As a long time lover of fanfics this book spoke to me and I am so happy I gave it a try. I’ve long ago realised that a good book doesn’t need to be a serious literary masterpiece but can indeed be a silly, tropey book. This book has not all of the tropes but a good amount of them! I absolutely love the humour in this book and I’ve come to realise that’s just something that Sophie Gonzales writes really well. I also really enjoyed the aroace rep in Henry that was a delightful surprise to me.

I love reading fandom-related books and this one was not an exception. It was a lot of fun to read. Fun and occasionally frustrating because of the characters. They, and their decisions and thoughts, definitely felt age-appropriate to me. Which was both great and annoying in a cringe-worthy, all too relatable way.

The main relationship was cute and full of fun tropes. The flashbacks helped flesh it out. I was definitely rooting for them throughout. I also really liked the main platonic friendship and what it brought to the story. All the shenanigans were very entertaining to read. The book as a whole felt like a love letter to all things fandom.

I read an ARC of this book from NetGalley. All comments are my own.

I feel like the cover and description of the book don’t really match the plot at all. Also this is the first time I’ve read a YA book that made me feel like I’m too old to read YA. All the characters were way too immature for me. I think other people would enjoy this book, but it definitely isn’t for me.

There was a lot to love here. The coming out, discussions around their friendship ending, but I did find that, for a character who’s a junior in high school, it felt like it leaned a bit younger. I did enjoy it, but it felt more like a book for 12-15 year olds rather than upper teens.

Great read! Fun and unique story about teenage friendships, how they relate to their parents, and learning that what we dream about and wish for isn't exactly what we may truly want. Loveable LGBTQ+ characters. Quick read, good story, tough to put down.

This story wasn’t up my alley. I have read Sophie Gonzalez other books and was excited to read this one. The premise sounded really interesting. However, when I was reading it, it didn’t really hit for me. I didn’t realize how much of this was a fanfiction based story, but also wasn’t into how it made it seem like people who wrote fanfiction didn’t want to face reality. Which comes off weird to me. I also didn’t like Mack and Ivy‘s friendship at all. The moments they had was fighting with each other which always seemed really petty. To me it made them really unlikable. This book came across to young for me. Which I think is the big reason this didn’t land the right way for me. If I was a lot younger I probably would have enjoyed it more. Unfortunately this one just isn’t and wasn’t for me.

This book had a very interesting premise but dragged as time went on. I wasn’t super pulled in by either of the characters, but enjoyed the dynamics and plot line. I did, admittedly, have quite high expectations for this book, and did end up a bit disappointed as a result, so my bad on that, but overall, a fun read.

I hated this book and definitely do not recommend it. I do not know how this is the same author that wrote Never Ever Getting Back Together. This book was literally a terrible idea and premise.

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC!

This is sooooo delightfully silly. It made me giggle constantly. I only give it four stars because sometimes the cheese was a little much.

This story follows a girl who accidentally wishes into existence her favorite tv character and then with the help of her best friend, ex-best friend, and the power of fanfiction they work together to get rid of him.

This is like helpful robot turns evil but make it gay and fanfiction i was obsessed with the plot!

As much as I love Sophie Gonzales, this book was not up my alley 😅 that's the problem with automatically requesting every book of hers, because I didn't read the synopsis. Otherwise I'd known this was about fanfiction, of which I'm not a fan, ooops. But as always, this book was easy to read, fluid, and so muchhhh queeeernesssss 💛

This book was adorable. A queer romance with friends-to-enemies-to-lovers YA novel with elements of magic and fanfic - what's not to love. I enjoyed how the book did not take itself too seriously and poked fun at the tropes in these kinds of books. The enjoyed the dual timeline with a diverse cast of characters. It was really adorable and I am thankful for the arc.

Thank you NetGalley for giving me an ARC of this story.
SPOILERS TO FOLLOW

I would like to preface this review by saying that I have loved Sophie Gonzales books in the past. I've read Only, Mostly Devastated and Perfect On Paper and enjoyed both. I'm too old for the YA genre but after reading the synopsis of the story I thought I'd fall in love with it. It's sapphic (with a bisexual main character and a lesbian Love Interest), it has fanfic tropes, and had the main character bringing her fictional boyfriend to life! That sounded like so much fun in principal but... I didn't like the execution.

I'm sure if I had read this book when I was younger I would've adored it, especially all the fanfic references like coffee shop AU's and the soulmate's first words on your wrist, etc. But reading it in this book felt very awkward like it was being forced onto the reader. There were a lot of scenes too that just didn't work well for me. Specifically the scene where Mack, Henry and Ivy try to write a new fanfic about Weston and they add in ALL these different elements like a TARDIS, dinosaurs, cures for cancer, etc. so that the scenario is completely illogical and made no sense. If they were being serious about testing out a new fanfic idea Ivy should have written something more mundane.

The fights between Mack and Ivy felt really petty too and so unserious. All of Mack's and Ivy's conversations didn't feel like real people talking. Some of the things they said to each other simply made no sense with the context of what they were saying. For example, Mack yelling at Ivy about a "sex dungeon" she had because Mack heard that a boy was over at Ivy's house. It felt so out of left pocket and I didn't enjoy it.

I didn't end up liking either Mack or Ivy by the end of the book. My favorite characters ended up being Henry and Weston. Henry because he was ACTUALLY funny and seemed like a genuinely good person and Weston because even though he was "fake" and was a little scary toward the end he was fun and ended up in funny situations and was so earnest that it was hard not to like him.

I also didn't like the implication that people only write fanfics when they can't face their own reality. That's what it felt like Ivy was saying at the end and as someone who wrote fanfic, that wasn't true for me. I'm sure it's true for some people but it's not true for everyone. It made writing fanfics sound... bad? In a way? Like people should stop doing what makes them happy just because its not real.

I am withholding my review until the publisher:

1) Addresses and denounces the Islamophobic and racist remarks from their employee.
2) Offers tangible steps for how they are going to mitigate the harm this employee caused.
3) Addresses how, moving forward, they will support and protect their Muslim, Arab and Palestinian influencers, authors and readers, in addition to supporting their BIPOC influencers, authors and readers.

Thanks to Netgalley and Wednesday Books for the eARC!

I'm calling it now. This will be in my top 5 books of the year. This effervescent romcom plops is right in to the head of Ivy, a dedicated fan of a show called HMAD about teen models with superpowers (and doesn't that just sound like fun?!)

We get to experience Ivy's cracking friendship with Mack and her relationship with her over eating mother in flashbacks interspersed throughout the book.

I don't want to spoil it but the humor regarding fanfic tropes is lovingly done and right up my alley!

In support of the SMP boycott, I will be withholding my review of this title until SMP speaks out. If the boycott is resolved, I will update with a full review.

I really, really wanted to love this one because I've loved previous books by Sophie Gonzales, but I just really do not enjoy magical realism. I stuck it out to finish the book because I loved the YA queer aspect and I wanted to know what happened, and it was a quick read. But overall, thanks to not enjoying magical realism, this one was not for me.

The Perfect Guy Doesn't Exist is a perfect YA novel for youth who are just trying to figure it all out. Navigating friendships, crushes, and your identity, all while going through school can be tough - but Sophie Gonzales does a great job bringing it all together and wrapping it up with a bow.

It was an easy read at first but then I started to get bored and skimmed through the rest of the book. I felt like younger me would've enjoyed this a lot more. I just felt like everyone was so immature. Ivy and Mack's friendship seems toxic as hell. Ivy has an unhealthy attachment to Mack and Mack just seems so hot and cold. One minute she seems genuine and then the next minute, she wants nothing to do with Ivy. I don't know how I'm supposed to root for them as friends and as a couple.

The fictional character coming to life wasn't as fun as I thought it would be. Maybe because I found Weston over the top annoying. Yeah, this novel wasn't for me. Maybe I'm outgrowing YA because a lot of these new novels are either the same book written over and over or just plain ole boring.

I didn't feel super attached to the characters which was disappointing because as a nerd, a premise like this was really interesting. I think part of it may just be because I feel I have "aged out" of fandom culture, atleast compared to how I used to be.

Ivy is a high school junior who spent a year of her life writing fanfic about her favorite show after a disastrous fight left her without her closest friend, Mack.

Now she spends her time with Henry, her new best friend and obsessive fan of the same fantasy show, H-MAD.

Now, she’s got a week at home alone to do as she pleases, which includes hanging with Henry and binge watching her favorite show. Except, after a frightening thunderstorm, she finds Weston, the blue haired main character from H-MAD very much alive and standing in her bedroom.

Somehow that fanfic has brought her version of him very much to life. Ivy quickly realizes she needs help, and between wise cracking Henry and nosy Mack, they’re determined to figure it out…and maybe find their way back to friendship or more.

Here’s what worked for me:
•The book safely explores sexuality and coming out in a way that could be beneficial to kids.
•Henry is a delight.
•The girls have a good, level headed conversation to work out their differences and what led to the end of their friendship.
•It feels very much like a pre-teen novel.

Here’s what didn’t work for me:
•It reads like a book for 10-14 year olds, not 13-18 year olds. I could imagine it, with some edits, as a read aloud for my classroom.
•The characters and their dialog do not seem like juniors in high school. They read much younger.

For what it’s worth, with the fantasy elements, I could see this as a fun graphic novel!

Thanks to Netgalley and Wednesday Books for the e-ARC to read and review. Available March 26, 2024.