It Only Happens in the Movies by Holly Bourne (review)
Buy Issue for $25 at JHUP- It Only Happens in the Movies by Holly Bourne
Bourne, Holly It Only Happens in the Movies. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2020 [368p] Trade ed. ISBN 9780358172062 $17.99 E-book ed. ISBN 9780358172055 $9.99 Reviewed from digital galleys R Gr. 9-12
In attempt to escape the utter dumpster fire that is her life—her mom is drinking herself into a stupor every night, her ex is flaunting his new girlfriend—seventeenyear-old Audrey takes a job at the local Flicker movie theater. The customers are annoying but the hours keep her away from home, and her new coworker Harry is good company despite being a notorious flirt. She's been warned by multiple people not to fall for him, but he's making it difficult, especially when he wants her as lead in the zombie movie he's making; she gave up on drama club—her one true passion—when her ex, the drama club's star, dumped her. What's set up to be a predictable good girl/bad boy romcom is upended by this UK import's ability to both embrace and subvert the genre's tropes, paying its simple fantasies homage but grounding the story with complicated realities. Harry is admittedly a cad (he even pulls out the "you're not like other girls" line, which Audrey promptly schools him on). Like most cads in romcoms, he ends up charmingly redeemable, but that's not really the point—it's Audrey's growth through their relationship and her realization that romance is different than love, and that love is work that still doesn't guarantee the payoff you want. The book offers a similarly honest look at sex—Audrey's experience with her ex was pretty awful, and Harry is definitely better, but it takes a lot of bumbling and awkwardness to get great. Like any good romcom, there is, of course, the obstacle that tears the lovers apart, but the grand gesture that allows [End Page 162] for reconnection subverts readerly expectations. Romantics and cynics might be surprised to find both groups satisfied with the happy ending.
