The last thing Henry Arlington wants is a girlfriend. He’s just very, very good with girls—reading their body language, knowing what they want to hear, and more importantly: getting them into the backseat of his car. But all that changes when he meets Garrett Lennox at one of the many Sweet Sixteen parties he crashes.
Garrett thinks she’s done with guys. She was dumped by her ex when she moved from Chicago to Long Island, and now she realizes that she needs to find out who she is by herself, instead of with a boyfriend. What she really needs is some good friends.
Fortunately for Garrett, the J Squad—the “it” girls of East Shore High School—want her in their clique. All she has to do is pass one little test: get East Shore god Henry Arlington to take her to one of the biggest Sweet Sixteens of the year, then dump him in front of everyone.
Garrett has promised herself not to fall for another guy, so playing with Henry’s heart shouldn’t be hard. Right?
And Henry doesn’t fall for girls, so when he and Garrett start to click, it doesn’t matter. Does it?
As William Shakespeare once said, “Love is blind,” or in this case, the lovers may be, as Henry and Garrett fall in love—and into the trap that awaits them. Because neither of them can even begin to see what the girls of Henry Arlington’s past have in store.
This hilarious, sharp, and surprisingly thoughtful novel is the teen Wedding Crashers, filled with love, hope, laughs, and surprising insights about the terrifying process of falling in love.
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SEVENTEEN MAGAZINE “SUMMER BEACH READ PICK”
BOOKS-A-MILLION BOOK CLUB PICK
“A heartening, SWEET STORY– as refreshing as a road trip in a convertible with your funniest friend behind the wheel. I loved this book so much, I was LAUGHING THE WHOLE WAY through!”
“TED MICHAEL HAS FOUND A TOTALLY UNIQUE (and irresistible) teen novel formula with his new book — think Wedding Crashers meets John Tucker Must Die. Be sure to check out this hilarious (and honest) portrait of what high school romances are really like.”
“Romance fans will enjoy the familiar theme of RELUCTANT, ILL-FATED LOVE and entertainment aficionados will appreciate the popular-culture references”
“The emotional intensity—sometimes PASSIONATE, sometimes TENDER—that develops between Garrett and Henry [will help] readers care about them enough to want to find out whether, against the odds, they can make their love work”
For my second novel, I wanted to examine a relationship from two different perspectives. So often, when you’re dating someone or have a crush on someone, you wonder—what is the other person thinking? I decided to explore that question and take a hint from one of my favorite movies, Wedding Crashers.
In Crash Test Love, Henry Arlington is a player—but down deep he’s a good guy, someone who has been hurt and wants to protect himself from getting hurt even more. He doesn’t open himself to love because he’s afraid that if he does, he’ll be devastated if the girl he falls for abandons him like his mom did when he was young.
Henry’s character came to me first. Then I thought, what would Henry’s opposite be? That’s how Garret was born—a girl who always opens up her heart to love and is left to pick up the pieces of failed romance time after time.
When Garret moves to a new town, she decides this is it: a fresh start. She is going to focus on making friends instead of falling in love.
Until she meets Henry, of course…
FUN TIDBIT: (Spoiler alert!) Some readers have criticized the not-so-happy ending in this book. But that was But that was always my goal: to show that sometimes relationships happen to teach you things about yourself (and also how you love), but that doesn’t always mean that the two people are meant to be together forever.