What Is Love?

Jen Comfort is an author I’ve been wanting to read for the past year, ever since I got her novel, Midnight Duet. While that is still on my TBR, I was excited to get an advance copy of her newest book, What Is Love?, set in the world of game show trivia. I love learning as much as I love romance, so this spicy romance between two trivia rivals was right up my alley.

Special thanks to Montlake and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC of this book!

Summary

One year ago, Maxine Hart and Teddy Ferguson crossed paths on the trivia game show Answers!, with her breaking his 76-game winning streak. Maxine, too, went on to win dozens of games, but when she and Teddy matched up again in a special show, he beat her by a landslide and bruised her ego in the process. Since then they’ve been enemies, albeit the kind who respect each other. Now, they’re being recruited by Answers! once more to compete in another special edition of the show, and they’ll be up against the long-retired all-time champion of the game, Hercules McKnight. Not only do Teddy and Maxine want a definitive answer on which of them is better at trivia, they also want to give Hercules a run for his money. So when Maxine proposes that she and Teddy train together until the competition, he agrees. But these two rivals will discover that learning can go hand-in-hand with a rapidly developing relationship.

Review

Growing up, I loved watching Jeopardy! with my family. While I’ve never done trivia myself, it’s something I’ve continued to have an interest in. So when I heard about What Is Love?, I was excited to dive into a romance centered around a trivia game show called Answers!

The characters in What Is Love? are highly intelligent, each full of both common and obscure knowledge that most of us mere mortals wouldn’t be able to compete with. However, one thing I most love about this book is how it highlights different kinds of intelligence and learning styles. Teddy Ferguson comes from a more traditional learning background. He did well in school, is good at studying and memorizing facts, and thrives in classrooms as we know them. Maxine Hart, though, has ADHD and learns completely differently. She doesn’t study or train the way you’re “supposed to”; she prefers to learn with a bit more creativity and abstract thinking. Her goal on Answers! is to show other neurodivergent kids that they, too, are just as smart and capable.

Both Maxine and Teddy have their strengths as well as weakness going into this new tournament. If they team up, they can each fill in the blanks and be better prepared to take on their mutual rival, Hercules McKnight. If Teddy can find a way to teach Maxine the more boring information she needs, in spite of how her ADHD brain works, that will be a boon to her. And if she can teach him to be less cautious, he may have a chance of edging out more daring competitors like herself.

I enjoyed Maxine and Teddy’s forced proximity and teacher-student dynamic as they train for one last Answers! tournament. They have such different personalities—he’s quite formal and serious; she’s a firecracker of energy and calls things as she sees them—and yet they complement each other so well. They also make some assumptions about each other that may not be so accurate, especially in regards to their schooling and socioeconomic backgrounds. Speaking of, I appreciated Maxine’s unabashed views on capitalism and class structures!

As Maxine and Teddy spend more time together, their mutual attraction becomes harder to ignore. What Is Love? gets pretty spicy… study buddies can certainly be something more than that! But both will have to stop hiding parts of themselves for a relationship to fully blossom. I love how they get there and how it all ends.

Final Thoughts

What Is Love? is such a fun, smart, and steamy romance. It will appeal to anyone who likes trivia or game shows, neurodivergent representation, and characters that jump off the pages. This is my first time reading Jen Comfort, but I’ve had her previous book, Midnight Duet, on my TBR for the past year. I think it’s time I bump that one to the top of my list!

Get the Book

You can buy What Is Love? here – it’s available as a paperback, ebook, and audiobook.

What Is Love? by Jen Comfort
Audience	Adult
Genre	Contemporary Romance
Setting	New York; California
Number of Pages	345
Format I Read	Ebook (NetGalley ARC)
Original Publication Date	April 1, 2024
Publisher	Montlake

Official Summary

Head and heart collide in a story of polar-opposite rivals that’s anything but trivial in this game show romance from Midnight Duet author Jen Comfort.

Answer: From the Latin word for crossroads, this is knowledge so common as to be obscure, the pursuit of which engages millions daily. Question: What is trivia?

Trivia is the magic in the mundane, the connection in the commonplace, and Maxine Hart’s second-favorite pastime. A self-proclaimed Brooklyn street rat and a high school dropout, Maxine has never been a fan of formal education, but thanks to her ADHD “superpowers,” she’s a glutton for knowledge—and a good fight. And when Maxine enters the trivia game show Answers!, her brilliance, coupled with her penchant for big bets, devastates her competition. Even record-holding, 76-time-winner Teddy Ferguson.

Or was it their kiss the night before they faced off that threw the buttoned-up professor off his game?

Now, Maxine and Teddy cross paths again in a high-stakes tournament against all-time Answers! winners, including undefeated champion Hercules McKnight. With nothing in common but an insatiable appetite for knowledge and a desire to win, Maxine offers Teddy a deal: combine their strengths to shore up their weaknesses. She’ll push his tolerance for risk and improve his buzzer speed, if he’ll find creative ways to fill in the gaps in her education.

Except neither one of them foresaw just how scintillating learning could be…