Wes and Liz are back - 2 years later with a million miles between them. After his father dies, Wes' life changes dramatically - pulling him away from school and from Liz. Liz has built her life away from him, leaving her hopeless romantic side behind and building a promising music career. When Wes returns to school, he's ready to get her back, but has Liz outgrown her first love.

It was interesting to see Wes' side of the love story here. I had to go back and re-read the first novel for the right context for this book. It was very cute.

When I read Better Than The Movies earlier this year and absolutely loved it, I was beyond excited when I heard that there was going to be a sequel. Now for Nothing Like The Movies, I have some conflicting thoughts. On one hand, I liked being back with the characters but on the other they felt like entirely different people, especially Liz who no longer enjoyed romance anything which was a huge part of her character in the first book. The other thing I don’t like is the miscommunication in this book. It’s one of my least favourite tropes because everything in this book could have been solved with one conversation. I liked most of the moments when Wes and Liz were together but for the most part this book was a severe let down after the absolute perfection of BTTM. Overall, sure you get some more content with the characters but this felt more like an alternative future than what it should have been. In my head BTTM is going to stay a standalone.

When I recieved this ARC I was sooooo excited!!! I was really hopeful for this book to be great because I really loved the first one. The first half of the book was great and I couldn’t put it down. I got to about 70% and it started to fall short for me. I just had a hard time getting into it after this point, I was just very bored. I’m so sad because I really wanted to love this. This book was good but it wasn’t great. If I’m being honest, the ending of the first book was fine the way it was and I feel like it didn’t really need the second. Anyways, I love Wes and Liz and I hope they live happily ever after.

Usually sequels written based on popularity of book one always fall a little flat, but this one really hit it out of the park. I finished this in a few hours and loved every cute moment between lizwes. I think it was a good plot, however it’s been done before and a little repetitive. It was kind of random how she added certain parts of what he told liz the reason for the breakup and then magically those never happened and he was absolved. I get he was lying to have her stay in college, but could have been more thought out.

I think it was the perfect amount of grovelling and push back from Liz. She wasn’t annoying or doing too much. The book did feel a little long and dragging near the middle.

Loved when they went home and also loved clark’s character. Obsessed with how obsessed wes is with her. Overall, a fun read!

Nothing Like the Movies was an excellent sequel to Better than the Movies. I enjoyed the development for both Wes and Liz and how their lives had changed since we last saw them. The book was entertaining, funny, and deliciously heartwarming and I rooted for the main characters to reunite. I also liked how the book covered topics like grief, mental health, and heartbreak with sincerity and sensitivity. Overall a great read and I so hope to see these characters again!

JUST WOW!

This book was absolutely magical. MAGICAL I TELL YOU!

Better Than The Movies was pure perfection, I loved every moment of it and it ended perfectly, In no world would I think it needed a sequel.

Until I read Nothing Like The Movies.

At first, I was so terrified when I heard this was a second-chance romance, which meant that Liz and Wes would have broken up and I was not mentally prepared for that.

Going into the book I was excited and scared, Lynn Painter kept breaking my heart over and over but luckily she also healed it and fixed it up so it was intact again. I love how Lynn Painter writes, her jokes are hilarious. I love Better Than The Movies but I might have to say that Nothing Like The Movies was better and won me over wholeheartedly. I loved all the references to Taylor Swift, as is typical for a Lynn Painter novel. I love all these new characters that are introduced, I need a book about Ross and Lillith RIGHT NOW! and Wade and Campbell, also I feel like there was definitely potential with Sarah and Clark. I loved how there was a crossover with Charlie and Bailey from Betting On You.

This book follows Wes and Liz while they're at UCLA. There's a bit of a time jump of TWO YEARS. While I was reading it, the two-year time jump shattered my heart but it made sense as you read the book. The new Guy Friend mentioned in the synopsis is Clark, he's amazing and such a great friend. It's basically Wes grovelling after Liz and trying to get her back.

After finishing the book, I'm so sad because there's not going to be any more books with Wes and Liz, I just fell for those characters and I'll miss them. I wish the book had been longer! I want to know what happens after the Epilogue, I want to know what happened in the six ish months between the last chapter and the epilogue! I need more bonus scenes of them!!

Here are some of my favourite lines from the book!

"I exist to exist alongside of you"

"Maybe something about how you've always wanted to be Elizabeth Bennett, and I'm the only guy who can give you that?"

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Simon and Schuster for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Thank you to Simon and Schuster Canada for an ARC of Nothing Like the Movies by Lynn Painter!!

I was a huge fan of Better Than The Movies, so I was so excited to receive this arc and get back to the world of Wes and Liz. I knew based off the premise there would be a mini time jump and that they would no longer be together in this book, and I was excited for some good ol' romancing from Mr. Wes Bennett. This book was good...but I don't think it was great. What really truly threw me off, was how different Liz's character was from the first book. What I found sweet and endearing about 'Little Liz' was how romantic she was and how much she just loved love. And I understand that people grow up and their experiences change them, but I wasn't expecting Liz to become a sports loving, love hating (for lack of better term) main character. It just felt like a 180 and I wasn't the biggest fan of it. I also thought the fake dating premise between Liz and her best friend was kind of not needed, as it didn't even feel like a major plot point (kind of just a throw away excuse why Liz couldn't get back together with Wes.) Despite all of this my main issue with the book was the length. It felt too long and wasn't giving enough to excuse how long it was (i.e Wes' failed balcony attempt, their date that didn't end well, etc) the whole time I'm just here like please just get together already. Even Wes getting injured at the end, was that really needed for Liz to get to the point that she loved him? We knew she loved him!!

Anyways this book was fine and I love Wes and Liz and I hope they live happily ever after with all the love songs ever.

Liz and Wes grew up as next door neighbours, but in their final year of high school they became more than just neighbours and started dating - if you’re reading this book then you’ve read Better Than The Movies and know how that all went down, if you haven’t read BTTM then stop what you’re doing and go read that. Now the two are off to college, UCLA. Things are fine and dandy for the both until tragedy strikes in Wes’ life and he ends up going home and not coming back to school. Flash forward 2 years, and a lot has changed between them, unfortunately they are not together anymore - Liz has lost all sense of her hopeless romantic attitude and Wes has had a lot on his plate over the last little while to get him to where he is today. Wes arrives back at UCLA trying to get his life back on track, and has some high hopes in rekindling things with Liz, but when she discovers that he’s attending school at UCLA she wants just about nothing to do with him. Liz tries her best to avoid Wes as much as possible while Wes does all he can to see her. Suddenly the 2 are intertwined in the baseball world and can barely avoid each other. Liz believes their relationship is dead, and Wes is now the hopeless romantic holding on to every bit of what they both had. But Liz doesn’t truly know what went down 2 years ago, and Wes is reluctant to tell her. Now these two have to figure out how to navigate this new normal, is their relationship really dead or will they figure out how to find their way back to each other, and do they even want to find their way back to each other.

I also adored that this was written in dual POV. Understanding how Wes is feeling about situations and also getting Liz’s POV in those situations was *chef’s kiss* I am a fan of multiple POVs and will always love a story written as so. The dual POV is what I CRAVED for in BTTM, and am over the moon happy to have gotten it in this book.

I did find that the story did drag on a little, and was a little repetitive. Each time Wes tried to break down Liz’s shields, she would just decline and run away. To me it felt as if no progress was being made with each attempt. It was a constant loop of Wes making minimal progress and Liz reverting back to wanting to keep Wes at arms length.

I found Liz to be a very annoying character in this book. I found her indecision to be childish, the way she lied about Clark after her very first encounter with Wes - also after everything that goes on throughout the book, I don’t believe the truth about this lie is ever told.

Wes, despite the growing up that he’d mentioned he had to do, I found was also still acting quite childish too. He refused to see the growth that Liz had had, and was adamant that she was still Little Liz and that he knew her best. If this were real life I too would be pissed if someone were saying these things to me.

I’m also a little sad that we didn’t get much of Liz and Joss. After all they went through in BTTM, I would’ve assumed that they maintained contact despite going to college’s miles apart from each other. I would’ve thought that Liz would have texted Joss immediately once she saw Wes on campus, and that the 2 of them would still be very much involved in each others lives.

***** spoiler ***** read at your own risk *****

I believe Wes and Liz should’ve had a more calm conversation discussing all the things that Wes had kept from Liz to protect her. Rather than just a screaming/fighting match outside of an ice cream parlour. There should’ve been a follow up conversation an unheated explanation of everything - why Wes did what he did, and Liz explaining her feelings about it and how it changed her and why things are different for her now.

I also was not the biggest fan over how many of Liz’s concerns were glossed over when things were turning around for the two of them. Yes Wes got injured and she realized should could truly lose him and did not want that whatsoever. But she had a lot of valid concerns prior to rekindling her relationship with Wes and declaring all her feelings. There should’ve been a conversation addressing these concerns to truly clearly the air between the two of them.

Also throwing in the ‘he cheated so I can’t love him at all, but actually he just lied and said he cheated because it was the only lie he could tell me to get one to move on even though it would make me hate him forever’ to justify Wes’ choices had me feeling type of way that I just can’t describe and I was not a fan. Wes was never painted as someone who would be a cheater both in BTTM and NLTM, even all his friends and those who’ve gotten to know him say ‘they can’t believe he cheated, it’s not the type of person he is’ it felt unnecessary and I found that this fact didn’t really play a huge of a factor to the plot as it was supposed to.

I do wish we got more of an ending with their rekindled relationship - I would want to see them
navigate this new world together, I would want to see Wes cheer for Liz at her graduation and vice versa, how they navigated their relationship once Liz graduated and Wes was still in school. I wanted to see grown up Liz and Wes after college and how their life played out - where do they live, what jobs do they have, are they married or still dating - I’m assuming after all that went down in this book that they are end game and nothing was going to break them up. There’s just so much more I would’ve loved to have explored - but this does leave Ms. Painter the opportunity to continue writing more about their story to which I will not be opposed to.

Unfortunately this book did not live up to the expectations that I had for it and despite the fact that I’ve mainly listed what I did not enjoy about this book, I did have a wonderful time reading it and being immersed back in this world of Liz and Wes.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster Canada for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

What a READ!! stepping back into wes and liz's life was so wonderful. i yearn and ache for more university aged protagonists and so this was such a perfect read. I will say, lowkey wish i did wait for it's publishing date to read this bc it wouldve been such a good read while in my school semester - however, its funny how books find you at certain times, bc as i balance a full time internship and two part time jobs (i like being busy okay) i definitely resonated with liz's ambition and willingness to shove aside her feelings for wes for the sake of her internship. anyway, loved this with my whole heart and soul.

thank you to netgalley to an arc in exchange for an honest review.