Rowena’s review of Just Like the Movies by Kelly Fiore.

Pretty and popular track star Marijke Monti is confident about almost everything – she’s got great friends, a great family, and she’s on her way to the State Track Championship. In fact, the only thing Marijke isn’t confident about is her relationship with Tommy Lawson.

Lily Spencer has spent her entire high school career preparing for the future – she’s participated in every extracurricular activity and volunteer committee she could. But, at home, she watches her mother go on date after date with dud-dudes, still searching for “the one.” Lily realizes that she’s about to graduate and still hasn’t even had a boyfriend.

While they live on each other’s periphery at school, Lily and Marijke never seemed to have much in common; but, after a coincidental meeting at the movie theater, Lily gets an idea – why can’t life be like a movie? Why can’t they set up their perfect romantic situations, just in time for their senior prom, using movie techniques?

Once the girls come up with the perfect plans, they commit themselves to being secret cohorts and, just like in the movies, drama ensues.

What a cute book this turned out to be. This is one of those books that ended up being exactly what I wanted it to be and perfect for the mood that I was in.

Marijke is part of the popular crowd at school. She’s a track star who is heading to the state high school tournament. She’s got a great boyfriend that all of the girls like and like a lot of teenage girls her age, she’s insecure as all get out about that. She knows that Tommy likes her and only her but that doesn’t stop her from being insecure because Tommy hasn’t ever said that he loves her.

Lily on the other hand is the opposite of popular. She’s one of those overachievers who always goes unnoticed. She’s the person behind the scenes and nobody ever really notices her until she bumps into her long time crush, Joe Lombardi.

Marijke and Lily are at the same theater, watching the same movie when Marijke bursts out of the theater in tears and Lily follows her.  They get to talking and they both agree that they wish their lives was just like the movies. Well, Marijke does. Lily’s spidey senses are tingling and she thinks a story is somewhere in this conversation so she comes up with the plan to help Marijke get the kind of love life she wants, by re-enacting famous grand gesture scenes from popular romantic comedies. But Marijke won’t do this alone. If she’s going to do this, she’s going to do this with Lily and Lily has to go after her long time crush, Joe Lombardi and just like that, the plan is put into action.

Marijke just wants her boyfriend to realize how much she loves him and in return, tell him how much she means to him. Lily just wants to go out on a date with Joe. But a lot of shenanigans follow these desires and it made for a fun read.

I will admit that Marijke’s insecurities drove me up the wall. Each and every single time that she doubted Tommy, I wanted to smack her upside her head.  There were even times when I wanted Tommy to break up with her to show her that she can’t keep on not trusting him for their relationship to work.  Tommy was a bonehead a lot of the time but he wasn’t a cheater.  He was just a boy who did stupid things or didn’t think about anything but living in the moment. But in the end, I really came to like Marijke’s character. Of the two of them, I thought her transformation was greater.  And sweeter.

But I liked Lily’s character as well. I liked the way that she thought (most of the time) and even when she did boneheaded things, I really liked her and I thought her little romance with Joe was just about the most adorable thing. I wonder if I would have thought the same thing had I caught on to the fact that Joe and Lily are my parents names. I doubt it, they were too cute for words.

Overall, this book delivered the goods for me. It was a cute story about two girls trying to make some changes in their lives and I liked it. I would recommend this to readers who enjoy contemporary YA stories, the cute ones. 🙂

Grade: 4 out of 5

This book is available from Walker Books for Young Readers. You can purchase it here or here in e-format. This book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.