Story for the Week
Yes, I dated in high school. Of course I dated in high school. And I dated in college. And I dated after college. But I didn’t meet the man I married until I was 35. We spent 18 amazing (and sometimes not so amazing) years together before he passed away in 2020.
Corinne graduated high school last week and definitely fell into the camp of not dating in high school. Part of that was Dennis’s influence because he always said he wanted her to focus on school. While she had plenty of boy <space> friends, she didn’t date any of them. There were times she said that she thought it would be nice to have someone to go out with, but she wasn’t really interested in anyone like that.
Corinne’s father passed at the start of her freshman year, before she really would have started dating, but I told her that I kind of agreed with him, primarily because I dated in high school. What I learned from my own experience was that I was a very different person when I finished high school than when I started. And I was even more different when I finished college. While I have (mostly) great memories of the people I dated, I don’t know that any of them would have been right for me long-term. (Sorry, guys!)
By the time I met Dennis, I was solidly in a career path, I knew who I was as a person, what my beliefs were. I was settled, and I had a routine. In fact, I wasn’t even looking for anyone. I could stay up late, go to bed early, sleep in on the weekends, take vacations wherever and whenever I wanted. I could watch what I wanted on television, and I could play The Sims as long and as late as my heart desired. I answered to no one. In fact, I distinctly remember telling my mom that I was sitting in bed, watching television, cats around my feet, and I thought to myself, “Do I really want a man to come into my life and mess this up?”
And then I met Dennis in an online chat room. I’m not going to say he fit right into my life because he absolutely did not. We both made a ton of changes. He sold a house in New York. We had to move apartments about a week after he moved to Illinois. We both had to purge because he had a fully furnished two-bedroom house, and I had a fully-furnished two-bedroom apartment. Suddenly I had someone to discuss purchases with because neither of us was the sole decision-maker anymore.
I remember one time Dennis really wanted a gaming console—an Xbox or a PlayStation. We talked about it and decided that it didn’t make sense. He wasn’t much of a gamer, and it would be an expensive paperweight if he ended up not using it.
When he told one of his cousins the story, the cousin told him that he was a grown man who should spend his money the way he wanted and that he should just buy the console. Dennis explained to him that he and I always talked about big purchases because it was our money. His cousin didn’t agree or understand, but his cousin was also single. (A couple years later, Dennis bought a Wii for my birthday, and Corinne eventually got a Wii U and then a PlayStation and a Nintendo Switch. Dennis never played any of them, so we clearly made the right call. 😉)
Everyone has an inner light, and there are people in your life who brighten your light and people who dim it. Dennis knew how to brighten mine. He was different from every guy I dated before him (and not just because he was shorter than I am). We both made a ton of adjustments when we got married (although I really do believe I made more adjustments than he did 😁).
Our marriage wasn’t perfect by a long shot. No matter what was happening in our lives, though, he supported me and was my biggest cheerleader. He searched every birthday and holiday for the perfect gifts. He was a great father, and always told me and anyone who would listen that I was an amazing mother.
Corinne may be headed to college, but she is still young. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, she has a chance to study in Liverpool next spring (Will We See Tottenham Hotspur FC in 2025?). I want her light to shine before she gives anyone the opportunity to dim it. I can’t think of any guy I dated before Dennis who could have brightened my light like he did. I want that for her.
And to quote the book reviewed below, “If you wait for other people to light you up, then I guess you’re at the mercy of darkness.”
Book Review
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
5 Stars for The Rom-Commers by Katherine Center
336 pages
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press
Publication Date: June 11, 2024
I received an advance copy of this title from NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press in exchange for an honest review.
Publisher’s Description
She’s rewriting his love story. But can she rewrite her own?
Emma Wheeler desperately longs to be a screenwriter. She’s spent her life studying, obsessing over, and writing romantic comedies―good ones! That win contests! But she’s also been the sole caretaker for her kind-hearted dad, who needs full-time care. Now, when she gets a chance to re-write a script for famous screenwriter Charlie Yates―The Charlie Yates! Her personal writing god!―it’s a break too big to pass up.
Emma’s younger sister steps in for caretaking duties, and Emma moves to L.A. for six weeks for the writing gig of a lifetime. But what is it they say? Don’t meet your heroes? Charlie Yates doesn’t want to write with anyone―much less “a failed, nobody screenwriter.” Worse, the romantic comedy he’s written is so terrible it might actually bring on the apocalypse. Plus! He doesn’t even care about the script―it’s just a means to get a different one green-lit. Oh, and he thinks love is an emotional Ponzi scheme.
But Emma’s not going down without a fight. She will stand up for herself, and for rom-coms, and for love itself. She will convince him that love stories matter―even if she has to kiss him senseless to do it. But . . . what if that kiss is accidentally amazing? What if real life turns out to be so much . . . more real than fiction? What if the love story they’re writing breaks all Emma’s rules―and comes true?
************
Main Characters:
- Emma Wheeler – 28 years old, teaches English at a community college, amateur screenwriter, considered by Logan Scott to be an expert in the execution of rom-coms, caretaker for her 55-year-old father for the last 10 years after he was injured in a climbing accident, her mother died in the same accident
- Logan Scott – Hollywood manager for screenwriters, Emma’s former high school boyfriend who offers her work on and off
- Charlie Yates – award-winning screenwriter, lives in Los Angeles, represented by Logan, Emma’s absolute favorite screenwriter
I have enjoyed and recommended all three of the previous Katherine Center novels I have read, and you should absolutely read those (Things You Save in a Fire reviewed in Women Can Be Whatever They Want to Be, The Bodyguard reviewed in The Fine Art of the Rom-Com, Hello Stranger reviewed in When Life Gives You Lemons….). This one…this one I just loved from start to finish, so you should order it now and await its June release with bated breath. Center is one of my must-read authors, and this is just another example of why.
The Rom-Commers is a screenplay within a book, a little different from your typical book within a book, movie within a movie. Logan Scott hires Emma Wheeler to help improve the rom-com that Charlie Yates has written because it is clear that Charlie’s expertise is not romance.
Logan outlines two conditions: Emma will be a ghost writer on the project and will not receive any writing credit, and she has to work with Charlie in L.A. The second one is a much tougher sell because Emma has been the her father’s caretaker since the accident that killed her mother. However, with the help of her younger sister and a push from her dad, she takes the job and heads to L.A.
That’s the summary you get. The story is a romance, so you know there will be a happily ever after, but there are surprises in this story that I did not expect and don’t normally get from a romance novel. I really don’t want to give those away. Some of them touch on my heartstrings because of my personal experience, but I have never had a romance novel make me cry, and I legit shed a few tears for this one.
Center writes her characters so well. Emma’s expertise in the art of the rom-com shines through, and Charlie gives the vibe of a talented, successful recluse who wants to shut out the world. Clearly, they will work seamlessly together (insert sarcastic eyeroll here). Logan is a classic case of the end justifying the means. He means well…he really does. He just makes some questionable decisions along the way.
This one will make you smile (and maybe shed a tear or two). I’ve said this in the past about Center’s books, I can see this on the big screen. When I read The Bodyguard, I envisioned Chris Hemsworth as a good Jack Stapleton with Emma Watson as Hannah Brooks, the two main characters. Those characters make appearances in The Rom-Commers, so for this one, Tom Hiddleston would be an excellent Charlie Yates with Emma Stone as Emma Wheeler. Someone in Hollywood make this happen.
Pretty please?
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