Review: The Fine Art of Pretending by Rachel Harris

Title: The Fine Art of Pretending
Author: Rachel Harris
My Copy: Ebook from Publisher
The BookWhisperer's Rating: 

According to the guys at Fairfield Academy, there are two types of girls: the kind you hook up with, and the kind you're friends with. Seventeen-year-old Alyssa Reed is the second type. And she hates it. With just one year left to change her rank, she devises a plan to become the first type by homecoming, and she sets her sights on the perfect date—Justin Carter, Fairfield Academy’s biggest hottie and most notorious player.

With 57 days until the dance, Aly launches Operation Sex Appeal and sheds her tomboy image. The only thing left is for Justin actually to notice her. Enter best friend Brandon Taylor, the school’s second biggest hottie, and now Aly’s pretend boyfriend. With his help, elevating from “funny friend” to “tempting vixen” is only a matter of time.

But when everything goes according to plan, the inevitable “break up” leaves their friendship in shambles, and Aly and Brandon with feelings they can’t explain. And the fake couple discovers pretending can sometimes cost you the one thing you never expected to want.

I thought that The Fine Art of Pretending was a sweet and cute story surrounding Aly and Brandon.  Granted, did I like that Aly tried to change herself to get boys to notice her? No.  Seriously girls, just be you.  However, I liked that she relied on her best friend Brandon to carry out her Operation Sex Appeal change with.  Did I like that Brandon only registered Aly as a girl after her OSA change? No. Seriously girls, just be you.  (I see a theme coming.)

But once I got over those two humps, I really liked that Aly and Brandon built a fake relationship together to fool Justin.  And I especially liked that while living this fake relationship, Aly and Brandon started falling for each other.

What I was surprised about was how much I liked Aly with Justin as well.  *Sorry, spoiler alert!  He was so sweet and nice to Aly that if Brandon wasn’t a character, I would have loved her with him. 

All around, it was a sweet story and Aly really truly found herself in this story.