by Gwenda Bond
THE END (… OF THE BEGINNING)
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
To the author pals who went along with my serendipitous plan to do an escape room next door to our hotel in Murfreesboro at the Southeastern Young Adult Book Festival (SEYA) in 2017: Court Stevens, Megan Shepherd, Sheba Karim, Lauren Gibaldi, E. Katherine Kottaras, I. W. Gregorio, and Andrew Maraniss. Did we escape? YOU BET WE DID. And I had the first spark of this idea on my drive home from the festival.
To my writing group, the Moonscribers, for general support and for reading and assisting with parts of this book. To Kami Garcia, for being the world’s best accountability buddy, and to Sam Humphries for always sending a “you got this” text at the right moment. To the Lexington Writer’s Room, a wondrous place filled with wondrous people. To Jennie Goloboy for supporting Romancing the Runoff with a generous bid for an advance copy of this book. To all the romance authors whose work has brought me joy and helped me survive the quarantimes.
To my fabulous editors on this book, Tiffany Shelton and Jennie Conway, and the entire team at St. Martin’s, who are rock stars of the first order. Speaking of, thanks to Mary Moates, DJ DeSmyter, Marissa Sangiacomo, and Kejana Ayala for their publicity and marketing work, and to Kerri Resnick for her cover design and Louisa Cannell for the character art. To my agent, Jennifer Laughran, for letting me do what I want and supporting me even when it’s a little out of left field.
To the menagerie: Izzy, Sally, and Puck, good dogs every one (Bosch might bear a certain resemblance to Ms. Isabelle), and Stella and Phoebe, co-queen cats. To Christopher Rowe, my husband, for meals and moral support and generally being the best romantic lead I can imagine.
And, as always, to all the readers who’ve supported me along my author journey and to the new ones. I love you all. Thank you, thank you, thank you for reading.
ALSO BY GWENDA BOND
Stranger Things: Suspicious Minds
YOUNG ADULT
Dead Air
Strange Alchemy
Lois Lane: Triple Threat
Girl Over Paris
Girl in the Shadows
Lois Lane: Double Down
Lois Lane: Fallout
Girl on a Wire
Blackwood
The Woken Gods
MIDDLE GRADE
The Sphinx’s Secret
The Lost Legacy
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
GWENDA BOND is the New York Times bestselling author of many novels, including the Lois Lane and Cirque American trilogies. She wrote the first official Stranger Things novel, Suspicious Minds. She also created Dead Air, a serialized mystery and scripted podcast written with Carrie Ryan and Rachel Caine. Not Your Average Hot Guy is her first romantic comedy for adults.
Her nonfiction writing has appeared in Publishers Weekly, Locus Magazine, Salon, the Los Angeles Times, and many other publications. She has an MFA in writing from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. She lives in a hundred-year-old house in Lexington, Kentucky, with her husband and their unruly pets. She believes she may have escaped from a 1940s screwball comedy. She writes a monthly-ish letter you can sign up for at her website (gwendabond.com), and you can also follow her on Twitter (@Gwenda). Visit her online at, or sign up for email updates here.
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CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
48 Hours
Part One: In the Beginning
Chapter One: Callie
Chapter Two: Luke
Chapter Three: Callie
Chapter Four: Luke
Chapter Five: Callie
Chapter Six: Luke
Chapter Seven: Callie
Chapter Eight: Luke
Chapter Nine: Callie
Chapter Ten: Luke
Chapter Eleven: Callie
Chapter Twelve: Luke
Part Two: The Descent
Chapter Thirteen: Callie
Chapter Fourteen: Luke
Chapter Fifteen: Callie
Chapter Sixteen: Luke
Chapter Seventeen: Callie
Chapter Eighteen: Luke
Part Three: Apocalypse Right Now
Chapter Nineteen: Callie
Chapter Twenty: Luke
Chapter Twenty-One: Callie
Chapter Twenty-Two: Luke
Chapter Twenty-Three: Callie
Chapter Twenty-Four: Luke
Chapter Twenty-Five: Callie
Chapter Twenty-Six: Luke
Chapter Twenty-Seven: Callie and Luke
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Porsoth
Acknowledgments
Also by Gwenda Bond
About the Author
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
First published in the United States by St. Martin’s Griffin, an imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group
NOT YOUR AVERAGE HOT GUY. Copyright © 2021 by Gwenda Bond. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Publishing Group, 120 Broadway, New York, NY 10271.
www.stmartins.com
Cover design by Kerri Resnick
Figure illustrations by Louisa Cannell
Cover art: flames © WinWin artlab/Shutterstock.com
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:
Names: Bond, Gwenda, author.
Title: Not your average hot guy: a romantic comedy at the (possible) end of the world / Gwenda Bond.
Description: First Edition. | New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 2021.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021016068 | ISBN 9781250771742 (trade paperback) | ISBN 9781250771759 (ebook)
Subjects: GSAFD: Horror fiction. | Science fiction.
Classification: LCC PS3602.O65648 N68 2021 | DDC 813/.6—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021016068
eISBN 9781250771759
Our ebooks may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, extension 5442, or by email at [email protected].
First Edition: 2021