The Princess & the Pauper

by Elizabeth Peters

Like Julia, your protagonist here is a young woman living a double life—by day she's a proper Victorian lady, by night she hunts supernatural creatures in Edinburgh's shadows. May captures that same electric tension between two worlds that Brian creates, but adds a darker, gothic edge where the stakes feel genuinely dangerous rather than just socially awkward.

by Gail Carson Levine

This one's from 1997, so it predates your book by several years, but it shares that same witty, character-driven approach to fairy tale tropes. Where Brian plays with the princess-swap premise, Levine deconstructs the 'obedient heroine' archetype—both authors trust their readers to laugh at the absurdity while genuinely caring about their heroines' agency and choices.

by Margaret Rogerson

This is my slight curveball for you—it's fantasy rather than contemporary, but Rogerson writes with the same focus on character chemistry and witty banter that makes Brian's dialogue sing. The romance builds with genuine tension, and there's that same sense of a protagonist discovering she's capable of far more than she believed, which is really the heart of what makes Julia's journey satisfying.

by Marc Brown

Doll examines what happens when a woman deliberately changes her social position and identity—similar premise to Julia's swap, but set in adult New York and grounded in real sociology rather than fantasy. It's got that same observational humor about class and belonging, though with a more reflective, grown-up perspective on what popularity actually costs.

by Jack Kerouac

Oseman's debut has that same sharp, contemporary voice as Brian's work, but focuses on a girl who's deliberately constructed a false persona at school—the inverse of Julia's accidental deception. The way Oseman explores why someone would create a false self, and what happens when it unravels, gives you the emotional depth beneath the premise that makes Julia's story work.