BOOK REVIEW: Love and Entropy: A Hollywood Lights Novella / Katie Rose Guest Pryal

TITLE: Love and Entropy: A Hollywood Lights Novella 

AUTHOR: Katie Rose Guest Pryal

PUBLISHER: Blue Crow Books
PURCHASE LINK: Amazon

GENRE

Women's Fiction

REVIEW

LOVE AND ENTROPY is the prequel novella to ENTANGLEMENT, Katie Rose Guest Pryal’s novel about two young women searching for new beginnings in 1990s LA. I read Entanglement a little while back and really enjoyed the story of Daphne, a charismatic fashionista with a dark past, and Greta, an awkward physics nerd, so I was excited to read the story of how the two became best friends in the first place.

In LOVE AND ENTROPY, both Daphne and Greta are students at a top-notch school. But whereas Daphne is a social butterfly with a frat-boy boyfriend, Greta is an isolated geek who’s more comfortable with numbers than people. Yet when Daphne meets Greta, she feels an instant friend connection. And when Daphne’s boyfriend suggests setting Greta up with a frat brother, Daphne sees it as an opportunity to help Greta come out of her shell. But it turns out that Daphne’s boyfriend has ulterior motives – one that could shatter the budding friendship before it begins.

I loved that LOVE AND ENTROPY tells the story of a strong female friendship. There’s no pitting women against women, no stereotypical mean girls or anything. Just two young women who support each other (that’s part of what I loved about ENTANGLEMENT too). In a way, LOVE AND ENTROPY is a romance – two dissimilar people meet, experience a mutual (friend) attraction, hit some rough patches, but deal with them and have a happily ever after. A friend-romance, if you will. It’s quick, delightful read, full of fun and feels.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Katie is a novelist, freelance journalist, and erstwhile law professor in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. She is the author of the Hollywood Lights Series, which includes ENTANGLEMENT, LOVE AND ENTROPY, CHASING CHAOS, and HOW TO STAY all from BLUE CROW BOOKS. With Raven Books, she is the author of LIFE OF THE MIND INTERRUPTED: Essays on Mental Health and Disability in Higher Education (2017).

As a journalist, Katie contributes to QUARTZ, THE CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION, THE (late, lamented) TOAST, DAME MAGAZINE and other national venues. She earned her master’s degree in creative writing from the Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins, where she attended on a fellowship. Katie has published many books on writing, including HOW WRITING WORKS with Oxford University Press. A professor of writing for more than a decade, she now teaches creative writing through Duke University’s Osher Lifelong Learning Institute and works as a writing coach and developmental editor when she’s not writing her next book.