At first glance, this does not appear to be something I'd typically enjoy - and I was partially right. While I found this book to be partially mediocre, there were still some aspects of it that I enjoyed.

Our main characters are two vastly different people. There's Violet, who isn't really a people person and finds them challenging and difficult to be around (I can relate to this), and Jack, who is a proud owner of the Golden Retriever Personality and beloved by everyone (except Violet, obviously). But then everything changes when Jack suddenly breaks his leg, putting his promising athletic future in jeopardy, and he ends up playing video games with Violet every night - but he doesn't know it's her.

I'm already not a huge fan of the author's writing style, having read a couple of other books by her, and this was no exception. I'm not a huge fan of Violet's character in general, and the way she's express her frustrations through these long rants that were pages and pages long - not something I'm particularly impressed by, as I sometimes found them unimportant to the story. I did like the layers of characterization though, and the complexities of the relationship between Violet and Jack.

In the end, I found this book pretty predictable, as most YA romances tend to be, and not something I'd likely gravitate toward in the future.

Twelfth Knight was an adorable young adult story. Bt I do not believe it was for me, However I can see why someone would give it five stars.

This book is EVERYTHING GIVE ME 14 OF EM RIGHT NOW.

I love a Shakespeare retelling and Twelfth Night retellings specifically are superior. Add in RPGs and cons and you have a GOLDEN young adult contemporary romance. The forced proximity and mistaken identity in The Twelfth Night were sooooo good in this retelling. I loved how this book was so obviously a retelling but was also extremely unique.

Vi was a super fun main character to follow because she thought she was a mean person and didn't care. She thought that because she was abrasive, that meant people couldn't like her. Jack was a super fun main character to follow because he realized for the first time that fandom and fantasy were fun. He was also a fun character to follow because he accepted Vi for who she was without judgement, but he still expected good things from her.

This was written SOOO well and I can't wait until I have my own copy and can highlight it. It's my favorite book by this author so far!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an e-arc in exchange for my honest review.

Honestly, I've been putting off reviewing this book for months, because I didn't have much to say about it. While the characters were okay, they didn't stand out at all to me and the romance didn't feel very special at all. I know Viola is supposed to be an unlikeable character, yet it became a bit much at times and made me not care very much about her or what she wants. I did like the role-playing video game addition to the story and how Viola and Jack bonded over it, but I think there could have been a bigger focus on it. One thing that is a bit irrational yet irked me nonetheless was the inside cover art. Don't get me wrong, the art is stunning, but it brings up a problem I had with the story. The super high fantasy illustration with the characters' players in the game feels so out of place and made me think that the book would lean way into the RPG game, when it really didn't go far enough.

Bottom line: This isn't a bad book, per se, but I think there's other books out there in this genre that I'd recommend to other people over this one.

Alexene Farol Follmuth is such a gifted YA author. She manages to tell cute, YA romance stories while discussing important and relevant things, and never ruins the balance of the two. This one follows Viola, a girl who loves gaming, tabletop roleplaying games, and all other aspects of nerd culture, and Jack, a popular football player who falls into gaming after an injury that threatens his sports career. Its real opposites attract story and follows the setup of the Shakespeare play with almost the same name, in a bare bones' way. There's hidden identity in an online game, and its great way to explore the sexism and harassment women in these spaces face. Viola's experiences in fandom have made her jaded and angry, giving her an arc that feels very complex and relatable, and deeper than what is often presented in YA stories. She does come off as very unlikable at times, but its always understandable. Jack also has a great arc, and the ways they help each other are very sweet and make them easy to root for as a couple. There's also a great supporting cast, who I would read full books about on their own.

Ultimately, I would not hesitate to recommend this to teen readers who have gotten excited about Dungeons and Dragons, or fandom in general. I'd also recommend it to readers who are looking for romance with a little something more, and while I'm not sure it'd fit into our small collection, I'd be excited to get it through inter-library loan often.

A Reese book club pick for YA readers. A fun love story that follows the trope of the nerd and the jock. A cute love story for those YA Gamers.

Book 24 of 2024 - ✅! Thank you to NetGalley, Tor Publishing Group | Tor Teen and Alexene Farol Follmuth for an ARC of Twelfth Night by Alexene Farol Follmuth in exchange for my honest review.

10 Things I Hate About You. Clueless. She’s the Man. Iconic movies and brilliantly done adaptations of Shakespeare plays into movies. When I saw Twelfth Night by Alexene Farol Follmuth, I KNEW I was the target audience and requested it immediately on NetGalley.

In my quest to get through all of the book I’d requested and were sitting in my queue it took me longer than I would have liked to get to it.

After suffering an injury during a football game that renders him unable to play for the rest of the school year, Jack “Duke” Orsino turns to the online game Twelfth Night for comfort and community. It’s there that he meets the online persona Cesario, who, unbeknownst to Jack, is the online alter ego to Viola “Vi” Reyes. Vi, like Jack, turns to the game as an escape as well, and the 2 bond over late-night conversation while playing the game. In this gender-bending adaption of Twelfth Night, Follmuth does do a good job of brining Shakespeare to that same audience that loves the movies I mentioned at the beginning of this review, but the book felt slightly too long for me. However, Follmuth gets major points for diversity all-around.

3/5 ⭐️ overall. 🌶️ scale is not relevant here as it’s a YA book. While I don’t happen to participate in the larger book clubs, this is one of Reese’s Book Club picks. 💻 ⚔️ 🏈 #NetGalley #twelfthnight

Thank you so much for the opportunity to read this title. It was an absolute blast.

I loved the characters and the struggles they had individually. I liked how they fit together to grow in the ways they needed to.

I loved how celebrated "nerd" culture was, and the patriarchal issues within the space.

This was a book I would have loved as a kid, and I am glad that teens have this now.

Twelfth Knight delivers a realistic tale of high school drama, qualms with yourself as you're growing up, and the unexpected consequences of personal injury. I was a big fan of the main character, Viola. I feel as if a lot of people will say she's too mean, or unbearable to read, but I grew up as that girl who was closed off from everyone because she was afraid that being lonely was easier than being loved and then abandoned. Both main characters have nontraditional family situations. Jack's parents are divorced but co-parent very easily and Viola lives with her single mother who has historically used romance and dating as a social experiment. Both versions of these nontraditional families feel very realistic.

The biggest let down for me was the very beginning of the story. There was a lot of exposition that needed to happen before the two main characters are even in each other's paths (besides them being in Student Government together where they don't really communicate either). There's a lot of setup for both ConQuest and Twelfth Knight, but only follow through on Twelfth Knight. I think to be able to move the story along a little be more there could've been lest focus on ConQuest.

All in all, it was an average book that delivered a very lovely ending that had me rooting for everyone!

3 ⭐️

Having been a girl gamer myself (WoW) and heavily involved in various fandoms, I’ve seen a lot of the things this book brings to light about being a female in the gaming and fandom world. That being said it also implied that every male in these types of environments will take on one, if not more, of these characteristics. That is simply not the case and is even more prejudice than the author is trying to prove males are in these environments.

This book came off far too preachy and I felt like I was being lectured to by a teenager.

I would not recommend this book.


**Thank you, NetGalley and Tor Publishing Group for sending this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.**

D&D is so popular with the teens in my library right now! I love making displays to go along with their interests and this was super cute. A defininte purchase.

The book was a good, solid four stars. The characters meeting in an anonymous way is always a fun trope and seeing their relationship blossom. I thought the FMC growing, but not in a way where she had to lessen herself to fit into the world, was handled well.

The biggest pet peeve for me was the way football was talked about. There were a few points in the book where the sports writing didn't make sense, which is to be expected in a YA book/show/movie, but the one I couldn't get over was the idea that he was going to come back from an ACL reconstruction in the same season. I can appreciate that maybe the point was the character was being delusional, but the timeline of the injury recovery was so wild, it took me out of the story. He easily could've sprained his knee/broken a bone/etc. and that aspect of the story would have made sense.

DNF’ing at about 5%. I’ve come to the conclusion YAs are just not for me anymore. Every YA book I’ve read this year has been disappointing and juvenile. This one lost me when I read 3 chapters back to back about the FMC playing D&D or whatever they were playing. I understand this plays a big part in the development of the story but I can’t sit through this. No more YAs for me… for a very long while.

I received this eARC from NetGalley and the publisher in return for an honest review.

There are stretches of telling and not doing, mostly going into detail around the play mechanics of the video game, the one knock on this book.

Using an MMO as the mechanism for assumed identities as a way to bring Twelfth Night into the 21st century was realistic. This book struck me as much more earnest than comedic, although I did find the main characters to be charming and it largely avoided some of the tropes around geeky kids.

Wow is all I can say. I was really annoyed by Viola's character at the beginning of the book. I thought she was being too gung ho about her feminism ideas and being extremely straight forward and to the point and brash is no the only way to get your point across and is often not the most effective way to do so. Until I took a step back and realized that I was exactly like viola when I was in high school. Too convinced that everyone would leave or hurt you so it was better to keep everyone at arms length instead to keep them from doing so. Deciding that the love wasn't worth the pain that would eventually come. I was reminded recently that sometimes the things that annoy us the most only do so because it reminds us too much of something we want to forget about or want to have back but can't. And I definitely think that philosophy is applicable in this situation. At the end I found myself more interested in Viola's character growth and journey than in the romance. which my outlook is more often the other way around. I went into this book thinking it was just another silly little rom com like my all time favorite movie "She's The Man" but it surprised me by being much more than that. I could expect this reaction from an expertly written non fiction self help book but, like Viola's approach to the world, sometimes that's not the best way to go about it.

Thank you to the publisher and netgalley for granting me early access to this book! It's such a treat to read. The trend of Shakespeare retellings as YA novels is my new favorite, and this one is one of the best. I love these characters and their dynamic so very much.

Such a cute, fun modern retelling of "Twelfth Night"! I'm not a huge Shakespeare fan but I do love a retelling that brings new nuance, depth, and diversity to the story, which this one definitely does. It follows Jack, a star football player who gets injured and is forced to take time off from the sport, and his nemesis, Viola, a proud nerd who can't stand Jack's laid-back attitude. When the two unknowingly begin playing an MMORPG together, they find themselves becoming closer and closer.

I love how the author infused this with fandom and nerd culture! I especially love the thoughtful conversations around being a girl in fandom and gaming communities and navigating the misogyny within those social circles. Viola is a feminist and I loved that she wasn't willing to back down when boys tried to intimidate her.

This book pairs really well with the author's previous book, "My Mechanical Romance" since that one also features an enemies-to-lovers romance that deals with feminism and being a girl in a traditionally male-dominated space. I think I prefered that one since this one did feel a little too long, but overall I still really liked this one! Both books star Filipino-American girls, which I always love to see.

Check this one out if you liked "Didn't See That Coming" by Jesse Q. Sutanto or the "Geekerella" series by Ashley Poston!

A spin on the Twelfth Night involving a football star, a grumpy nerd, and a video game that unites them. Vi Reyes finds herself unexpectedly working with Jack Orsino in a video game. However, he does not know it is her (and thinks it is her brother). In real life, they start to get closer as well as they both work toward becoming true to themselves.

Teenage rom-coms can be hit or miss for me. This one started out slow, but then I really started to like it. I think it was because this focuses a lot on being authentic to yourself. yes, there is some romance, but all the storylines, even the side ones, are really about accepting who you are. Even at the end, when they are together, Vi even says something along the lines of it won't necessarily lead to marriage or kids, etc., which I appreciated. I also appreciated the way the author portrayed what a healthy relationship is - as in you can fight and be mad, but it doesn't mean everything is over or ended. If you find it a little slow, just stick with it until about ⅓ way and then it really picks up.

I received my copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Unfortunately, this book was a DNF. I had high hopes since I loved 'My Mechanical Romance' but this book just wasn't for me.

My first issue was the writing style. It felt very awkward. It seems there was an attempt to be quirky but it just took me out of the story. I also disliked the characters. I felt I could've really connected to the FMC, especially with her passion for intersectional feminism as well as her being a girl who is comfortable with herself and isn't the typical female character, with her being somewhat gruff. I really felt I could've liked her. However, I just found her annoying and she had a "not like other girls" aura to her and I really couldn't be bothered to look passed it. The MMC was even worse because at some points in the story, he is absolutely insufferable and at other points, he is overwhelmingly boring.

Unfortunately there was nothing about this story that made me want to push through.

Twelfth Knight is a modern retelling of the Shakespearean classic, Twelfth Night, with a bit of a nerdy twist. Viola is your typical nerd. She’s into RPG’s, video games, loves the Renaissance Faire, and does really well in school. But, she’s a SHE. To try to avoid the misogyny that is rampant in nerdy fandoms, she creates a male alter-ego on her favorite RPG video game, Twelfth Knight. Enter football superstar Jack Orsino. After an injury sidelines his football career, he turns to Twelfth Knight for comfort and entertainment as he heals. He ends up teaming up with Viola’s alter-ego in game and the two do surprisingly well. They create a bond and friendship online, but Viola has been keeping her secret identity from him. When their real world relationship collides with their online one, how can Viola reveal her secrets to him without hurting the one person she has started to have feelings for?

This retelling was very well done. Viola is the epitome of the grumpy in “grumpy sunshine.” Her likeability is a large part of the plot, and I thought her arc was beautiful. You could really feel the pain and insecurity hiding behind her gruff exterior. It was also lovely seeing Jack break through her shell. This book handled the mistaken identity trope in such an ingenious way by translating it to online characters vs. real life people. It was entirely believable and made so much sense in this modern age. I also appreciated the commentary on the misogyny in the fantasy/gamer realm and women not being taken seriously when they have a passion for it. The nerd-core, in general, was on point and wonderful. I would have liked to see a little more romantic tension between Viola and Jack building throughout, because the bits that we did get were fantastic and I wanted more of it. Overall, Twelfth Knight was a super fun read and I definitely recommend it.