“I’ve always taken my relationship with my body seriously and wishing it were different, or worse insulting it outright, felt like a betrayal. I can be uncomfortable sometimes and I can dislike how I look occasionally but I can’t go through life hating my body. It’s the only one I get.” 🙌🏻👏🏻🙌🏻

Wyn is going to beat Three even if it kills her—or, preferably, him. Being freshmen staffers on the university newspaper puts them at the bottom of the pecking order—until a rare reporter spot opens up. Wyn and Three are both determined to get the position, starting a game of sabotage that pushes them to do their worst, from stealing each other’s ideas to playing twisted mind games.

As Wyn’s search for the perfect story leads her to an anonymous, campus-wide dating app, she hits it off with a mystery man she thinks might be the cute RA from her dorm. But Wyn is all too familiar with being rejected because of her weight, and she’s hesitant to reveal her identity, even as she grows closer with someone who might be the guy of her dreams.

When Three breaks a story that’s closer to home than he or Wyn expects, the two must put aside their differences to expose the truth—and face their real feelings for each other.

Ellen Quay nails the narration of this heavy set girl and her quest to be something great. Her voice just sounds YA, sucking you right into the story. She makes me feel for Wyn but also laugh out loud at times. An enjoyable listen!

Thank you to Netgalley, Spotify, @sam.markum, and @tlcbooktours for the audiobook.

This was an entertaining college rivals to lovers, with themes of friendship, body image, and family dynamics. The story was cute and the banter between Wyn and Three had me chuckling. I also appreciated the friends that Wyn made and how they were so different and brought various strengths to the relationship.

This is well paced and I appreciated that Wyn sometimes made mistakes and had to learn to navigate adult life and her personal feelings of self worth.

I listened to the audiobook and thought the narrator was a great match. She really embodied Wyn and made the listening experience great. This was another hit from Markum for me!

I voluntarily read and reviewed this book. All opinions are my own. Thank you to Spotify Audiobooks and NetGalley for the copy.

I'm always a little put off by extremely earnest teenagers. Like, I kind of remember the first year or two of college and distinctly do not recall anyone taking any single thing in thier lives as seriously as these kids take the school paper. But also, that's genX for you, or whatever.

I really liked This May End Badly… BUT the whole time I wanted Three’s story. There’s just something about him. Well, his book is here!! And it’s perfect. Him. Wyn. Their Banter. Their battles. Their relationship. Them. Perfection.
Don’t skip Love, Off the Record 💕🎉
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Casting:
Three Matt Czuchry
Wyn Selena Gomez

And of course back to Wells Derek Thelar

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for a chance to read and review.

I devoured with competitive rivals romance! There's fighting and there's flirting and there's all the angst! The authors wrote their chemistry so well!

Wyn is a girl who unsure of the road she's on (weren't we all like this?) She sees everyone makes friends and hook up and wonders why they can do it all so easily. She does know she wants the position at the university newspaper and she will take down her once-friend-now-rival Three to get it. When they have to work together is when the sparks begin to fly.

I wasn't sure if I was going to like Three but he grew on me as the story went on. Now, he's one of my favorite book boyfriends!

This was a fun read that tackles some heavy topics that are done with a gentle hand. I loved this smart and funny read and enjoyed the audiobook narrator very much!

I like a secret mystery crush book, and this didn’t disappoint. The main character really struggles with her confidence and worth. She is smart and kind, but can’t see that she is making friends, and is worth being a friend, I liked that there wasn’t just a romance in the story, but a big friendship aspect too. It gave the story more dimensions.

Well, that is three for three with this author (pun intended)... This is the third book I have read and absolutely loved from Samantha Markum.

This is rivals to lovers at it's finest! There is build up... There is tension... There is internal struggle... There is BANTER... This was just so much fun. I absolutely fell in love with these characters. Aside from the two main characters, we have this awesome group of fellow students that I really enjoyed.

I love the body positivity in this book. Wyn is plus sized and living most of my life in a fat body, myself, seeing her continue to love her body even when she is insecure about it was a great message. One I would have benefited from seeing when I was younger. Markum goes at it with a very real approach and gives it the right amount of focus.

If you want a cute, very funny academic rivals to lovers story, look no further!

I’ve been trying to listen to more audiobooks, so I jumped at the chance to listen to this one!

Freshman Wyn wants to be a reporter for her university newspaper, but so does Three, her newspaper staff nemesis.

Then scandal happens, and Wyn and Three go from being enemies to teaming up, giving them a chance at a huge story but also to face how they really feel for each other.

This was compared to a New Adult Hating Game, and I loved the vibe.

We have rivals to lovers, amazing banter, and deep love that never loses its character.

I love how Wyn and Three are with each other, how their friends are, and thoroughly enjoyed being part of their world for a little while.

I recommend this book- either in written or audiobook form! The story is so much fun and certainly hard to put down.

The audiobook was excellent quality, and almost gave it a TV show vibe, which I enjoyed.

If you want to elevate your podcast experience with some riveting fiction, download this!

Alex, Approximately is my FAVORITE young adult book of all time, so of course I need to read any book that claims to be similar. I definitely still like Alex, Approximately more, but can't really say that's a shock because, again... favorite YA of all time status. But don't let that deter you from reading this because I did really like it! Wyn and Three both write for the school newspaper, and even beyond competing for the same Campus Life position, their personalities clash. They do petty things like steal each other's story ideas and sell each other's stories to other news outlets before publication. Then, they anonymously match with each other on a dating app and hit it off.

I appreciated the conversations around being fat and how HARD escaping internalized fatphobia can be, because it's just so "sticky." Even though Wyn has grown to love her fatness, she still fears that it's a turn-off to potential romantic partners. Wyn and her friend/roommate, Dara, have a similar conversation about being Black on a dating app. I thought this was well done.

I didn't realize Three is a character from another one of Samantha Markum's books, so now I need to read her backlist. I'd never heard of her before finding this one on Netgalley, so I'm excited to have found a wonderful new-to-me author to explore!

In terms of the audio, I really liked the narrator. Her voice sounded exactly as I would have pictured Wyn's voice. She was animated and youthful (which I think is necessary when narrating young adult books, since sometimes the narrators just sound "too old," if you know what I mean?).

Thank you to Spotify Audiobooks for the advanced copy of this book!

This book was exactly what I have come to expect from Samantha Markum. It was filled with amazing banter, oodles of chemistry, and a ton of heart. I never wanted it to end. It was 400 pages and that still didn’t seem enough. Three and Wyn's story was so good. Watching them fight their attraction to each other was perfection. I liked Three in This May End Badly, but I loved him in Love, Off the Record. The one thing I wish was that we got a little more follow up from the last handful of chapters, but even with that wish I’m giving it 5 stars because it was that good to me. Make sure you pick this one up.

I listened to this audio in one sitting, I loved it. The tension and banter between Wyn and three is exactly what I love in enemies to lovers. Their competitive tactics against one another had me smiling and I loved the “game” they played. The mystery brought Wyn and Three together in unexpected ways and I liked the investigating that they did. I found the characters relatable, and the humor was great. Wyn’s roommates had the best conversations as they all had different backgrounds and I liked what they brought to the story. The ending was so heartwarming and left me very happy.

Thank you @tlcbooktours @netgalley @spotify @sam.markum for the gifted audio

I'm a huge Samantha Markum fan and I absolutely loved this enemies to lovers college romance between rival school paper grunts fighting for the same position. Throw in an anonymous online friendship, great #ownvoices fat and mental health rep and a fun undercover drug ring story and this was all kinds of entertaining! Perfect for those who enjoy authors like Rachel Lynn Solomon or Emma Lord and good on audio too. Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an early audio copy in exchange for my honest review!

CW: internalized fat phobia

Being a college student is hard. Making friends is hard. Moving away from home and not having the support base you need is hard. Having self-esteem issues because of your weight makes it all even harder. You get all of this through the writing in this story and it’s so well done that you feel all the anxiety and anguish that Wyn goes through. But you all get the highs – the chasing of a story, the stirrings of first love. I enjoyed getting to know Wyn and Three, watching them slowly fall for each other and follow a story for the paper that was bigger than they could have imagined.

Who doesn't love a good enemies to lovers trope? This cute YA is just the right book to start out a school year. I lived the characters, the dialog, and I hated for it to end. Wyn is such a relatable character and I see Three as a Logan Huntsberger type. I very much enjoyed this book and can't wait to see what Samantha Markum will write next. Thank you NetGalley for the advanced preview.

This was such a good romcom
The banter between the two main characters was top notch, I loved the character development and the issues within the main character as it shows that even when you work through an internal issue such as fat phobia as it has with this book, triggers still occur and set back happen but it doesn’t mean all is lost.
I love this book! Such a good couple I really felt the chemistry towards them

This was a really cute book and I enjoyed listening to it. The competitive rivals-to-lovers trope is one of my favorites, and I love that it is based around journalism and news because that is the industry I worked in, and I wish I could have a romance like this. The narration was really good and clear to follow along with. I think this is a cute romance, and I highly recommend the audiobook because as I was listening, I could picture all of it in my head.

I loved this book.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5

Thank you NetGalley and Spotify Audiobooks for allowing me to listen to the ALC of The Love Hack.

If I had to describe Love, Off the Record with three words they would be: angsty, funny, and absolutely important. In this YA rom-com, Samantha Markham doesn´t just give us a rivalry between lovers in college romance, but she gives us banter, friendship, angst, and a view of how difficult it can be to be plus-size and love yourself.
 
Wyn and Three are rivals. She will beat him no matter what and the position on the university newspaper will be hers.
And while Wyn tries to beat Three, find her voice,  friendship, and maybe even flirt a little with the cute RA.
But when Three hits a story too close to home for Wyn they need to put their differences aside and try to uncover something too important to continue bickering.
 
The banter and angst in this book are top notch and I was engaged since the second one.
 
As far as internalized and not fatphobia goes this book threads the topic very gently without being too heavy, but it says what we fat girls always think. How others perceive us, how we have to hide while eating for fear of being judged, how it is not even remotely possible that a cute guy can like us when there are so many pretty skinny girls out there.
And let me tell you, I know everything about this, since I lived it.
And girls, always love yourself. Because like Wyn you are capable, strong, and most importantly beautiful, and people who fall in love with you will like you no matter what.
 
The audiobook is really well produced and I loved the voice actress. She did a beautiful job voicing all of Wyn´s internal struggles and not.

hank you to Netgalley, Spotify Audio, and Samantha Markum for the chance to listen to this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

The tension! The banter! The sabotage! The roommates! The newsroom! The chemistry!

As The Novel Neighbor stated in their video promoting the book- picture Paris Geller and Logan Huntzberger, vying for the same position at the college newspaper. Add in You've Got Mail (millennials and up)/Cinderella Story (millenials and down)- and wow! Honestly- if you want the best summary of the vibes of this book- go check out The Novel Neighbor's reel/tiktok.

The narrator did a wonderful job! Great pacing and emotion.

I have never spoken about this in a review- but I have to this time- the cover is perfect. Exactly all the information I needed to know to draw me in. The book TOTALLY lived up to the cover!

Firstly. I am one of the biggest "Hating Game" fans. To me that is a perfect book and this book "Love, off the record" by Samantha Markum is giving the feeling and the joy that the Hating Game gave me to many years ago.

I love an book where the banter is on point! Banter can be hart to write and it can be hard to perfect. This book, this author, she gets it.

There is enough tension, enough will they? won't they? and enough heat to keep me reading and to make this a favourite of 2024!

4.5⭐️

Quick intro:
Three and Wyn are college freshmen rival journalists fighting for the same spot on the paper staff and their feelings for each other.

Quick thoughts:
Wow, this book was a fun read! I was able to switch between the audiobook and ebook and have to say I preferred reading it over listening to it. But, if you’re looking for an easy, quick, and fun YA listen this would be a good audiobook for you. There were just a lot of breaths I think could have been edited out of the narration?

Overall, I think the author captured what being a college freshman is like really well. We walk with the MCs through friendship trials, family pressures, adjusting to collegiate life, parties, and mental health issues. It all felt super realistic. And gosh, every interaction between Wyn and Three just had me rolling. Their sarcasm, witty banter, and DEEP competitiveness was just so so good.

Wyn lives in a bigger body and I appreciated witnessing her journey with internalized fat phobia and how she viewed her own body affected her relationships with other people. Markum delicately handled Wyn’s body image struggles and I think reading this character would provide those who live in thin bodies some good insight into what it’s like to live in a fat body.

Read this book if you like rivals to lovers, top notch banter, plus size MCs, mental health rep, epistolary elements. If you’re a fan of YA books from Lynn Painter, Amy Lea, and Rainbow Rowell you might want to check it out.

Thank you so much to NetGalley, Simon and Schuster, and Spotify Audiobooks for advanced copies of this book in exchange for my honest thoughts.

Quick details:
YA/New Adultish - mature language surrounding intimacy and drug use
🔥 Closed door
245 pages
🎧 8 hours 58 minutes