Sometimes you just want to read or listen to something light and frothy, especially after reading through some pretty heavy history tomes. That was the condition I was in when I plugged in my Kindle and listened to Tweet Cute by Emma Lord. It was just what the doctor ordered.

From the publisher: “Meet Pepper, swim team captain, chronic overachiever, and all-around perfectionist. Her family may be falling apart, but their massive fast-food chain is booming ― mainly thanks to Pepper, who is barely managing to juggle real life while secretly running Big League Burger’s massive Twitter account.

Enter Jack, class clown and constant thorn in Pepper’s side. When he isn’t trying to duck out of his obscenely popular twin’s shadow, he’s busy working in his family’s deli. His relationship with the business that holds his future might be love/hate, but when Big League Burger steals his grandma’s iconic grilled cheese recipe, he’ll do whatever it takes to take them down, one tweet at a time.”

First off, I just want to say that Tweet Cute is an absolutely clean novel, something you could give to your teen to read if they like romantic comedies. That was refreshing after reading a couple of books where random sex scenes were thrown in for no good reason. Not that I’m a prude, but I just wasn’t in the mood for another random coupling, you know?

The idea for the book is not original by any stretch. Tweet Cute is a direct rip off of the Meg Ryan/Tom Hanks movie You’ve Got Mail, which was actually a remake of The Shop Around the Corner starring Jimmy Stewart back in the 1940’s. But the use of social media brings the story into the 21st century.

Pepper and Jack (what perfect names for a story about grilled cheese sandwiches) have parents who run restaurants. The two of them end up getting into a Twitter war over Jack’s grandmother’s grilled cheese recipe, which Pepper’s family seems to have stolen. Sparks fly both on and off Twitter. Their Twitter battle is realistic and reminds me very much of several businesses that I follow on Twitter like Kwik Trip, the Wisconsin-based gas station and convenience stores, or Culver’s, also a Wisconsin-based restaurant chain. They’re a little snarky, and they sometimes mention each other. Tweet Cute makes grilled cheese sandwiches sound exciting, just like Culver’s makes deep fried cheese curds appealing, or Kwik Trip’s tweets about regular cheese curds and other Wisconsin delicacies.

Besides all the Twitter banter, though, is the journey of self-discovery that Jack and Pepper make in their roles of their family restaurants. Both of them have big decisions to make about their futures, and it’s not quite what their parents have in mind. And their parents have some owning up to do, too. They weren’t exactly honest with their kids, which caused endless troubles.

This is the 40th Audiobook I’ve listened to as part of my 2021 Audiobook Challenge.

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