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ABOUT THE BOOK
NO SPOILERSLiz Buxbaum has spent her whole life prepping for a real-life romantic comedy, the kind her late mother taught her to love from the time she was seven years old. When her elementary school crush Michael Young moves back to Omaha right before senior year, Liz decides fate has finally caught up with her plan. There's just one problem: she and her next-door neighbor Wes Bennett have been locked in an ongoing war over the single parking spot between their two houses, and Michael has fallen in with Wes's friend group. Liz strikes a deal. Wes will help her get close to Michael, coach her on how to seem less like the awkward kid he remembers, and vouch for her with his friends, and in exchange he finally gets the parking spot for good. As Liz launches her campaign to land her dream guy, she has to keep pretending to Wes, to her best friend Joss, and to her stepmom Helena that everything is going exactly according to plan.
Free Battle of the Books questions for Better Than the Movies
SPOILERSEvery one of these has the same answer, and that is the point. In a real battle the question is read aloud with a dozen other books in play, and students have a few seconds to place it. Here is what a battle might ask about Better Than the Movies. Use them as a quiz, a trivia round, or BOTB practice.
Where in the book they come from
- Early in the book
In what book does a crush walk down a hallway in slow motion with blue birds circling his head?
✓ Answer
Better Than the Movies by Lynn Painter
This is how Liz sees Michael Young the morning he turns up at her school after years away in Texas. Her brain supplies the slow motion, the birds, and the sparkling breeze, because she narrates her whole life like a romantic comedy.
- First half
In what book does a girl's friend react to basketball plans as though she claimed to be a triceratops?
✓ Answer
Better Than the Movies by Lynn Painter
Jocelyn cannot believe Liz is going to a game with Wes Bennett of all people, wearing Chuck Taylors of all shoes. By this point Liz is lying to her best friend constantly, and the guilt keeps piling up.
- First half
In what book does a boy pull off his shirt to stop a girl's bloody nose?
✓ Answer
Better Than the Movies by Lynn Painter
A wild chest pass catches Liz square in the face in the practice gym and the blood absolutely pours. Wes reacts before anyone else does, and it is the second time in two nights he has given her the clothes off his back.
- Second half
In what book does a boy text a girl, "Don't forget that white is your color, gurl"?
✓ Answer
Better Than the Movies by Lynn Painter
Wes is texting Liz while she is trapped in a fitting room hating everything, and his joke about her best color sends her reaching for the one white dress in the pile. She ends up loving it and sends him a picture, and he writes back begging her to buy it.
- Second half
In what book does a dad in pajama pants wander outside near midnight and ask for a marshmallow?
✓ Answer
Better Than the Movies by Lynn Painter
Liz and Wes are roasting marshmallows by his firepit on a school night when her father appears in the clearing, remembers the meteor shower, and drops into the empty chair between them. The funny part is that neither teenager had bothered to look at the sky all evening.
- Near the end
In what book does a Mardi Gras prom feature an enormous papier-mâché baby on a giant cake?
✓ Answer
Better Than the Movies by Lynn Painter
Prom happens in Ballroom C of a convention center done up in jarring purple, yellow, and green, and the centerpiece is a huge papier-mâché infant perched on an even bigger fake cake. Liz stares at it and counts the paper smudges so she does not have to watch Wes dance with someone else.
