Book Review: Love At First Set by Jennifer Dugan

‘Love At First Set’ by Jennifer Dugan was released in 2023. It drew my eye thanks to TikTok, where it was promoted as a love story between two women who meet in the bathroom, and one encourages the other to leave her fiance at the altar.

But this book is so much more! It’s more than just girl code and hyping each other up, it’s about deep-rooted insecurity, family trauma, found family and love. So much love. Finding self-love, falling in love, understanding that you deserve love.

Lizzie, our plucky protagonist is a lesbian in a dry spell. Financially insecure, using her paycheck to support her mother, and a girl with a dream. What Lizzie wants more than anything else in the world is a gym. She wants to own a gym, make it inclusive, accessible, body-positive and a safe haven for everyone and anyone. It was a pipe dream until the gym she worked at, owned by her friend James’ family, announced they were opening a new location, and she could go from a front desk manager position to running a whole gym. Not the pinnacle of the dream, but as close as she felt was possible at the time.

Except she has to win James’ parents over. And surely there’s no better opportunity to shmooze than at the golden child’s wedding, the prodigal daughter whom despite working at the gym for five years, has never met.

I loved so much about this book, but the family expectations and how willing everyone was to forgive Stella and George, Cara and James’ parents seemed a bit convenient, especially considering how they treated Lizzie prior to the events of the story, and how Lizzie spoke to them. Perhaps I expected them to cut their parents off and go no-contact, but knowing they were able to get over that rift, without showing any of the progress felt a bit ‘tie it all up in a bow and hey presto we have an ending’, to me.

Despite this, I would love to read more of Dugan’s work, since her means of storytelling, her character voice, and command of language is very fun and easy to read. I look forward to my next one of her books.