She Gets the Girl works on a very tidy piece of machinery. Alex Blackwood is impulsive and has just been dumped. Molly Parker is a shy freshman with a crush on a girl she has never spoken to. Alex offers to coach her — she is good at this, she says — and the two of them spend a semester at the University of Pittsburgh executing a plan aimed at somebody else entirely, in alternating chapters, each of them completely wrong about the other.
Three findings before the list.
The coaching is the rare part, and the closest match is not what you would guess. The Cyrano setup — one girl teaching another how to win a third — barely exists in sapphic young adult. Where it does turn up, it is usually one girl coaching a boy, or a bisexual protagonist with a male love interest, which is not what you came for. The nearest real equivalent is The Falling in Love Montage, where two girls run a romance as a deliberate project with rules and a checklist.
Sapphic young adult is generous with arrangements but stingy with dual narration. Fake dating, deals, bargains and contests are everywhere. Books that actually give you both girls’ heads are much rarer — most stay in one point of view, which means you never get the specific pleasure of watching two people misread each other in real time. Only three books below do it properly, and they are numbers one, three and eleven.
And almost none of it is set at university. Sapphic YA is overwhelmingly a high-school genre. If the campus itself was part of the appeal — the shared house, the roommate, the friend group that becomes the point — the honest answer is to cross into adult romance, which is why Catch and Cradle is on this list despite being open door.
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All 11 Books at a Glance
| Book | Setting | Reluctant pair | An arrangement | Dual perspective | Age band |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| She Gets the Girl (the original) | University | Yes | Romantic coaching | Yes | YA |
| Youngblood | A boarding school | Yes, with history | No | Yes | YA |
| She Drives Me Crazy | High school | Yes | Paid fake dating | No | YA |
| Hani and Ishu’s Guide to Fake Dating | Secondary school | Yes | A negotiated deal | Yes | YA |
| The Falling in Love Montage | A summer, Ireland | Softer | A rom-com checklist | No | YA |
| I Kissed Shara Wheeler | A Christian academy | Yes | A search party | Multiple | YA |
| You Should See Me in a Crown | High school | No | A prom campaign | No | YA |
| Cool for the Summer | High school | No | No | Dual timeline | YA |
| Love & Other Natural Disasters | A summer, San Francisco | No | A fake ex | No | YA |
| Catch and Cradle | College | Some | A no-dating rule | Yes | Adult |
| You Don’t Have a Shot | A soccer camp | Yes | Forced co-captaincy | No | YA |
| Home Field Advantage | High school | Yes | No | Yes | YA |
1. Youngblood by Sasha Laurens
Kat Finn has spent years telling herself she is over Taylor Sanger. They were inseparable as children, before Taylor’s family money and Kat’s financial-aid status pulled them apart — and now they are roommates at the same elite school, in alternating chapters, refusing to talk about any of it.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: The strongest match on the two axes that matter most: a reluctant relationship between two girls who used to be close, told in genuine dual perspective where each of them is wrong about the other. That gap between the two heads is the engine of She Gets the Girl.
How it differs: There are vampires. It is a boarding-school gothic as much as a romance, the tone is much darker, and there is no coaching arrangement. No print edition on Bookshop.
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2. She Drives Me Crazy by Kelly Quindlen
Scottie Zajac, still bleeding from a breakup, rear-ends Irene Abraham’s car. Irene is the cheerleading captain and Scottie’s least favourite person. They strike a deal: Irene will fake-date her so Scottie’s ex notices, for a fee.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: An arrangement between two girls who cannot stand each other, entered into to win somebody else’s attention. That is She Gets the Girl‘s premise with the sign flipped, and at over eighty thousand ratings it is the most-read book of its kind.
How it differs: High school rather than university, and it is fake dating rather than coaching — Irene is not teaching Scottie anything, she is standing next to her. Single point of view.
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3. Hani and Ishu’s Guide to Fake Dating by Adiba Jaigirdar
Humaira Khan is popular and easygoing at her Dublin school. When friends dismiss her bisexuality, she claims she is dating Ishita Dey — the intense, unpopular academic overachiever. Ishu agrees, on terms: Hani helps her win a popularity contest.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: A negotiated arrangement with clauses, two girls who would never have chosen each other, and dual narration that lets you watch each of them misread the other. Structurally it is the closest thing to Alex and Molly’s deal.
How it differs: Secondary school in Dublin, and the arrangement is mutual rather than one girl coaching the other. It also carries real weight on biphobia, racism and Islamophobia, so the comedy is not the point.
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4. The Falling in Love Montage by Ciara Smyth
Saoirse does not believe in love at first sight or happy endings — if they were real, her mother would not be in a care home with early-onset dementia. Then Ruby proposes a summer of deliberately executed rom-com clichés, with an expiry date attached.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: This is the closest anyone gets to the coaching axis: two girls running a romance as a project, with rules, a checklist and a stated purpose. If what you enjoyed about She Gets the Girl was watching a plan collide with real feelings, this is the same collision.
How it differs: Ireland, a summer rather than a campus, and the plan is between the two of them rather than aimed at a third party. It is also much sadder underneath — the dementia thread is not decorative.
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5. I Kissed Shara Wheeler by Casey McQuiston
Chloe Green is going to be valedictorian of her Christian academy in Alabama. Shara Wheeler kisses her and then disappears a month before graduation, leaving notes for the three people she kissed. Chloe teams up with the other two to find her.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: A reluctant alliance between people who do not like each other, pursuing somebody else, told across multiple perspectives. The bickering-partners energy is very close, and McQuiston writes it with more jokes per page than almost anyone.
How it differs: A mystery rather than a courtship, and there is no coaching. Small-town Alabama, a Christian school, and a closet that presses on everyone in it.
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6. You Should See Me in a Crown by Leah Johnson
Liz Lighty has one plan with one step: get the scholarship, go to Pennington College, play in the orchestra, become a doctor, never think about Campbell, Indiana again. When the scholarship falls through, the only route left is winning her school’s prom-queen contest.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: A campaign with a strategy and a scoreboard, run by a girl who is out of her depth and being helped along by the girl she is falling for. The plan-versus-feelings structure is the same, and Liz’s voice is the warmest on this list.
How it differs: A prom contest rather than a courtship, and the romance is a subplot inside a bigger book about class, race and a small Indiana town. Single point of view.
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7. Cool for the Summer by Dahlia Adler
Lara has wanted Chase Harding for years, and now she has him. Then Jasmine — the girl she spent last summer with, in a way she has not let herself think about — transfers into her school.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: Dual timelines rather than dual narrators, but the effect is similar: you get the version Lara tells herself and the version that actually happened, and the gap between them is where the book lives.
How it differs: A love triangle with a boy in it, and no arrangement of any kind. High school, and the tension is about bisexuality and self-knowledge rather than about two girls learning to tolerate each other.
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8. Love & Other Natural Disasters by Misa Sugiura
Nozomi has never had a girlfriend. When she meets Willow, she claims to be one — Willow’s ex, specifically, back to make somebody jealous. The lie is not sustainable and Nozomi keeps sustaining it.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: A fake relationship set up to make a third person notice, run by a girl who has no idea what she is doing and is receiving a great deal of unhelpful advice. The comic escalation is the same and so is the eventual reckoning.
How it differs: San Francisco over a summer, not a campus, and there is no reluctant partner — Nozomi and Willow like each other from the start. The deception runs one way and it costs more than in She Gets the Girl.
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9. Catch and Cradle by Katia Rose
College lacrosse. The captain has a firm rule about not dating within the team. She also has a two-year crush she had not noticed. The friend group around the two of them is what readers talk about most.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: The most genuinely collegiate book here. If it was the university setting of She Gets the Girl you wanted — the shared house, the team, the friend group that is really the point — this is the one, and nearly six thousand ratings for a self-published sapphic romance says readers agree.
How it differs: Adult and open door rather than young adult, so the heat is a real step up. No coaching arrangement, and the first quarter is slow before the season starts. No print edition.
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10. You Don’t Have a Shot by Racquel Marie
Valentina Castillo-Green and Leticia Ortiz fight during a playoff match and end up co-captaining a rookie team at the same summer camp, with college scouts watching.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: Forced cooperation between two girls who actively dislike each other, with something they both want on the line. The reluctance is real rather than performed, which is the part most enemies-to-lovers books fudge.
How it differs: Soccer rather than romance strategy, and no coaching of the romantic kind. A single point of view keeps you out of Leticia’s head, which is exactly the thing She Gets the Girl‘s dual narration does best.
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11. Home Field Advantage by Dahlia Adler
Jack Walsh arrives as the new quarterback at a school still grieving the last one. Amber McCloud wants the cheer captaincy and cannot afford a scandal. Neither the team nor the squad wants this to happen.
Why a She Gets the Girl reader wants it: Two girls on opposite sides of a school’s social architecture, each with a plan the other threatens, told in alternating chapters. The dual narration does the same work here as in She Gets the Girl — you always know more than either of them.
How it differs: American football and cheerleading rather than a campus courtship, no arrangement, and effectively closed door. It is also a book about grief as much as about romance.
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If You Only Read One
Read Youngblood. Two girls with a shared history refusing to talk about it, in true alternating narration, on a campus. It is the closest match on the axes that matter most — as long as you can accept the vampires.
For the coaching: The Falling in Love Montage. A romance run as a project, with rules and an expiry date.
For the arrangement: Hani and Ishu’s Guide to Fake Dating, which negotiates its terms out loud and gives you both heads.
For the campus: Catch and Cradle, with the note that it is an adult romance and considerably steamier.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is there a sequel to She Gets the Girl?
Yes — She Gets the Girl at Christmas, a holiday follow-up from the same authors. It is very new, so at the time of writing there is no print edition in Bookshop.org’s catalogue, but the ebook and audiobook are both available.
Are there other sapphic books with romantic coaching?
Very few. The Cyrano setup is common in young adult generally but usually pairs a girl with a boy, or gives a bisexual protagonist a male love interest. Within sapphic YA the closest thing is The Falling in Love Montage, where the romance itself is the project rather than a third party being pursued.
Which of these have genuine dual narration?
Youngblood, Hani and Ishu’s Guide to Fake Dating and Home Field Advantage. I Kissed Shara Wheeler uses multiple perspectives in a looser way, and Cool for the Summer alternates timelines rather than narrators. Everything else here stays in one head.
Are any of these set at university rather than school?
Only Catch and Cradle, and it is an adult romance rather than young adult, so the heat is a real step up. Sapphic YA is almost entirely a high-school genre — if the campus setting is what you want, you have to cross the line into adult.
What if none of these is quite right?
Tell us the book, not the trope. Our Books Like directory takes a title and routes you to the closest read-alike list we have — and if we have not written that one yet, it points you at the trope pages that get nearest and records what you searched for, so it gets built next.
Looking for read-alikes for a different book? Browse the full Books Like directory — search any sapphic title and we will point you at the closest match we have.