Dungeons and Drama

actual rating: 3.5⭐️

Can I first start by saying I love books that feature young love?? It's so sweet and soft; truly just warms my heart.

Dungeons & Drama follows Riley, a musical theater obsessed girl that dreams of being a director for Broadway productions. She lets her love for musical theater cloud her better judgement as she takes her mother's car to drive her and her best friend, Hoshiko to a show despite not having a driver's license. Naturally, her parents ground her by making her work at her father's game shop for eight weeks. Riley is kind of distant from her father as her parents divorced due to his father “choosing the game store over Riley and her mom” or at least that's how Riley sees it. But the punishment commences whether Riley likes it or not, and somehow finds herself in a fake dating situation with one of the employees there that goes to her school, Nathan.

From then on, I have to say that's when I truly enjoyed the story. The beginning where Riley is whining about the punishment and her parents not understanding that her love for musical theater doesn't allow for her to think logically made my eyes roll. I understand she's a teenager and teenagers do dumb things but, I don't think she understood the gravity of what she did or how badly things could've ended up. However once Nathan and his group of friends came in, I enjoyed the dynamics within the friend group. I don't know much about D&D but I really love how we got to see them play the game and how Riley brought her kind of spin to her character. She finds the similarities of what she loves to do which is sing and act and ties it to the D&D game which is essentially role playing. I have to say Riley is very unapologetically herself, in the way she carries herself by wearing bright loud clothes and not letting anyone deter her from doing so.

The topic of being a child of divorce is brought up and I have to say, the way Riley finds herself changing how she views her father throughout the story is incredible. Not only that but, her father also realizing his shortcomings, apologizing for them, and promising to do better; this facet of the book is very well constructed because it's gradual.

I have saved Riley and Nathan; and the fake dating for last because I am a sucker for the fake dating trope. Riley wants her ex to not pity her for not dating anyone (especially since her ex has seemingly already moved on) and Nathan wants the girl that sometimes joins their D&D sessions to show more interest in him; which starts this entire scheme. And if you're familiar with this trope, you know this is not going to end well. They're obviously going to fall for each other as they fake flirt to make their respective counterparts jealous because I mean HOW CAN YOU NOT?? The lines definitely get blurred for the pair as they start growing real feelings for the other but either aren't sure if the flirting is real or not. Towards the end, I will say we had slight miscommunication as Riley had to work up the nerve to communicate her true feelings to Nathan. But honestly, the story and its characters felt realistic. I will say now after reading this book, I am super intrigued about the world of D&D as this is my first time reading a book that features it.

I highly recommend this book if you love young adult romance novels that feature the fake dating trope and do it justice, if you love musical theater as this story packs in a lot of that, and if you love all things D&D!

Thank you NetGalley, Random House Children's, and Delacorte Press for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!