Below is the complete list of Lynn Painter’s Better Than the Movies books in order. For this series, the chronological reading order is the same as the order of publication.
Publication Order of Better Than the Movies Books
About Better Than the Movies
Lynn Painter’s Better Than the Movies series is a contemporary young adult romance sequence built around Liz Buxbaum and Wes Bennett, two longtime neighbors whose relationship begins in irritation, rivalry, and childhood history before turning into something far more emotionally complicated. The series starts with Better Than the Movies, Painter’s breakout YA rom-com, and continues with Nothing Like the Movies, which follows Liz and Wes beyond the first rush of high-school romance into the messier territory of college, distance, insecurity, and second chances.
The first book is deeply rooted in romantic-comedy language. Liz Buxbaum has grown up loving the movies her late mother adored, and she carries those stories as both comfort and expectation. For Liz, romance is not simply about liking someone; it is tied to memory, grief, fantasy, music, outfits, gestures, and the hope that life can still arrange itself into something beautiful. That makes her funny and endearing, but also vulnerable. She is not just chasing a boy. She is chasing a version of happiness that feels connected to her mother and to the emotional script she has been holding onto for years.
Wes Bennett initially appears to be the wrong person for that script. He is Liz’s annoying next-door neighbor, the boy who has teased her, frustrated her, and known her too long for her to perform a perfect version of herself around him. Their banter gives the first book much of its energy. Liz thinks she wants help winning the attention of Michael, the polished crush who seems to fit her romantic fantasy, but Wes’s presence keeps disrupting the story she thinks she is trying to live. Painter uses that familiar setup well because the emotional truth is clear: the person who ruins the fantasy may be the person who sees the real Liz most clearly.
The appeal of Better Than the Movies comes from the way it mixes trope awareness with sincerity. The book knows the rhythms of fake dating, enemies-to-lovers tension, makeover energy, prom-season drama, and the grand gesture, but it does not treat those elements as empty references. Liz believes in them because they help her organize grief and hope. Wes works as a romantic lead because he is not merely charming; he is specific to her history, her embarrassment, her temper, and her softness.
Nothing Like the Movies changes the emotional scale of the series. Instead of simply repeating the high-school rom-com structure, Painter moves Liz and Wes into a more difficult phase. College changes their timing, their confidence, and their understanding of what love requires after the happy ending. The sequel is still romantic and funny, but it is more concerned with repair than discovery. It asks whether two people who were right for each other once can find their way back after hurt, distance, and mistakes have changed the shape of the relationship.
Reading the series in publication order is the natural approach because the emotional payoff depends on seeing Liz and Wes first as rivals, then as partners, then as people forced to reconsider what partnership means. The first book delivers the rush of realization; the second tests whether that realization can survive real consequences.
The Better Than the Movies series endures because it understands why readers love rom-coms without mocking that love. Painter writes with speed, warmth, and sharp banter, but the books work because beneath the jokes is something tender: the desire to be chosen by someone who knows the unedited version of you. Liz may begin by looking for a movie-perfect romance, but the series’ real argument is that love becomes better when it stops needing to look exactly like the movies.