Marcus Caster-Rupp is on a Game of Thrones expy-show, Gods of the Gates. The showrunners are awful, they ran out of material years ago, and the showrunners are ruining the entire show. Even though the show's ending, the entire (pissed off, frustrated) cast is forbidden to say anything negative about the show, spoilers, anything at all. To the public, Marcus appears to be dome, pretty man-meat who only talks about his workouts or hair products in interviews. This is a strategy he developed after years of growing up dyslexic with intellectual parents who kind of despise him--play dumb and nobody asks you show questions. But secretly he's writing fanfiction for Gods of the Gates and venting his show rage into fix-it fics as "Book!AeneasWouldNever." (or "BAWN"). On the secret server, he's friends with "UnapologeticLaviniaStan," but declines meeting IRL for uh, obvious reasons.
April Whittier, i.e. "UnapologeticLaviniaStan," and "Ulsie," is a geologist of size who, after finally getting a job where she can come out of the closet as a nerd, posts her Lavinia costume online....which leads to people insulting the shit out of her....which leads to Marcus Caster-Rupp asking her out. Yeah, that's weird and April's not sure what to make of the whole thing, but she dates him a few times. It's kind of weird because he kind of goes between his hair products persona and asking if she wants to work out with him at the gym (something April takes in exactly the wrong way, something Marcus didn't think of going in that direction) and being more of a real person. At the same time, "BAWN" (i.e. Marcus online) makes up some crap about how he won't have any Internet access any more once he finds out April's dating Marcus, which upsets April. You get why he did it, but still, awkward.
Anyway, Marcus and April eventually work out the whole dating thing and it goes great, but Marcus doesn't feel like he can confess his secret fanfic identity (seriously, it's like modern You've Got Mail in some respects) both for legal reasons and just outing himself reasons, inevitable blowup occurs, and then there's a fan convention where all kinds of interesting things happen!
I did appreciate that both April and Marcus had horrendous parent issues going on. April's father ignores her because of her weight, and her mother's been so scarred by her husband's treatment of her after gaining some weight in the past that she's constantly on April to lose some. Marcus's parents basically think he's an idiot even though he's dyslexic. Both of them eventually get up the nerve to tell their parents "either stop it with this shit, or I'm cutting you off," which is great. That ends kinda ambiguously, but so goes life.
I did enjoy the unabashed geekiness of April's new coworkers--we don't see much of them, but their band amuses me. I also was amused by the Gates of the Gods group chats. One cast member is obsessed with tuna for some reason, so making fun of that guy is fun.
I would also like to mention the parallel story being mentioned off and on in this one of Marcus's castmate/bestie Alex, a hot-tempered fellow with ADHD who's been assigned a minder for his bad behavior. We hear him grumbling about this off and on, and then suddenly Shit Blows Up But Good (which we somewhat hear about) around the time of the convention, causing a very snitty Alex to waaaaaaay set off a drama bomb in public. What happens after that isn't answered, as there's going to be a companion book/sequel (sounds like it takes place at the same time as this one) for Alex and his minder. I admit I think this is an excellent way to seed interest in a sequel and it does make me rather interested in the upcoming follow up to see what goes on.
What I wasn't so into in this book:
The book switches between April and Marcus's POV's and then has interstitial chapters that are fanfics, or conversations between "BAWN" and "Ulsie," or scripts from Marcus's worst movies. Those didn't always add to the book in some respects. (Though that shark movie, in which Marcus is in a lab coat and a Speedo as he watches the president get eaten by a shark? Damn.)
I admit I'm not a fanficcer. I don't read a whole lot on AO3. I'm sure the author has and she's being accurate when she has online characters that all just refuse the names Aeneas and Lavinia and/or both as their screen names OVER AND OVER AND OVER. To say I can't keep track of it all is an understatement. I'm not sure if I was meant to keep track of them all, really, but everyone being referred to by very long screen names that just repeat Aeneas and Lavinia's names over and over and over kind of got to me. And sometimes I just got kind of eye-rolling over the whole "fix it fic" concept, or allllllllll the pegging references (looking at you, Alex) after awhile. Maybe that's more of a specialized audience thing to appeal to a certain crowd.
Anyway, I'm giving it three and a half stars. I'm not madly in love with sexy fanfic and all the names and that's probably my one issue over the book, but also that's just my own personal preferences. I found it kind of hard to wade through that stuff at times. But overall the relationship works, it's sexy and sweet, you get why the characters do what they do, and it all works out. So, pretty good book!