Thanks NetGalley for the preview!

This book was adorable! Gave me a little Mrs. Maisel vibes with a disguise. I loved the Jeremy twist and really didn’t see it coming. Ethan was swoon worthy and I really enjoyed his wit. Very good!

Such a fun read!
Thank you to NetGalley and the amazing publisher for the ARC of this title! I have the perfect audience for this story and know many of our students would enjoy this lighthearted and fun coming of age story. The Girl Least Likely will have a spot on our shelves for both the middle school and high school campus library.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for giving me an advanced copy of this book to read and review.

This was a cute and fun ya romance. I enjoyed this read and felt like the book was a solid read. I’m happy I found it here on NetGalley

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel meets a YA romcom perfect for teens today.
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Gretchen likes to be on the fringe of high school, never going to parties or making friends outside her long time BFF Sam. Only recently she’s started having feelings for him and has no clue what to do with them. One night before New Year’s Gretchen and her sisters drag her to a comedy club. Using a fake ID to get in, Gretchen somehow finds herself on stage doing stand up—and she’s pretty good at it too. Good enough to catch the attention of fellow comic and doorman, Jeremy. Unfortunately due to the fake ID Gretchen can’t really be herself around Jeremy, but her yearbook friend Ethan gets to hear all about her boy drama and gives her advice. Which boy will grab Gretchen’s heart in the end? This book is a romance but also more about finding yourself AND your voice.
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Those who can write stand up that’s featured in books and movies are just so impressive to me. The author does such a great job of inserting humor onto every page of this YA romance I adored it and can’t wait to read more by her! P.S. The Office references were amazing!

CW: teen drinking

Really enjoyed this fun coming of age story! The character of Gretchen was well developed and I felt like I got to know her well. The others not so much, but since they weren't the main character, it didn't matter. The story had a good flow and I really liked the ending!

Gretchen has never been the spotlight kind of girl but rather the behind the scenes best-friend girl instead. But when she stumbles into a secret persona she realizes she may have been holding herself back. The Girl Least likely is a look into how we may see ourselves vs how the world sees us. Gretchen is every teenage girl who feels like she is overlooked and playing a supporting role in their own lives. I loved Gretchen and her search for who she is. Her humor and enduring love of rom-coms makes her a relatable character for readers. From the very start you cheer her on and want her to discover that her prince charming has always been right in front of her. I loved the complex relationships that she has with the side characters and the slow burn romance that came out of no where. The pace was steady and allowed for characters to develop with depth and complexity.

Adorably quirky, The Girl Least Likely is high school drama meets rom-com. Gretchen is funny and insightful, and surrounded by an equally amusing group of characters. I enjoyed the story, but especially her growth. Worth reading, and recommended to my school librarian for our high school students.

This book made me laugh so much. The characters are so relatable, and well written. The author did an amazing job writing this book. I would totally recommend this book to anyone who likes YA romance

I love that 'female comics" is becoming something of a sub-genre of YA. This novel is especially fun because of its unique setting (Portland, the Maine one!) and its world of engaging and unique characters. I enjoyed how for the most part, even supporting characters are three-dimensional, and not necessarily all bad, even when they're showing undesirable true colors. I love a good Hannah Montana-style double life, and was also pleased to see how much Gretchen grew as an individual as a result.

I really loved this book, it was super cute! The plot was really good and I ended up loving the main character. The main character was biracial, hispanic and white. The parents were awesome and the love interest*s* were al very different there wasn’t any mixing up. This book dealt with putting yourself out there, feeling like you don’t fit in, feminism, ROM COMS, comedy, romance, friends, and family!

I honestly enjoyed the main character a lot more than I thought I would. In the beginning I was like eh she’s kind of annoying but once you get to know her she really grew on me. I really liked how this book incorporated rom coms and rom com elements to the book it was just really fun!

I really didn’t know how I was going to feel about this book when I picked it up, but honestly I really did like it a lot!! If you want a book with comedy, rom coms, and just and overall good book than definitely check this one out!

The Girl Least Likely is such a cute and heartwarming book that delivers on every promise. It’s a romance with different characters with chemistry really leaping off of the pages, as it of course should. The romantic element is a key aspect to this where it has to be visible yet still allowing the plot to continue on. While there were some parts that did slightly drag and were stagnant, for the most part it wasn’t bad at all as the tension is still steadily growing.
In terms of the predictability, I believe that this book really exemplifies how it can be done effectively. The ending is pretty predictable. It can be seen clearly as how the different subplots will end up as well as who the main character will end up with. However with that being said, there is something enticing about knowing that ending and seeing all of those pieces slowly build up. It is deliberate enough that the ending does not feel sudden but not super obvious.

This book has a lot of character growth for a single YA novel! I loved our heroine and her voice, she was often pretty funny, even just internally. I had a hard time liking either of the love interests though

Overall I thought this was a great book! I was surprised by the twists in the plot, and happy with the ending.

I have received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The Girl Least Likely by Katy Loutzenhiser is the story of a girl and her alter ego trying to figure out life, love, high school and where she fits in. Gretchen is a quiet high school junior who mostly stays to herself. She really likes watching Rom-Coms, and now she feels like she is in one, all the scenes are there (and defined at the beginning of each chapter):
1. The Best Friend Crush - She has a new crush on Sam who has been her best friend since they were very young.
2. The Funny Gal Pals - Her sister Hen and her cousin Carmen
3. The Makeover - Hen & Carmen talk her into going out using someone else's fake ID and dress her up to match.
4. The Roguish Bad Boy - Jeremy
5. The Classic Love Triangle - who should she choose

What follows is a Laugh-Out-Loud good time.

My full review can be read here: https://twincitiesgeek.com/2021/07/the-rom-com-takes-center-stage-in-the-girl-least-likely/

THIS BOOK IS THE BEST. This is the cutest rom com I've read in a long time. The cover is perfect. The writing was light and the jokes hilarious. The chemistry, the drama, the everything. Yes, yes, and more yes. Katy Loutzenhiser wins this round.

The Girl Least Likely was cute and funny but just not a big win for me. I liked Gretchen and found her to be relatable but her sister and cousin were both annoying. I would have liked to see more development in Gretchen as it was a perfectly set up coming of age story, but the end was fairly satisfying so I guess that's okay.

Thank you to NetGalley and HarperCollins Children's Books for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

The Girl Least Likely is funny. It’s not the forced kind of funny which can unfortunately happen when an adult is trying to write from the voice of a teenager. As someone who always felt like they were on the outside looking in, it was nice to feel represented and seen in the maze that can be high school. These characters are flawed and real and were easy for me to root for.

Gretchen is a girl who has been the girl who sits in the shadows. She has her best friend who lives next door and her cousins but other wise, she keeps to herself. One night she goes out with her cousins to a bar with a fake ID. She joins in on the comedy contest and finds that she enjoys it and wants to continue competing. Suddenly, she finds herself living this double life where she goes to high school by day and at night she is a 21 year old wanna be comedian.

My favorite kinds of comedians are the ones who take their inner monologues and use it for material. Thankfully, this is what Gretchen does through out The Girl Least Likely. She takes her thoughts on her family, her newly developed feelings for her best friend, and the events that continue to unfold as she does her best to try and juggle her double life. It is funny and awkward especially as things begin to unfold around her. I also enjoyed Gretchen’s love for realistic rom-coms because that was completely relatable to me as a reader. Her journey throughout this book had me invested and wanting for her to find her happy ending.

Having Gretchen step out of her normal element and into a different type of world allowed her to develop as a person. She experiences those invincible sensations that one feels when they are noticed after feeling invisible. This creates multiple scenarios within The Girl Least Likely for her to come to terms with and figure out what it is she actually wants out of life. The good news for her is that she is only a junior in high school – so she has time to figure things out – and that is such an important message for young adults. You don’t have to have everything figured out right away – most of the time adults are still trying to figure it out as well!

I wasn't entirely sure what to expect from this story, and I'm really glad that I went in with no expectations.

Gretchen is a really fun MC. She's relatable; confused about her relationships, what she wants, and how she wants to be seen. I love that she finds the answers in comedy.

My big complaint about the story is that Sam (her best friend, and now crush) is so unlikable that it's really hard to see him the way she does in the story. Her other love interests are far better suited for her. I also found myself a bit confused by her family dynamic, forgetting that Carmen wasn't actually her sister. It's a small thing, really, and not at all integral to the ending, it was just something I noted while reading.

I loved the entire family she makes at the comedy club, and that the author took so much time introducing each of them to us, and giving them each such unique voices. It really enhanced the stakes for Gretchen, ultimately. And I loved the inclusion of rom-com tropes. I thought they were really well used.

I found this entire book to be really sweet and endearing and I would absolutely recommend it to anyone who loves a good "finding yourself" YA story.