Better than the Movies

What's inside (7 sections)

1. The crush who moved away
2. Fake dating and borrowed shirts
3. The storm, the kiss, the Jeep
4. The cruelest sentences
5. Prom night and the backyard fire
6. Key takeaways
7. FAQ

I picked this up because half my feed was crying over a parking spot. That sounded strange until I started. Lynn Painter published it in 2021 with Simon and Schuster Books for Young Readers, and the hardcover runs 368 pages. It is a teen rom com set in Omaha during senior year, and it reads fast because Liz Buxbaum talks like someone narrating her life as a DVD commentary. Full spoilers here, because the fun is watching her plan fall apart and seeing what she builds after.

Liz is seventeen and sure she knows how love works. She learned it from romantic comedies she watched with her mom, who was a screenwriter and died when Liz was young. Her dad has remarried to Helena, who is kind and a little quirky and tries hard. Liz loves her dad. She keeps Helena at arm's length without quite admitting it. Every senior milestone feels loaded. Prom dress shopping, college forms, graduation. Her mom should be there making a scene in the best way, so Liz either clings to the movie version of the moment or wants to skip it entirely.

Her best friend is Joss, tall, blunt, loyal, done with volleyball and done with high school games. Liz works at a bookstore, drives an old car, owns a cat named Mr. Fitzpervert who judges everyone, and keeps playlists for every mood. She has a neighbor problem. Wes Bennett lives next door. They have fought since grade school. Frogs in the Barbie Dream House. A beheaded garden gnome. Hose water sprayed over the fence at exactly the wrong moment. Now the war is about The Spot, the prime curb space in front of their houses. They leave notes. They move cones. They glare over fences while music plays too loud.

Then Michael Young moves back.

The crush who moved away

Michael lived on their street years ago, then moved to Texas a month before Liz lost her mom. In Liz's memory those two losses fused. Michael was the sweet boy who played kickball and drank from garden hoses and watched her mom steal home base in a sundress. Now he walks into school senior year with messy blond hair and a drawl and a smile that makes Liz forget locker combinations.

Liz decides fast. Michael will take her to prom and fix senior year. The catch is access. Michael is suddenly tight with Wes. They play ball, they joke, they invite each other to parties. Liz needs an in, and Wes is the door. She hates asking, which makes the scene on his porch fun. She offers the only currency he respects. Uncontested rights to The Spot if he helps her get noticed by Michael. Wes agrees way too fast, which should have warned her.

I liked how Painter handles Liz's logic here. Liz does not see people as people yet. She sees roles. Michael is the love interest. Laney Morgan, pretty and popular, is the rival. Joss is the best friend who should cheer. Wes is the comic neighbor who should run errands. Helena is the stepmother who should not try so hard. Liz keeps a mental soundtrack running, and every interaction has to fit a trope. It is funny until you see the cost. She lies to Joss about shopping trips. She hides the scheme from Helena. She tells herself small lies are fine if the ending is romantic.

Wes plays along, but he keeps breaking character. He remembers odd details about Liz. He once gave her ten dollars so she could buy back her mom's donated DVDs, then pretended he just wanted her to stop talking. He notices when her curls spring back after she stops straightening them. He asks real questions while Michael asks polite ones. Liz files these moments under friendship, because admitting more would wreck the plan.

Fake dating and borrowed shirts

The plan grows. First Wes gets her invited to a party at Ryno's house where Michael will be. Liz borrows clothes, practices lines, tries to be chill. Someone throws up on her. That is not in the movies, except as a joke that happens to side characters. Wes does not laugh. He finds her gym clothes for the ride home and acts like it is no big deal. Liz is mortified and grateful in equal measure.

Then the basketball. She takes a ball to the face at school, blood everywhere, nose swelling like a cartoon. Wes tears off his own shirt to press against her nose, walks her to the ER, cracks jokes about Mrs. Potato Head to keep her from crying, waits while her dad and Helena rush in. Michael texts later to check on her, sweet but distant. It is Wes she calls first. She tells herself that is just convenience. Readers can see the shift before she can.

Painter stacks these rescues without making Wes a saint. He still teases. He still parks in The Spot when he can. He makes fun of her playlists and her dramatics. But his teasing has changed tone since second grade, when he learned he could make her cheeks turn pink with one word. Now the jokes cover worry. He asks about her mom without flinching. He tells her she looks better with her natural hair, not as a line but as an observation after rain ruins her straightening work.

The fake dating part starts because Michael still sees Liz as Little Liz, the nice weird kid from the street. Liz proposes they pretend. If Wes acts interested, Michael will look closer. Wes agrees, though you can tell he hates the idea. They trade late night calls. They sit in his backyard by a fire with cherry cigars and s'mores. Wes tells a story Liz never heard, about her mom faking a hurt finger so she could bandage his scraped knee without shaming him. He says he thinks of her mom every time he sees a cardinal in Liz's yard. Liz feels something crack open that has nothing to do with strategy.

Her cemetery visits show the other half of her life. She talks to her mom's headstone like a voicemail box. She gets furious when Wes finds her there once, because that patch of grass is the one place she does not perform. He backs off, texts an apology, says he visits his grandmother's grave in Minnesota. Grief recognizes grief. Liz does not know what to do with a boy who respects a boundary and then tells the truth about his own loss.

The storm, the kiss, the Jeep

The storm scene is the hinge. Wes is driving, rain hammering, and he swerves to avoid a crash. The car slides down a muddy slope and catches on a boulder with one tire in the air. They sit in the fogged cab with hearts pounding. Wes says he missed her curls. He says she looks best when she is herself, not dressed up for someone else. Liz kisses him.

For a second he freezes. Then he kisses her back, hands on her face, sweet and shaky. His dad's headlights cut through the rain. They separate, climb out, walk to the other car with fingers laced. Liz floats home sure everything just changed.

Silence follows. No call. No text. Liz replays the kiss until it curdles. Then school delivers the movie moment she ordered months ago. Michael parks a Jeep in the concourse with a giant Boggle board on the side, red letters spelling PROM. He holds a poster asking Liz to play Boggle with him, a nod to games they played as kids. Crowd claps. Teachers pretend not to see the Jeep. Liz scans for Wes and finds him by the wall with his arm around Alex, a nice girl he has mentioned, whistling and giving a thumbs up like a supportive pal.

She says yes to Michael on autopilot. Flowers in her arms, cameras out, Joss watching with narrowed eyes. Later Joss corners her and names every lie. The shopping, the party, the Wes deal. She says Liz is so tangled in romantic nonsense that she cannot see who actually cares. She walks away. That fight stung me more than the love triangle, because Joss has been patient for months while Liz treated her like an extra.

Liz spends the next days numb. She goes to Michael's house for a scary movie night with a group, hoping sparks will fly. Instead she watches herself perform. She laughs too loud. She leans in. Michael is kind. He talks books with her, argues about Gatsby, remembers childhood bits. There is no pull. The pull was in a muddy car with Wes, and she cannot stop thinking about fogged windows while Michael talks about prom dinner.

The cruelest sentences

Hurt makes Liz sharp. She fights with Helena at the cemetery, telling her to stop trying to fill shoes that will never fit. Helena, who has cooked and driven and waited outside dress shops, goes quiet. Liz knows as soon as she says it that she aimed at the wrong person. Helena was not trying to replace her mom. She was trying to show up for a senior who keeps pushing everyone away before milestones can hurt.

Then Liz finds Wes on the street and unloads. She calls him a sports bar to Michael's gourmet restaurant. She says he is the opposite of everything she wants. She drags up the gnome head and the frog and the hose, as if listing old pranks will prove they mean nothing. Wes does not yell. He says she is living inside her dead mother's script, dressing like her, quoting her movies, refusing to change the lines because she is scared of disappointing a ghost. He says her mom would still love her if she smoked a cigar in the dark or kissed someone in the rain. He says Liz would be charming doing either.

He gives the words room and walks off. Liz hands him The Spot forever and tells him to forget everything. She means it as payment. It lands as goodbye.

I thought this stretch saved the book from being fluff. Liz is not cute when she lashes out. She is specific and unfair, using details she knows will stick. Painter lets her sit in that ugliness without a quick rescue. Liz has to see that movie rules taught her to sort people into types, and types do not bleed. Wes bleeds. Helena bleeds. Joss bleeds. Michael, for that matter, has his own quiet story she never asked about because she was busy casting him.

There is a fair criticism tucked here too. Everyone in this Omaha feels white by default, straight by default, money comfortable enough for Jeeps in hallways and UCLA plans. The stakes are prom and parking spots, not rent or safety. That narrow frame fits a cozy rom com, but it means some readers will bounce off. Liz herself can grate for long chapters. She repeats mistakes, ignores clear advice, and narrates her own charm a little too often. I forgave it because Painter knows Liz is grating. Wes and Joss and Helena say so to her face.

Prom night and the backyard fire

Prom arrives with Liz on Michael's arm and her heart elsewhere. Dinner is pleasant. They debate books like friends. Then Laney appears at the restaurant, and Michael's face gives him away. Liz finally asks the question she avoided for months. Who do you actually like. He admits he likes Laney, not her ex, and that he was scared to act. Liz tells him to go to her. He hugs her hard and goes. It is the kindest thing she does in the book, and it costs her the fantasy she carried since age ten.

Hiding in a stairwell, she finds Joss already there, barefoot, escaping a bad date. Liz drops the act and tells the truth in one rush. Senior year without her mom feels empty, so she tried to direct it like a film her mom would have loved. Every ritual felt like proof of absence. Joss listens, cries a little, forgives in the way only long friends can, with teasing and strict orders not to lie again. They fix the hem of the night together.

Liz also makes peace with Helena, who admits she knows she cannot replace anyone and never wanted to. She just wanted to be there for dress zippers and photos and late rides. Liz lets her be there, which sounds small and feels big after all that pushing.

Then the grand gesture, Liz style. She burns a mix CD with ketchup heart art, builds a small fire in the Secret Area behind Wes's yard, sets out s'mores, waits for hours. Wes comes home with Alex. Panic. Liz kicks s'mores into the waterfall, drops the CD player, hides behind bushes and gets caught mid crawl. She gives a mortifying speech about a lost lucky penny that is clearly about Wes, then runs.

He knocks on her car window later. He found the CD, the note, the soggy marshmallows. Liz says being with Michael is nothing next to eating burgers with Wes, sneaking out back, fighting over curb space. Wes says Alex is great but she is not Liz. He says he started falling for her in second grade when teasing made her blush, and he never really stopped. They kiss under the streetlight while Mr. Fitzpervert watches from the car in a plaid scarf, because Painter never misses a chance for a cat cameo.

The epilogue moves fast. Both head to California for UCLA, Wes on a baseball scholarship, Liz to study music and soundtracks. Before they leave, Liz visits the cemetery alone. A red cardinal lands on the chokecherry branch by her mother's name and sings. Wes sees it too. Liz does not feel fixed. She feels steadier, like she can love her mom's movies without living inside them.

What stays with me is not the prom but the ordinary scenes Painter writes best. Shirt pressed to a bloody nose. S'mores smoke in hair. A porch talk about graves. A parking spot that starts as war and ends as gift. Liz wanted a story better than the movies by copying movies. She finds one by letting people surprise her, which is the least cinematic skill and the most useful. The book is 368 pages in hardcover and never drags for long, though the middle misunderstanding will test your patience if you hate miscommunication plots. Stick through it. The payoff earns its title without pretending love is tidy.

FAQ

Is Better than the Movies a standalone?

No. It is the first book in the Better than the Movies series, followed by Nothing Like the Movies. This summary covers Liz and Wes in high school only.

Why does Liz care so much about romantic comedies?

Liz loves rom coms because she watched them with her late mother, a screenwriter. The movies feel like a way to keep her close, which is why letting go of the script hurts so much.

What age is Better than the Movies for?

It is a young adult contemporary romance published in 2021 by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers. It has kissing and party drinking but stays light and sweet rather than explicit.