THE. ROM. COMMERS. Book of the summer!!! Katherine Center is a genius! Such a funny, beautiful book.

I'm such a sucker for books where a character is passionate about romance and teaches other people to love and respect the genre, and this did this wonderfully. I felt so wrapped up in all the emotions of this story, and I actually can't wait for it to come out so I can buy a copy for myself.

Thank you so much to NetGalley, the publisher, and Katherine Center for this advanced reader copy in exchange for my honest review. Katherine Center’s newest (and I’m going to argue best work yet) is a joy to behold, a love letter to love and romcoms, but more importantly a book full of heart and tenderness. I was genuinely giddy while I read this book. With shades of Beach Read by Emily Henry and Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld, Center manages to take Hollywood’s writing room and the romantic banter between two wildly different writers (one, the mega popular Charlie Yates who hasn’t penned anything in four years after decades of award-winning material, the other, Emma, a no-name writer who has spent a decade catering to her ill father while putting her writing career on hold) and electrifies it. This book is a gem, and I can’t wait for everyone to fall in love with The Rom-Commers.

I enjoyed this book so very much -- one of the best modern romance books I have read in a while. It made me feel all the right things in all the right places. I'll definitely be recommending this one.

Katherine Center consistently puts out sweet romances and The Rom-Commers is no exception. We follow Emma (an aspiring screenwriter) and Charlie (a screenwriting legend in a bit of a slump) as they work together to fix up Charlie’s terrible script. Banter, hijinks, and classic tropes abound in this predictable, but delightful, romcom.

Pretty good pacing throughout, although the ending felt rushed to me and I’m not sure all the characters *really* made amends for some *really* horrible things said in the final act. I would’ve appreciated more development on the periphery relationships with the family/friends, but I enjoyed the tension between our two leads.

Katherine Center writes beautiful rom-coms and this certainly fits in that category. Emma is wonderfully complex; she is incredibly giving while still knowing who she is as a person. Charlie is hot-shot Hollywood and he knows it. Emma does not back down from the challenge of writing with him and the chemistry is absolutely palpable. There is such wit, humor, and genuine feelings that build between the two of them. I love that it’s so incredibly rom-com-y that the concept of romance and love spills from every page. A book that is a rom-com about writing a screenplay for a rom-com with a writer who needs to be conceived that love is real. Emma and Charlie go through some classic romance maneuvers to determine if they are possible for actually falling in love and all the real awkward moments are included. It’s refreshingly honest with the characters without having them feel like characters - all of this feels like it could really happen outside a book or movie. I was happy with the overall ending, but one giant plot point pissed me off - when you read this - which anyone should - you’ll understand what I mean. This book was a delight to read and as always, Katherine Center is the queen of rom-coms. 4.75⭐️, 0.5🌶

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC!

This is my favorite of Katherine Center's books to date. I've read each one, starting with The Bodyguard which I didn't seem to love as much as the hype, then Hello Stranger, which I loved more than popular opinion because I just found the face blindness so charming. And here we are with Rom-Commers, her best book yet. I don't usually like a celebrity romance, as someone who grew up around Hollywood and just find it to be so fantastical that it takes me out of the story. Not here. I love that Center has not just written another book about a writer. She's given us details, about lucky charms and habits and black and blue ink that bring a writer to reality, rather than endlessly hammering in her "action" of writing. Charlie is endlessly charming and I found myself laughing out loud multiple times and their quips, and just found each and every chapter both satisfying and bingeable. Full five stars for me for this charming, loveable romance about two screenwriters trying to understand love again through fiction. How relatable.

💐 Grumpy/Sunshine
💐 Forced Proximity
💐 Workplace (ish)

This was a cute, fun, quick romance that I zoomed through in a day! Katherine Center never disappoints. She always has great characters, with beautiful character development. The romance is so adorable, and I loved the grumpy/sunshine aspect of the two main characters, Emma and Charlie. I also enjoyed how they worked together and how their romance developed.

I would recommend this book to fellow romance readers!

For 10 years Emma has sacrificed and put caring for her father, who was injured in a tragic accident, and her sister as her number 1 (only actually) priority. When her former high school boyfriend Logan, who is a big shot agent in LA calls her with the chance of a lifetime, no one will let her turn it down. Emma quickly learns the true meaning of “never meet your idols” … but nothing is quite what it seems.

I truly loved this book! I don’t know much about the behind the scenes of making movies, writing screen plays ect but it didn’t take away from the story. I loved how fiercely Emma loved her family. I loved Charlie and his quirks. The story was engaging and the end was such a roller coaster! I loved the twists and turns. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to watch someone learn how to fall in love.

Thank you NetGalley and St Martin’s Press for the ARC copy of this book!

Katherine Center cannot write a bad book, I am convinced. She has outdone herself with The Rom-Commers. Spoiler it is my new favorite! I know it is too soon but I am ready for her next book! If you have read The BodyGuard you will appreciate the little cameo. I absolutely love this book, I flew though it. I had so much fun! I laughed and I cried and then I laughed some more. Emma's backstory really got me, if you have ever been a caretaker or an older sister you know. I love Charlie and Emma so much! Plus Charlie has a Guinea Pig. If you have not read a Katherine Center book you are missing out and I highly recommend picking this up.

I recommend Katherine Center's books for anyone who is looking to try romance but all of it just sounds too cheesy or all spice, no plot...

Katherine Center DOES IT RIGHT! Its real life, relatable, imperfect people who just happened to fall in love. We watch her characters grow together as well as watch them go through a ton of personal growth.

The third act conflict was fantastic, I honestly wondered if this would end with a happy ending even after all the screen writing talk about happy endings being so necessary.

Katherine Center is an auto buy from here on out!

This is the fourth book by Katherine Center I've read and it is by far the best. I absolutely adored Emma and Charlie. I laughed, I cried, I got a bit miffed. 5 HUGE stars!!!

I hereby declare this as my favorite Katherine Center book and so far, my favorite book of 2024! As the title suggests, this book is the perfect romcom. I loved it the whole way through because it’s not just a surface level enemies-to-lovers/forced proximity trope, but it also has some deeper themes and heavy topics intertwined! This book touches on death of a parent, caring for elders, guilt (ohhh the guilt), cancer, anxiety, overcoming fears, and more. The whole book was good and it gripped me from the start, but the last 20% I simply could. not. stop.!! Some little twists at the end had my heart racing and while I didn’t want the book to end at all, I needed to see how it concluded.

One of my favorite parts of this book were the small romantic gestures that really highlight “it’s the little things” that matter- the hands in the pocket kisses, tying her shoe, line dancing, learning the special birthday donut recipe, all the things that took grumpy Charlie into a full-on romantic. I loveeeeed to see it! And not to mention Emma’s unwavering passion to make sure that Charlie starts believing in ALL of that- romance, love, and the importance of writing a great rom-com of course. She was a great main character and I fell in love with her and Charlie’s story.

Prob some spoilers in this paragraph so be warned, but there were seriously so many aspects of this book that I loved- Emma’s backstory with her parents and sister, the LA setting and glam lifestyle, the history between Emma and her ex-boyfriend, her initial obsession with Charlie that turned into a “don’t meet your idols” moment, her wild red curly hair, Emma helping Charlie with his terrible movie script, forced proximity, the high dive, the cameo of Jack Stapleton and Hannah from “The Bodyguard”, Charlie’s history with his ex-wife, the guinea pig, the intense twist and anxiety-ridden ending, and OBVIOUSLY the tension building between Emma and Charlie the whole time!! And last but not least, the happy ending. UGH. beautiful.

Katherine Center is an auto-buy, auto-read author!! You gotta add this book to your summer tbr!! This book hits the shelves June 11 and I am SO grateful to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for letting me get a sneak peak with a digital copy! Thank youuuuuuuu!

Read Completed 3/26/24 | 3 stars
Wow, I'm incredibly disappointed that I didn't enjoy this one more. The ratings so far (this is a June release date and I read it in March) are very high with mostly 4 and 5 stars, but this one just didn't do it for me. If this was my first Katherine Center book, I probably wouldn't have picked up another one.

My main disappointment was that I felt zero chemistry between Emma and Charlie. ZERO. I didn't feel any butterflies, I got not emotion from Charlie, and it felt very one-sided and disproportionate to have Emma infatuated with him a little bit in the beginning. I've read plenty of rom-coms where the affection is unrequited at first and then they fall in love, but I don't know. For some reason, it didn't work here for me at all, and Charlie is so closed off that I didn't EVER feel like they were falling in love. There was a point about that in the book, kind of, but as a reader, I just never really felt it at all.

There was just something about the characters too... I didn't like any of them. I actually really didn't like Emma right from the beginning. Charlie was a jerk when they first met. I didn't like the randomly British best friend. I didn't like her sister. Okay, her dad was sweet. We'll give them that one, but everyone else I just actively didn't like. This is SO WEIRD because I adored THE BODYGUARD and really enjoyed HELLO, STRANGER.

One of the things I really appreciated has to do with something Charlie reveals to Emma that becomes something important to the plot. MINOR spoiler but I'll put it in tags in case you don't want to know... Charlie reveals his ex-wife left him when she found out he had cancer. He was going to celebrate his 5-year anniversary of being cancer free with Emma and that it was basically cured at 5 years, which I appreciated like crazy being that my husband had cancer and hitting that 5 year remission mark is huge, amazing, and also the same for his type of cancer where you're basically considered cured at 5 years. So that was a big thing for me and I appreciated the heck out of how that was written. But THEN... more major spoiler since it's a thing that happens in the end.... I HATED that she gave him a cancer scare. Charlie had bronchitis and is coughing a lot throughout the middle of the book. They think he may have lung cancer because they can see something on his scan, but it's just bronchitis. I absolutely hate that it was used as a cancer scare and that it was used as a turning point for the characters to profess their love. That ruined the magic of him being cancer-free and as someone who has also had that feeling (a plain old boring cyst that didn't show up well on a scan and then we had to wait to find out what it was), I hated that moment and it ruined things even more for me.

I also didn't really like the asides to the reader, breaking the 4th wall, essentially. I would rather Emma just tell the story and not like she was telling the story to you, dear reader. It got like, cheesy movie rom-com instead of cute book rom-com. I don't know. Something about it just really took me out of the reading experience.

Clearly others loved it so I will be the outlier opinion here (hey, did you also not like HAPPY PLACE by Emily Henry? Let's join this lonely club) while others gave it 5 glowing stars. You'll just have to read it for yourself! But if you find you're feeling no chemistry, maybe we feel this together.

AUDIOBOOK REVIEW: Patti Murin was the narrator for this audiobook and normally I usually love her. I've listened to many of her narrations and she voiced both THE BODYGUARD and HELLO, STRANGER and I had no issues with her narration. I guess combined with this book, it just didn't work for me. She was fine, but I didn't like the characters and that just all compounded. I really hated her voice for Charlie? It didn't feel attractive or like much of anything at all. Again, probably the character's fault, but I just didn't connect with that.

I thought this was such a cute read! It wasn't a light read by any means, but the comedy aspects helped it feel that way. I felt like I was experiencing everything right along with them. I do wish we saw more of Charlie & Emma's life together after their reconciliation.

Katherine Center is one of my favorite Romance authors, her stories have depth and vulnerability while still being full fun and joy. Her characters face all that this messy adventure we call life throws at them and find people that value them to love along the way. The Rom-Commers is another wonderful story that teaches us to chase after our dreams and passions, to be true to ourself and find fulfillment in the things that bring us joy. I loved watching Emma teach Charlie to appreciate and understand Rom Coms and the joy and wonder they bring to the world. I loved watching them both learn to love and be loved in open and healthy ways, to see that sharing your struggles and sorrows doesn't make you weak, but does allow you to find the strength to face hard things and to go on with the help and support of those who love you. As always, I loved the supporting characters. This is a gem of a love story! The beauty of romance is that readers are guaranteed to come away from the story glowing and joyful and lifted by the HEA and by characters figuring out how to love and connect deeply. A romance about teaching others to value romance, even better!! I'm on board 100%

I especially LOVED the author's note at the end of the audiobook that shouts from the rooftops that Romance is not a genre to be scoffed or belittled or ridiculed, but should be valued and appreciated as the most pro-social genre out there. Love stories are actually the most hopeful and healing stories. The world will always be better with more love and kindness and people learning to connect and appreciate others and treat others well. I LOVE romance and I'm always thrilled to support the authors and stories that put more hope and joy and love into the world. Katherine said this in her author's note, "If you've been shamed away from reading love stories, hello friend, come over to the fun side, the ridicule is wrong...come hang out with me on my hill of love stories." Thank you so much Katherine for adding this wonderful story to the hill of love stories that fill me up and let me soar! The Rom-Commers will speak to the soul of every hopeless romantic and closet romantic out there; come join us romance readers, writers and lovers on the fun side!

Synopsis: Emma Wheeler is an aspiring screenwriter stuck in her career and love life while she takes care of her father after an accident made it so he can’t live on his own. When the opportunity of a lifetime comes her way to work with her screenwriter idol and longtime celebrity crush, Charlie Yates, it’s too good to be true. Her sister convinces her to go by coming home to take care of their dad. But as soon as she gets to LA, things do not go as Emma expects them to in the slightest.

Review: I was so lucky to read an advanced version of this book thanks to @katherinecenter and @netgalley! I also did a fun buddy read with good buddies @booksmartkate @bibliolater.alligator @kansasreadsalot! (We are very much under the impression that Katherine is also one of our new book besties just FYI.)

This was a very quick read because it was one of those you just can’t put down! I absolutely adored this book. Katherine Center is quickly becoming one of my very favorites and I can’t wait for everyone to read this one in June!

Katherine Center does it again! Recently, I've been struggling to stay focused on a book, and that was not the case with this book. I was hooked from almost the first page and could not put it down. The characters are so real, and I felt emotional and every page! Thank you Netgalley, for giving me an opportunity to read this ARC!!

Another fantastic book by Katherine Center! I really enjoyed this slow burn rom com about 2 screen writers writing a rom com movie. I loved the characters and their relationship and watching them become friends first. The author did a great job at dealing with some tough subjects. I would have liked a little more romance but I still really enjoyed everything from start to finish with this book.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin’s for the ARC of The Rom-Commers by Katherine Center.

5 Stars. No Notes. I laughed. I bawled. I wanted to read it all over.