Beth O’Leary’s The Flatshare is like a Richard Curtis film populated by actual humans – transplanting all the delight of a thinking rom-com into the 21st century. London’s ridiculous rents force Tiffy (crafts book editor, works 9-5) and Leon (a hospice nurse on night shifts) to share not only a flat but a bed. Sleeping in shifts, their schedules mean they never meet – Tiffy rents the bed via Leon’s girlfriend to begin with – but they soon come to rely on each other’s notes for support.

As Leon’s relationship falters and he tries to help his brother in prison and Tiffy struggles with leaving behind a toxic love affair that’s destroyed her self-esteem, the two become increasingly drawn to each other’s eccentricities and kindness. It’s a portrait painted in the most tender and convincing of ways – made all the more poignant when the two finally meet.

Shop The Flatshare by Beth O’Leary (Quercus) at Amazon, from £6.55

Written and directed by Jennifer Kaytin Robinson, Someone Great is an ode to love, mates, getting drunk, heartbreak, doing exactly the wrong thing when you’re hurting and, ultimately, trusting your instincts. Jenny (the adorable Gina Rodriguez) lands her dream job only for her long-term boyfriend to end things because he doesn’t want to move from the East Coast to the West. 

With a supporting cast of smart, funny and well-conceived women played by DeWanda Wise and Brittany Snow… Friday night sorted. 

Imagine: the whole of North America has turned gay thanks to the efforts of the Gay Agenda (and also “realistic depictions of same-sex couples on cable TV”) but there’s a rebel band of heteros and one boy, Mikey Pence (get it?), is discovering that Gay Academy (core curriculum: algebra with glitter) might not be the place for him. 

Properly laugh-out-loud funny, Gay Future is a delirious satire on dystopian fiction, conservative paranoia and, ultimately, a tale of letting people love (and be) whoever the hell they want. 

If ever there is proof needed that some of the greatest love stories ever told are about people finding themselves, then Sorry I’m Late, I Didn’t Want To Come by Jessica Pan is it. A self-understanding introvert, Pan decided that her natural setting meant she was missing out on life so, for one year, she forced herself to do the work of an extrovert by trying improv, throwing a dinner party and dating friends. And, she hated every minute of it. 

A paeon to knowing thine own self – this is a love story for us all. 

Sorry I’m Late, I Didn’t Want To Come by Jessica Pan (Doubleday) at Waterstones, £12.99

Pairing Charlize Theron and Seth Rogen could have happened in just about any rom-com of the past 20 years. But – and this is a big but – Long Shot is a brilliant and funny clear-eyed story, following the unlikely romance between Rogen’s journalist and Theron’s Secretary of State. 

With knowing nods to Pretty Woman, US politics (Rogen loses his job when a right-wing mogul takes over his mag; the super-successful Theron is patronised by other politicians) and a cracking soundtrack, it’s a pure delight.