Romantic Friction by Lori Gold

Romantic Friction by Lori Gold

Published by MIRA ISBN 9780778387657

Trade paperback, $18.99, 304 pages

From the publisher:

Sofie Wilde’s bestselling fantasy romance series has been breaking bestseller records and readers’ hearts for years. She’s primed to become a worldwide phenomenon as the tenth and final book is set to debut after the annual romance readers convention takes place in Chicago next week. As buzz continues to build toward the book’s release, Sofie is asked to headline the event for the first time, a career milestone. One she won’t let anyone take from her, especially “the next Sofie Wilde.”

That’s what they’re calling her—Hartley West, the self-published debut author who writes in the style of Sofie Wilde. Except she doesn’t actually “write” anything. After Hartley admits to using AI to create her novel, Sofie’s ready to watch Hartley be skewered on social media. Except in this unpredictable world, Hartley is instead lauded for being innovative, for being such a skilled editor to take what the AI churned out and massage it into a story that’s just as compelling as Sofie’s—maybe even more so.

After her unhinged rant unintentionally goes viral, Sofie loses her keynote, and she’s starting to lose all her support. That loss is Hartley’s gain—as her book sales start soaring, she’s given the headliner spot. Sofie is livid. And she’s not the only one. As the convention begins, Sofie is surrounded by fellow authors who also fear for their futures, their livelihoods, their art being stripped away, one AI prompt at a time. Something must be done. This has to be stopped. Now. With the clock ticking down to the keynote, Sofie enlists her fellow authors in a plan to stop Hartley, vowing, “‘The next Sofie Wilde’—over my dead body. Or hers.”

My thoughts:

As someone who doesn't know (or care?) too much about AI, I found Romantic Friction's look at how it steals from authors' works enlightening- and frightening. Hartley West at first appears to be just a Sophie Wilde superfan who writes fan-fiction in the same style of Sophie Wilde, but clearly there is more to her than meets the eye.

Hartley wants to be a successful author too and sees using AI as a way to do that. Sophie rightly feels that Hartley is stealing from her, and as things begin to spiral out of control at the romance convention, she must figure out a way to stop Hartley.

Other romance authors at the convention confront Sophie and insist that she stop Hartley or they fear that there will be more Hartleys coming their way stealing their books. I did feel that the other romance authors were less well-drawn that than other characters in the book.

And who is this handsome mysterious man oddly named Cooper-Brad who appeared at the infamous book signing and now shows up at the romance convention? Is he Hartley's partner in crime or someone who Sophie can count on to help her?

Sophie is a great flawed character. She drinks too much, is pretty anti-social with other authors, and has trouble with the concept of friendship. 

There are hijinks a-plenty as Sophie attempts to stop Hartley, and if you've ever been to a book convention, you'll enjoy that aspect of the story. (If you haven't been to a convention, you'll like it as well.) 

There's also a few twists in this fun inside baseball look at the publishing industry, and it's not all flattering, but it is thought-provoking.

Thanks to Harlequin for putting me on their Summer 2025 Blog Tour.