Would Like to Meet has a quirky premise- our heroine, a stressed-out agent’s assistant, has to wrangle a manuscript from an intransigent screenwriter by proving that true love does happen like in the movies. I really liked the idea, and went into reading totally prepared to love it, but unfortunately it was pretty underwhelming.
Evie, our protagonist, is charming and likable, but a human disaster, because she puts her whole life into her job and doesn’t maintain a personal life. She also has a lot of unresolved issues related to her desire to be a writer, and her father’s death. Evie is almost a laughably bad friend, as she is entirely consumed with getting a promotion and being an agent. This book is kind of her coming-of-age-story, and not the romance I was expecting. The main strength of the book was good writing and great characterization, all of the people in the story are well-defined and their motivations are easy to discern. Unfortunately, the characters weren’t really given too many good moments because of the main problem with the story: bad pacing, and an overwrought plot.
The story really suffers from being so compressed, there’s too much happening without letting the reader breathe. Evie is essentially buffeted along by the plot and does whatever she has to do to make the story move forward. Character relationships and the love story are sacrificed for red herrings, and to give the antagonist more time on the page. The “twist” is pretty much obvious from the beginning of the book, and the ending is happy, but underwhelming. I was also partially disappointed that this wasn’t the enemies-to-lovers romance I was expecting, with Evie and the screenwriter coming to understand one another. I would say that the weakest point in the book was the love story, so you shouldn’t go into this book expecting romance. As a novel, it is enjoyable, though a bit scattered. I will say that I did read it in a matter of hours because I wanted to know the end, so at least it keeps one’s attention.
The Chamber of Spoilers 