Would you rather A novel

Ashley (Home Sweet Mess) makes favorite rom-com tropes feel new again with a pitch-perfect friends-to-lovers story. Architect Noah Agnew and administrative assistant Mia Adrian have been close friends from childhood through college and into the workforce, where they're constantly playfully pranking one another. Mia never finished her degree, letting go of her dream of being a dietician when she left school to manage her rare kidney disease. Now she's offered a scholarship to go back to school--but taking it would mean losing the employer-provided health insurance she requires. Noah offers a radical solution: marriage. As his wife, she can stay on his insurance plan--and what's some light fraud between two friends anyway? It also doesn't hurt that Noah has been secretly in love with Mia forever. The all too real motivation for the pair's fake marriage makes the trope sing, and Ashley surrounds her characters with supportive friends, family, and colleagues, grounding the story in community and heart. Mia's struggles with chronic illness are similarly well handled, capturing both the physical and emotional toll it takes on her day-to-day life. Readers won't want to put this one down. Agent: Kimberly Lionetti, BookEnds. (Aug.)

Noah Agnew has been in love with his long-time best friend Mia Adrian since he was 18. When he proposes marriage, Mia, who has a chronic health condition, does not respond with shocked joy. She knows the marriage would be on paper only, but she doesn't want to be a burden to anyone. Their marriage, however, would allow her to return to school and still receive medical benefits. After a brief ceremony, she moves into Noah's house and finds herself thinking often about the night they almost became more than friends. Noah has his own preoccupations; a coworker is blackmailing him about the insurance fraud. Despite brief blissful happiness, they utterly fail at the fake marriage and realize that they'll need to address their fears if they want to make a real marriage work. VERDICT Ashley (Home Sweet Mess) picks two tropes that can't miss (marriage of convenience and friends-to-lovers), throws in a bit of sweet and a dash of steam, and mixes it all together to make a love story readers will thoroughly enjoy.--Kellie Tilton