I loved chick magnet, like couldn’t get enough. This unfortunately was completely different. I could not get past the whiney characters. They were toxic and definitely didn’t read as friends to lovers when there was multiple choices. I do love the career choices unique and fun. I think the heroine was too wrapped up in how her choices would affect the hero to have any real development.

I enjoyed this book. It was an interesting read . I found that I was able to read quickly and enjoyed the pacing and premise of the book. I would recommend to others.

This is a friends to lovers trope book that features a Sam and Bree. Besties since teenagers and pining for one another for years. Sam's introduction in the book was painful (no one wants to be the source material for a hit song). And Bree is always there whenever Sam needs her. The relationship almost seems one sided but as the book goes on you realize he's in just as much.

Funny Guy was my foray into the funny girl that is Emma Barry and I loved it! For fans of friends-to-lovers romcoms, this book delivers the mutual pining I've come to adore from the trope along with a fresh and exciting premise with Sam's comedian gig. Bree has been in love with her best friend since they were kids but both of them are jaded by their difficult pasts. While Bree just landed her dream job, Sam's career is on the line after his last breakup's public scandal which puts their long-standing friendship to the test. While Bree was the sweetest urban planner ever, Sam was a harder egg to crack. While his obliviousness was frustrating, he really was a good friend to Bree and seeing him slowly recognize his true feelings for the girl that had always been in front of him was everything I could hope for! Barry has me sold with Funny Guy and now I'm excited to check out her other popular novel, Chick Magnet, next!

Sam is a famous comedian, famously known for being hilarious and an asshole. He and Bree have been best friends since they were kids living in a small town with bad family lives waiting to get out. They successfully did. They’ve relied on each other all their lives including when Sam becomes famous once again for his break up with the latest hot celebrity and finds himself on Bree’s couch once again.

A cute rom com, close proximity, if that’s your thing then this is for you! The relationship where they lean on each other is very sweet and after initially not liking Sam in the first couple pages, he certainly won me over by the end.

Thank you to NetGalley and Montlake Publishing for this ARC!

3.5 stars

Truth: I am a HUGE Seinfeld fan, which is one of the many reasons I looked forward to Emma Barry’s Funny Guy. Another is, simply, it’s an Emma Barry romance! I was not thoroughly enamoured of Chick Magnet (because “chickens”) but it won me over. Funny Guy, on the other hand, had me from page one, thanks to “funny guy” Sam Leyland and his torch-carrying best friend Bryony “Bree” Edwards…oh Sam’s carried a torch for as long, except he’s so-not-clued-into his feelings. Another reason this romance works so well? We are privy to Bree’s tortured, often funny thoughts about her love for Sam; when Sam’s revelation comes, it’s more “road to Damascus” than slow burn. Because this isn’t only a friends-to-lovers romance, it’s an opposites-attract romance and the latter makes it more compelling than the former. But, to start, let the blurb speak for itself:

Sam can’t escape the smash hit “Lost Boy” because, well, he is the lost boy. His pop-singer ex immortalized him in a song about his childish ways, and now his comedy career is on the line.

At least he still has Bree, his best friend and confidante. Bree has always been there for Sam, but she’s never revealed her biggest secret: she’s in love with him. To help herself move on, Bree applies for her dream job across the country—and doesn’t say a thing to Sam.

But as Sam tries to resuscitate his career, he turns to Bree for support—and maybe more. In the confines of her tiny apartment, they share a different dynamic. A charged dynamic. But she’s his friend. He can’t be falling for her. Except he is. Are his feelings for Bree just funny business? Or is their smoldering attraction the real deal?

The attraction is real all right: a long, torturous awareness on Bree’s part and a smack up side the head for Sam. And how I loved them both. Sam is such a mess and Bree is calm, self-aware, and self-contained. Sam is petulant, sarcastic, rude and yet Barry manages to make him lovable. Maybe because no matter how outrageous he is with everyone else, he’s good to Bree. Sam’s Bree-lodestar helps us sympathize with him even while we’re heart-broken for Bree.

That forced proximity business suggested in the blurb? Sam doesn’t only turn to Bree because he imploded his career (he doesn’t suffer fools easily); he nurses Bree through a bad cold, with soup, meds, ginger ale (stirring the bubbles out) and cuddles…the cuddles lead poor Sam to a confusing physical awareness, a tight heart-stirring he can’t quite figure out for his best friend; after all, “Bree Edwards was the conscience Sam didn’t have.” Sam puts Bree on a not-to-be-soiled pedestal while Bree yearns, “when she’d been fourteen, she and Sam had been laughing together in the sad excuse for a park near his grandma’s house when she’d known: I will love you and only you forever.” It’s quite the entertaining dynamic.

Barry centred Bree and Sam’s identities and relationship in their background from a small, poor Ohio town and their troubled families. They brought themselves up and they brought each other up since the day they met as children on the playground. This bond goes deep and, while Bree has known she’s been in love with Sam for years, Sam never allowed himself to “go there” because Sam is a self-acknowledging mess: how can he risk losing the person who centres him by ruining another romantic relationship? The only people who don’t realize Sam loves Bree are Sam and Bree. So the reader’s smug knowingness adds to the novel’s pleasures.

Barry does something interesting: while most romance writers are content to show how their protagonists make their way to each other, Barry wants to show how they must break away from their long-running self-sculpted molds. She accomplishes this most successfully with Bree because when we first encounter her, Bree is determined to move away from Sam, to build a life away from him and find a partner. She is, however, equally motivated by her career, not in a sharky ambitious way, but an aspirational, valuable, purposeful work way.

Bree is an adult and makes adult decisions, but she’s also vulnerable because she’s watched Sam fall in love with other women over and over again while she pined. I loved Sam’s moment of realizing he’s in love with Bree, but the dark moment, when it arrives, is one in which both participate. But it’s Sam who has to make the greatest change. It works in every way. Miss Austen would love Sam and Bree. Barry’s Funny Guys offers its readers “a mind lively and at ease,” Emma.

Emma Barry’s Funny Guy is published by Montlake. It released in mid-May. I received an e-ARC from Montlake, via Netgalley, for the purpose of writing this review. This does not impede the free expression of my opinion.

Loved the concept of this book such a fun read. Really fun characters and the story is well written. First by the author but will read more as loved the style.

I was really getting tired of the friends to lovers trope in romcoms. But Barry brought me back around 100%. Sam and Bree finally got the HEA both characters deserved given there backgrounds.

Thank you to Montlake and NetGalley for providing an eARC for an honest review.

Surprisingly this book was really good. The title and cover lead you to believe it’s a “Rom-Com” it’s so not.

Funny Guy is a deep, moving, character driven story. Bree and Sam have been best friends for years, however Bree has been secretly in love with Sam for quite some time. Sam has his head so far up in his own head space he doesn’t see what’s right in front of him. It takes one of his ex girlfriends to write a song about him, which becomes a massive hit, for him to take a long hard look at himself.

Sam is a bit clueless, a tad broken, but deep down he’s incredibly sad. I enjoyed getting in his head. He was self absorbed at times and didn’t see what was right in front of him. Clearly you can see how much he cares for Bree, it just took him a bit to recognize it. Bree, I felt she didn’t have much of a backbone with him. It was like whatever Sam wanted and needed she was always there for him.
All of that being said, I did enjoy the banter and them finally getting together.

Looking forward to more from this author.

If you already like friends to lovers romance and particularly longterm friends to lovers, I think you will enjoy this book. Emma Barry captures the emotions of being convinced that the relationship cannot go romantic or the friendship will be ruined type situation, but that's also the type of thing that can frustrate people who don't love the trope. Personally I really appreciated that.

The other key aspect of this book besides the childhood friends to lovers is that our MMC is a mess. He is messy and has no filter and also pulls his life apart for comedy, which makes him good at his job, but also his boundaries are maybe not the best. In contrast, our FMC is extremely well put together. She's so good at her job. She seems to adult well. And she's struggling to decide if it's time to move on. So, I think that if you're not the biggest fan of that sort of dynamic, you may not appreciate this book as much as I did.

My final note specifically about this book is that I really do think Emma Barry has a really great writing style that is extremely engaging and easy to fall into. So I definitely recommend if you're looking for a quick read with some interesting characters!

If you love Scoring Off the Field by Naima Simone, pick up this book. If you loved this book and you haven't read Scoring Off the Field, I'm going to need you to pick that up immediately.

A cute read. I didn’t really click with it though so it was a little bit of a drag unfortunately. I am a sucker for bestfriends to lovers so it was enjoyable!

A cute romance that made me smile. I will have to find more Emma Barry books and read them! Enjoyable and unputdownable.

Look, this was angstier than I was expecting, but Barry absolutely sticks the landing. (Or punchline, if we're going for a comedy analogy.) It's friends-to-lovers, where Sam and Bree grew up together in awful family situations. They're both living in New York now, escaping the demons of their past. Sam is a successful comedian and performer on fake-SNL and Bree works to increase affordable housing in the city. Sam's career is on the rocks after a public outburst and his ex's hit song about all of his very real flaws. Bree's considering a new job that would take her away from NYC, but after a lifetime of loving Sam, she has a hard time imagining a life away from him, even if it's probably what she needs. Sam's a bit of a hot mess, which I don't usually find attractive, but he does experience real growth. Their chemistry is believable and the story is an intriguing read-alike to Romantic Comedy.

Emma Barry’s FUNNY GUY (Montlake, 271 pp., paperback, $16.99), a take on comedic and romantic timing, features a city planner and an improv comedian whose pop-star ex just turned his shortcomings into a hit single.

Sam has a chip on his shoulder and a tendency toward impulsive mistakes; it has made him a star but also kept his childhood scars on full display. His best friend, Bree, is cautious and hesitant, dragging her feet when it comes to telling Sam anything: that she’s in love with him; that she has been offered a spectacular new job in another city.

The problem isn’t reconciling two sets of feelings. No, our couple struggle with finding a shared rhythm, a sense of pace for their relationship that doesn’t feel glacial by Sam’s standards or reckless by Bree’s. It’s a tug of war that would be hard for a less adept writer to pull off, but Barry’s work has always thrived on this kind of interplay. She seems to be feeling her way to a new kind of structure here, one that’s organic and messy but still generates a vital catharsis.

Ok, I really liked this book - something about the voice and the story just clicked for me. It can be really hard to do a friends to lovers trope well, but in this case it seemed very believable and realistic why the two main characters had not gotten together before. I loved the comic/SNL spin, and love a grumpy/kind of broken hero realizing he needs to make some changes and then moving forward with that plan. Definitely excited to see what Emma Barry does next.

Since he was a child the one constant in Sam’s life has been his best friend, Bree. She has always been there for him through all the ups and downs so when the ending of his most recent relationship goes viral it was only natural that he would stay with her until the frenzy ended. He expected that this would be like the other times she has been there for him, but she has some news that will force him to re-evaluate their relationship.

Bree has a successful career, and she has been in love with her best friend since they were teenagers even if he doesn’t know. She has come to accept that he only wants a friendship so the best way to protect her heart is by distancing herself from him and the recent job offer out of town is the way to do that, but his reaction will change everything.

This is a story of two people who with the help of each other overcame their less than idyllic childhoods. They were both scared of destroying the best relationship in their lives as their journey is filled with humor and emotion.

gosh what a fun, sexy, and angsty romance for these two forever friends. HE is such an absolute disaster and mess, and i really loved seeing how Barry worked how these two forever friends finally got their HEA. An epic Howl's Moving Castle inspired tale (he is SUCH a Howl).

I will definitely need to reread this at some point because I want to hear the jokes on audio!

thank you to the publisher for the ARC

Sam and Bree are childhood best friends who have overcome impossible odds to find success in their respective careers. Bree has been in love with Sam for as long as she can remember but her feelings have been unrequited.

This is a pretty classic friends-to-lovers story full of pining. I appreciated that Bree never had the “rose-colored glasses” when it came to Sam. She knew who he was as a person and a lot of the insecurities she carried into their relationship were legitimate. It was clear that they both had some growing to do before they could bring their whole selves to their relationship.

I’m normally not a fan of a 3rd act breakup but in the case of this book, it was both well done and necessary for the growth of our main characters. Honestly, both characters reacted realistically to the situation at hand and their subsequent actions made sense. I also appreciated the mention of Sam going to therapy in the epilogue. Love is wonderful but it isn’t a silver bullet for mental health.

There wasn’t much talk of Sam and Bree’s life before ending up in NYC together. I think that’s the only place where this story misses the mark for me. If there had been some flashbacks or conversation around their past, maybe some build up around when Bree fell in love, it would have added more depth to their characters and their relationship.

Prepare yourself for a laugh-out-loud gem with “Funny Guy“! Join Sam, the self-proclaimed funny guy, and his loyal childhood best friend Bree. Right from the start, Sam’s antics will have you in stitches.


The undeniable chemistry between Sam and Bree is the heart and soul of this delightful story. As they transition from best friends to lovers, their journey is filled with heartwarming moments and some comedic relief. Their friends can see the sparks flying, but will they realize their true feelings before it’s too late?
But it’s not all laughter and jokes for Bree. She has been secretly in love with her best friend Sam since they were young. They both grew up in less-than-stellar homes and scraped their way out into careers they love. Now, Bree is trying to find the courage to move on and concentrate on her dreams even if it means without Sam.

Adding to the comedy gold is the unforgettable pop-singer ex and her chart-topping hit, “Lost Boy.” Sam, the lost boy himself, can’t escape the paparazzi frenzy and scandalous headlines that come with it. This love song turned comedic nightmare has him crashing on Bree’s studio apartment couch, turning their lives into a real-life sitcom with no commercial breaks. I just wish we had some lyrics of “Lost Boy” to get an idea of who and what Sam is like in a romantic relationship.

The pacing of “Funny Guy” is crafted with comedic mishaps and heartwarming romantic tension. You’ll find yourself eagerly turning pages, unable to resist the magnetic pull of the story. This rom-com gem is a perfect blend of laughter, love, and a touch of bad boy charm.


“Funny Guy” is a must-read for anyone in need of a good laugh and a delightful dose of romance. Get ready to fall in love with this cute gem!

This review was a challenge because I felt like I was waiting to like the book more than I did. And the book is fine! It's a lot better than other contemps out right now. I just couldn't see myself rereading it. I liked the character growth a lot, both have their fair share though moreso for Sam. I liked that Bree worked for her own goals and they weren't derailed by the potential relationship and Sam's fame. Barry's writing is solid all around. I wish I could put my finger on what the missing spark is, but not sure yet.