Starred review from July 15, 2024
Grischow’s debut is as self-assured and charming as her protagonist desperately wishes she herself were. Three years into a marketing degree and Murphy can’t catch a break. Her best friend Kat has transferred from their community college to the University of Illinois, while Murphy is stuck in their little hometown and her parents’ house until she can pass accounting and make the same move. Then Kat comes back for Thanksgiving with a boyfriend and a life that doesn’t seem to have space for Murphy in it anymore. While feeling hurt and abandoned, Murphy meets funny, artsy, super-attractive Ellie, who’s also back home for Thanksgiving and reeling from a recent breakup. The pair bond over a night of sharing their woes, after which Murphy realizes that Ellie’s mother is her accounting professor, who notoriously goes easy on her favorites. So they make a deal: Murphy will pretend to be Ellie’s girlfriend, since Ellie didn’t have the courage to tell her parents she was dumped. They’ll use the ruse to talk Ellie’s parents into letting her attend the grad school program of her dreams and to get Murphy enough good graces for a passing grade. But only pretending to love Ellie turns out to be much harder than it looks. Grischow’s take on fake dating is compulsively readable, funny, and full of heart. Readers will fall for this as fast as Murphy falls for Ellie. Agent: Dana Murphy, Trellis Literary.
December 6, 2024
This cute, sapphic, holiday, fake-dating romance debut sees two college-aged queer women teaming up over Thanksgiving to achieve mutual goals. Murphy, 21, finds herself stuck in her tiny hometown of Geneva, IL, trying not to fail the same class that prevented her from graduating last time. With hopes of joining her best friend in Chicago next year, Murphy needs to find a way to pull off a passing grade. Enter a former classmate, Ellie Meyers, whom Murphy bumps into at a bar. As the two strike up a friendly conversation, they realize that Murphy's professor is also Ellie's mother, and they just might be able to help each other out by going to Ellie's house for the holidays as fake girlfriends. The plan is for Murphy to make a good impression on her professor while simultaneously helping smooth the path for Ellie's mother to agree to her pursuing her dream of living on the West Coast. While a touch angsty and dramatic at times, this fun rom-com is well narrated by the author's sister, Allison Grischow, who voices both women with heart and distinction. VERDICT Fans of sapphic holiday stories such as Alison Cochrun's Kiss Her Once for Me are the audience for Grischow's fun novel.--Shannon O'Connor
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