We Could Be So Good
by Cat Sebastian

From the publisher

Casey McQuiston meets The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo in this mid-century romdram about a scrappy reporter and a newspaper mogul’s son–perfect for Newsies shippers.

Nick Russo has worked his way from a rough Brooklyn neighborhood to a reporting job at one of the city’s biggest newspapers. But the late 1950s are a hostile time for gay men, and Nick knows that he can’t let anyone into his life. He just never counted on meeting someone as impossible to say no to as Andy.

Andy Fleming’s newspaper-tycoon father wants him to take over the family business. Andy, though, has no intention of running the paper. He’s barely able to run his life–he’s never paid a bill on time, routinely gets lost on the way to work, and would rather gouge out his own eyes than deal with office politics. Andy agrees to work for a year in the newsroom, knowing he’ll make an ass of himself and hate every second of it.

Except, Nick Russo keeps rescuing Andy: showing him the ropes, tracking down his keys, freeing his tie when it gets stuck in the ancient filing cabinets. Their unlikely friendship soon sharpens into feelings they can’t deny. But what feels possible in secret–this fragile, tender thing between them–seems doomed in the light of day. Now Nick and Andy have to decide if, for the first time, they’re willing to fight.

My Review

Nick and Andy are the sweetest. Nick is a closeted gay newspaper reporter from a traditional Italian family in Brooklyn (his brother is an asshole cop and the first time we meet her, his mother is actually making sauce.) Nick has a crush on Andy, his boss’s son and new hire in the newsroom. Andy has no idea.

The thing I love most about this book is the timeline. Too many romances take place over just a week or a month or a summer or a holiday season. But this one? This one takes its time. The main pair’s evolution from meeting to friends to roommates to queer awakening to lovers to in love feels natural and realistic. They team up on projects, they face obstacles in their personal lives, they date other people, they have to negotiate the changing nature of their relationship, and the reader is along for the ride for all of it. The fact that Cat Sebastian is able to do all of this in under 400 pages is simply amazing. Five stars. The best.