How to Kiss a Movie Star

I’ll admit, I groaned when I saw the ‘Hollywood star hides in small town’ premise—until the first chapter, where our heroine, a wildlife biologist with the social grace of a startled badger, *literally* mistakes the world’s most famous actor for a trespasser and threatens him with a tranquilizer dart. That’s when I knew *How to Kiss a Movie Star* was playing a different game. Lidia Dornet’s narration sells every beat of the heroine’s exasperation, her voice a perfect mix of academic precision and ‘I cannot believe this is my life’ fatigue. Philip Alces, meanwhile, nails the duality of a man who’s spent a decade being everyone’s fantasy but has no idea how to be *real*—his performance softens just enough when the character’s guard drops, making the emotional payoff land harder. The story’s strength is in its details: the way the town’s reaction to the star isn’t uniform adoration but a spectrum of annoyance, opportunism, and genuine indifference; the running gag of the heroine’s *terrible* lie-detection skills; the sex scenes that are somehow both steamy and awkward in the best way. My only critique? The mid-book lull where the conflict feels manufactured—Proctor leans a little too hard on miscommunication tropes, and the pacing drags when the couple’s separation lacks the same bite as their banter. And while Alces’ narration is stellar, his ‘small-town accent’ attempts occasionally veer into caricature. But these are quibbles. The audiobook’s production is polished, with seamless transitions between perspectives and a score that swells just enough to underscore the romance without drowning it. By the end, you’ll believe in a love story where the real chemistry isn’t in the kissing—it’s in the way these two force each other to *see* the world differently.