This was excellent! I've been wary of contemporary rom-coms lately, particularly YA (as I'm not the target audience), so I went into this book with slightly lower expectations in terms of my own personal enjoyment (especially because I also just did not click with this author's writing style in The Atlas Six, written under her Olivie Blake pseudonym). All that being said, Twelfth Knight sounded exactly like my kind of rom-com (Shakespeare retelling set in high school, fandom culture, a prickly heroine, slow burn rivals to lovers) and it absolutely delivered. This was a lot of fun. If you have a nostalgic love for 2000s romcoms based on Shakespeare plays/classic novels (She's the Man, 10 Things I Hate About You, Clueless, etc.), you will likely love this.

It's dual POV, which I don't always love in romances but overall it worked well here, especially in terms of the "false identity" plot (though I greatly preferred reading from Vi's POV). Vi and Jack both have their own personal arcs outside of their romance (though the romance is central) which I appreciated and their banter was excellent. This was also a true slow burn (with a perfectly paced rivals to friends to lovers arc) which is refreshing when most books marketed as "slow burn" either take place over a very short period of time or include some type of insta-love/lust/attraction.

Outside of the romance I appreciated the focus on other relationship dynamics. In Vi's POV in particular there was a focus on her relationship with her mom and brother, her best friend Antonia, and her growing friendship with Olivia. All of these relationships felt just as important and as well developed as her romance with Jack. I think this aspect is one of the weaker parts of Jack's POV - outside of his evolving relationship with Vi, his familial relationships and other friendships (perhaps with the exception of Olivia) felt a bit underdeveloped in comparison.

I also really enjoyed the exploration of fandom culture (and particularly the experience of being female/female-presenting in sci-fi/fantasy fandom spaces). Sometimes the fandom experience in contemporary novels doesn't always feel authentic to me but it definitely did here. You can tell Alexene Farol Follmuth has been in the trenches of 2010s Tumblr fandoms (and if you were also in those trenches, like me, it will add to your enjoyment of this book). The experience of tabletop RPGs and MMORPGs also felt authentic. Even though I'm not really a MMORPG player anymore, I was getting nostalgic for the brief time in high school I played World of Warcraft and was even tempted to log into my SWTOR account for the first time in years. The concept of the MMORPG in the book was so well developed that I'm disappointed it doesn't actually exist

the Arthur and Guinevere twist at the end of the game's story was just as exciting for me as it was for Vi and Jack - and I loved how it mirrored their relationship a bit

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