Friends With Benefits
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Overview
A witty, warmhearted romance about best friends, bad timing, and the lengths we go to just to survive — perfect for fans of Emily Henry and Katherine Center.
Evie Bloom notices everything. As an aspiring Foley artist, her entire career is built on catching what others miss — the exact crunch of a footstep, the precise smack of a kiss, every tiny sound that makes a scene feel real. When she lands a coveted fellowship that could launch her career, she should be celebrating. There's just one problem: the position comes with no health insurance, and for Evie, who lives with a chronic illness, that's not a small detail she can overlook.
Theo Cohen is an elementary school teacher who loves his rent-controlled LA apartment almost as much as he loves his best friend. But when his roommates fall in love and move out together, Theo suddenly can't afford to stay — unless he finds a workaround buried in the fine print of his lease. Married tenants are exempt from the income threshold. And Theo happens to know exactly who he'd want to marry.
The solution seems almost too logical: Evie gets health benefits so she can accept her dream fellowship, and Theo keeps his apartment. They already spend all their time together anyway. It's practical. It's temporary. It's completely under control. Except Evie has never wanted to get married — not to anyone, not ever. And Theo has a secret he's been carrying for a very long time.
What follows is a slow-burn, will-they-won't-they story that wrestles with the very real pressures of healthcare, housing, and what happens when the safest relationship in your life starts to feel like something more.
"Theo and Evie have sizzling chemistry, and their relationship is a satisfyingly slow burn." - Kirkus Reviews
Reviews and Author Praise
"There are many fake-dating and marriage-of-convenience romances out there, but Kanter's stands out by presenting an entirely realistic reason for two best friends to get married. Evie's struggles with her illness and the American healthcare industry are believable and surely relatable for many readers. Theo and Evie have sizzling chemistry, and their relationship is a satisfyingly slow burn."
— Kirkus Reviews
"A romance that balances fun tropes with the frustrating realities of America's healthcare system."
— Kirkus Reviews
"The kind of read that's good for both the heart and the soul."
— Kate Spencer, author of In a New York Minute
Topics and Key Themes
Narrative Tropes
Forced Proximity
Slow Burn
He Falls First
Friends to Lovers
Marriage of Convenience
Key Themes
Healthcare as a life-or-death stake — chronic illness forces Evie to choose between her dream and her survival.
The cost of practicality — a logical arrangement quietly dismantles every wall the heart built.
Secrets between best friends — Theo's long-carried truth threatens the relationship built on honesty.
Career dreams with impossible fine print — ambition means nothing without the safety net to pursue it.
Marriage as the safest risk — two people terrified of forever find it in each other anyway.
Who is this book for?
Primary Genre: Contemporary Romance - Marriage of Convenience
Spice Level: 🌶️🌶️ 2/5: Light Spice
Behind closed doors. Tension builds to intimacy; scenes fade to black—brief and non-graphic. Chemistry is there, without the details. Want a hint of heat without anything overt? This is it.
Fans of Emily Henry's People We Meet on Vacation will enjoy the heartfelt best-friends-to-lovers slow burn, witty banter, and emotionally rich storytelling wrapped in a charming marriage-of-convenience premise.
About the Author
Marisa Kanter is the author of three novels for teens (What I Like About You, As If on Cue, and the forthcoming Finally Fitz – S&S BFYR). Born and raised in the suburbs of Boston, her obsession with books led her to New York, where she worked in publishing. She now lives in Los Angeles, writing love stories by day and crocheting her wardrobe by night. She is also an amateur baker, and reality television enthusiast.
Similar Authors
Reader FAQs
It shares Henry's warmth, witty banter, and emotionally grounded best-friends-to-lovers dynamic. Where Henry often leans into introspective prose, Friends With Benefits grounds its emotional stakes in concrete real-world pressures — chronic illness and housing insecurity — giving it a sharper social edge.
The book handles chronic illness and the American healthcare system as genuine, plot-driving stakes rather than background detail. The tone remains warm and hopeful throughout, but the emotional weight is real. It sits closer to Katherine Center's balance of heart and substance than to pure escapist fare.
Friends With Benefits is written for adult readers. The spice level is low, the emotional themes — career ambition, chronic illness, and navigating adult relationships — are aimed at readers in their twenties and up.
The book contains depictions of chronic illness and the stress of navigating healthcare without insurance. Readers sensitive to medical anxiety or financial precarity should be aware these are central, recurring themes rather than brief references.
The premise is rooted in two of the most pressing realities of American adult life — lack of health insurance and unaffordable rent. Kirkus Reviews notes this grounding distinguishes it from more fantastical takes on the trope, giving the arrangement genuine emotional and practical stakes.
Info
ISBN: 9781250358899
Published Date: May 6, 2025
Publisher: Celadon Books
Language: English
Page Count: 371
Size: 8.13" l x 5.38" w x 1.00" h
Category
Fiction