never read a book by Ava Wilder, so I really didn't know what to expect from this story. The elements of everything I love in a romance were there: fake-dating, a Los Angeles setting. and why not throw in celebrity/PR shenanigans while we're at it? How to Fake it in Hollywood was turning out to be the perfect romance for my summer.

However, despite my general enjoyment of this romance, I did have some issues connecting with the story. This is a classic case of "it's not you, it's me" but I found myself not clicking with our protagonists. Obviously, we live completely different lives, as I am not a Hollywood starlet coming off of a hit teen-soap, but while I was reading, I couldn't help but feel like there was a wall between me and Grey and Ethan that made me feel disconnected from the story. I also had an issue with the addressing of Ethan's addiction, and how it felt a little too normalized in the book. Addiction is no stranger to Hollywood, but the way it was written into this book felt like the author was driving the point home a little too far, especially in regards to the protagonists' lack of conversation around it.

Despite my critiques, How to Fake it in Hollywood was a delightfully steamy romance for my late summer nights (full of reading, of course). I can definitely see myself reading more by Ava Wilder in the future because this was a solid contemporary romance.

Rating: 3.5 stars
Thank you to the publishers for the ARC! In no way did this affect my rating.

How to Fake it in Hollywood is a fake dating romance that follows the POV of Gray and Ethan. Gray was a child star who's current acting career as an adult is failing. So when she is offered the chance to save her career through a fake relationship with a very famous actor, she reluctantly takes it. Ethan, who once had a very successful acting career, is now living a reclusive life where he drinks away the pain of his best friend's death and his very profiled divorce. But in order to finally complete the project that he and his best friend had started, Ethan needs to fix up his ruined reputation. As a result, Gray and Ethan begin their fake relationship as a publicity stunt to boost and fix up their careers. But it slowly turns into something more than a publicity stunt.

I absolutely loved Hollywood setting and the insight into the lives of actors. It was so fun and was one of my favorite aspects of this book. I did find the characters to be very frustrating at some points in the story. In some cases in made sense, especially since Ethan was struggling with grief and his coping method was alcohol. Watching his journey was both heartbreaking and frustrating at the same. One thing that knocked down my rating from a 4 star to a 3.5 was the miscommunication trope. It was vey present in Gray and Ethan's relationship and so many things could have been solved if they would have communicated like the adults they are.

Overall, if you love the Hollywood setting and want a cute romance with some deeper topics, I would recommend picking this one up!

Fake relationships in Hollywood are a staple of celebrity and romance novels, so I confess to coming into this one with low expectations for such an old cliche. But major props to Wilder for crafting a story full of characters that feel like real people and emotions that hit true while avoiding all the pitfalls of a cliched story.
Grey is a great character because she's in the industry but not enough to be disassociated with how 'normal' people react to celebrities and the awful ways that their privacy is invaded. She's an extremely likable character that you can't help but root for as she works hard to get what she wants. Ethan is the epitome of the damaged hero in need of someone to love him. He has some very serious issues that I'm happy to say don't get magically fixed by him falling in love with Grey, which is one of my biggest pet peeves with damaged heroes. Seeing him slowly realize that the path he's on is a bad one and actually working to fix it by himself is a high point in the book.
Overall, it's a very solid romance with high levels of drama and tension that work to make the inevitable and eventual HEA all the sweeter.

Very happy thanks to NetGalley and Dell for the emotional read!

I absolutely LOVED this debut from Wilder! This book uses a fake dating trope, but the characters are so well-developed and deep. The typical Hollywood cliches don't apply because Wilder did such a great job making this relationship feel so real and well-thought out. I've been recommending this book to everyone this summer and can't wait to see what Wilder writes next! This book has so much heart and you couldn't help but root for these characters!

I loved this book. I’m glad I had heard enough about it to know that it deals with heavy topics and the tone is heavier than what the illustrated cover seems to suggest, so I went in with the right expectations. I think the author did a great job of exploring Hollywood, fame, addiction, and grief. I’m also really happy about how the 3rd act break up was handled. It was a big gamble for the author, but I think it was the right choice for the characters and the situation.

I started the ebook version since I had an ARC of it, but ended up listening to the audiobook and I think the narrators did an amazing job with the narration.

Celebrity romances aren't usually my jam, but I LOVED this book! Everything about it worked so well for me. However, if you are looking for something super light and fluffy, I'd pass on this one as it deals heavily with grief and addiction. If readers know that going in, and are ok with that subject matter, then I highly recommend this emotion filled, age gap, fake dating romance! How To Fake It In Hollywood is an amazing debut and I cannot wait to see what Ava Wilder writes next!

I'm going to need to think for awhile about how to rate this because I'm trying to separate how triggering the end of this book was for me with how I actually felt about it.

The bottom line, though, is that I think there's a critical problem to this book: it focused far too much on the progression of their relationship while Ethan was an alcoholic, rather than them working through it after he began to receive treatment (which I'm not providing a spoiler warning for because I think we should all hope that a romance novel wouldn't romanticize alcoholism).

This book would have worked better if it had dual timelines, one half of the story being them falling for each other, the fake dating, whatever, and then the other half taking place after rehab. That was far too big of a third act conflict for the last 30-40 pages or so to make up for it.

Despite these problems, I did care about the characters and the story. I think that's part of why I'm so torn up about it. I wanted more for Grey than this. And I wanted Ethan to take accountability for himself before the book was turning to a close. It felt a little bit like watching a train leave the station knowing it was going to wreck in an hour. I wanted so desperately to stop it before it got there.

Maybe that's a testament to the way she got these characters into my heart, or maybe it's a testament to my own mental health issues: that I saw myself in Grey and wanted to tell her to not make the mistakes I am so afraid of making myself. I know the book never tried to romanticize Grey's inclination to "fix" Ethan, but I feel it never fully succeeded. She welcomed him back too easily. I don't know. I just wanted to see the work he did to become better, rather than hear him promise things I am hesitant to believe (though, I know of course, that Ava Wilder wants us to believe them). They're just not...believable, I guess.

I don't know. I think this book could work for a lot of people, but I am not one of them. This book hit too close to home for me to love it. There's some books that hit too close in a good way, in a way that makes you love it more (see: Radio Silence, Imagine Us Happy), but some books that hit too close to home in the way that makes you squint your eyes, like "are they really doing that? am I really about to watch a train wreck happen when I know how easily it can be prevented?"

I think, also, one of the things that bothered me throughout was how Grey never brought up his clear alcoholism until it was too late. She wasn't worried about it until he had disappeared to a bar and came back on alcohol and drugs. (Again, I'm not putting a spoiler warning because these are things people who could be triggered by these topics should know.) She should have been worried before, and I think, honestly, any person would be, so I don't love the authorial decision to make her so naive or, I suppose, willfully ignorant.

Anyway, this review has gone on long enough, but what I'm hoping has come across is that I don't think this is a bad book. It's just a bad book for me. I think some readers might be able to read this easily while others might have a hard time.

TW: alcoholism (graphic), drug addiction (mild and implied), drug use (mild), discussions of physical abuse, leaked nudes (not sure what the word for this is...), poor parent/child relationships, death of a loved one, grief

Always a fan of the fake dating trope, I knew I would love How to Fake it in Hollywood by Ava Wilder. Plus I mean look at this cover, it is so cute. But I underestimated how much, because I loved this book.

Grey Brooks was a child actor, a main character on a TV drama and now is trying to figure out what to do next. Enter her Publicist with a crazy idea, fake date one of her other clients. But her other client is none other than Ethan Atkins, major movie actor, who has done nothing the last five years since the loss of his best friend. Intrigued by the idea and meeting Ethan, Grey decides to take the meeting, and then sign the contact. Now she just has to make it through six months.

But be warned, this was not just a fun, lighthearted romcom. There was moments of that but Wilder tackled some tough subjects through Gray and Ethan. Including dealing with grief and loss of a friend, alcoholism, and being in the public eye along with social media. Their relationship, although starting as fake, was put through the ringer. I appreciated the push/pull and give/take that was written about because it doesn’t always come easy, and doesn’t happen has fast as what you would want.

How to Fake It in Hollywood is Ava’s debut novel and I cannot wait to see what she writes next.

How to Fake It in Hollywood is the kind of romcom that's fun, but it also has a serious side. I'm a fan of the fake dating trope, so I really enjoyed this one between Grey and Ethan. Their banter was so fun, and I found them both very multi-faceted! It does deal with some heavier topics so it's definitely not a light, fluffy read, but if you like character growth in your plots, this is a great one!

I adore the fake dating trope especially combined with forced proximity. This one has both. It's also a celebrity romance. Grey is trying to keep her career alive. Ethan, a former A-lister, wants to make one more movie and needs to come out of his self-imposed isolation. They make a deal (contracts and everything) and, despite themselves and their own personal demons, they fall for each other. It's not an easy fall or an easy romance. There's grief and addiction along with regret. It gave me some of the same vibes as the movie A Star is Born (but with a different ending). It is a romance so you know there's going to be a HEA, but boy was it a journey to get there. This felt authentic and hard. It was worth reading and experiencing all they were feeling. I recommend, but know that this has some serious themes.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a copy. All opinions are my own.

I am not a fan of celebrity romance and this was a bit cringe for me but I wouldn't say it is an entire cringe cringe. But good enough cringe if that makes sense

Thank-you NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for the chance to review this ARC.

I was not expecting this book. Like I feel like I got more than I bargained for but in the best way!

Grey and Ethan I loved them!

I loved the writing style here, and how real and raw the characters felt.

I’m a sucker for fake dating stories and as a teenager, I was super obsessed with People magazine and reading all about celebrities and their lives. This book is really the best of both of those worlds, but with a lot more serious content than I was expecting.

Grey, a B list star, and Ethan, an A list star who hasn’t been out in years, agree on a mutually beneficial setup from their agents. They’ll get some buzz as a couple, it will help both their careers. Despite Ethan’s very prickly personality, they catch feelings. But that’s not the end of this story. They face a lot of battles as a couple - Grey’s hesitancy to trust, Ethan’s guilt over the death of a friend and his alcoholism.

This was a fun and sometimes spicy read that delved into much more serious issues than I had expected, but I enjoyed the candor and the lack of an immediate happily ever after as soon as they admitted feelings.

This book is a 4.5 for me. This book shows you a little bit of the struggles actors and actresses like Grey and Ethan may go through. From the first time they met, you could feel the tension between Grey and Ethan and I knew they couldn’t hold in their feelings and sexual desires for too long. They both had their own personal struggle that they tried to get through together but we all know they need to handle them alone. This book really pulled at my heartstrings and I recommend that all readers read this book at least once.

Eh. This trope is overdone. Why is it always a hollywood person meeting a normal person and suddenly their world is changed? The story was fine, but it isn't a trope I enjoyed reading.

First, I loved this beautiful cover art! It's what originally drew me into wanting to read this book. The story did not disappoint! This book was perfect. I absolutely loved Gray and Ethan. Can't wait to read more by Ava Wilder!

This wasn’t really on my radar….. Until I started seeing so many people talking about it. And then of course, I had to find out about it too. I will say this tho…. I will no longer be using Goodreads as my main book tracking app/site. I had no idea this had one of my biggest triggers in it.

Like I said this has one of my biggest triggers in it. Drug abuse. I’ve said why time and time again, and i don’t want to say it again. And because there’s no clear space on Goodreads for TW/CW, most people have put them on their review (which I don’t read until I’ve written my own so there’s no way I can be influenced on what I think about it ), or they might place a spoiler alert on it. Which doesn’t work for someone like me. I don’t like spoilers or any kind, so I would never click on that. Because of that, I missed them entirely. Normally when people say this is heavy or whatever, I would check on Storygraph, but for whatever reason I never thought it would be THIS. So I didn’t. And it cost me. I found myself anxious and stressed about their recovery and so so sad for the people they left behind. It took me a good while to remove myself from the situation and remember that it was a book and not what happened to my uncle and cousin. Once I realized I was spiraling, I realized it was my fault. I shouldn’t have let my guard down and assumed that it meant sad in another way. But then I also thought it was the author’s fault for not including a TW page. Obviously I was still spiraling but whatever lol

Other than that, I thought it was ok. Y’all know fake dating is my jam. It’s actually the reason I wanted to read this. I saw that people were saying it was heavy, but because it was fake dating, I was thinking heavy was concerning the dating part. (Definitely not.) The romance was cute also. It started off with what I thought was some elements of enemies to lovers, but now on the other side of this, it seemed like the fighting only started when they were still fighting their addiction. But once they finally got it together, it worked. And I was happy for them. They turned out to be what the other needed. Not savior wise, but really like they needed each other. It was sad and heartbreaking and not at all what I thought I was going to get from the cover.

Though I enjoyed this one and the angst, I could have done without the triggers. I now know better than to trust the cover and the just assuming triggers. Definitely something I will think about more when I think of picking up another book by Wilder. Solid debut, but I will be more wary of their next one.

4.25 stars! i was thoroughly surprised with this book and really liked it, which i thought i would!

grey and ethan were both such likable characters even when i didn’t want to. they were kind and wanted the best for themselves and the ones they loved but were dealing with their own demons. the synopsis had interested me but i was nervous it would let me down but it didn’t! truthfully, i did think it would be a little lighter in topic but the issues written about were handled well and not just fixed with easy solutions.

without giving too much away, there’s always simple love cures all solutions in books especially when dealing with issues discussed in this book and i’m glad it wasn’t. it was still light enough to be a romance so pleasw don’t look to this book like it has deep, intensive solutions. i just thought it was heavier than most romcoms but still in a tasteful way.

grey and ethan’s characters were ones i enjoyed reading. they were kind and multifaceted and lovable despite everything. tbh i was getting sort of a weird vibe from nora but that’s neither here nor there.

anyway! i liked this one and i probably will be buying my own copy! thanks netgalley and the publisher for sending this my way in return for an honest review.