Nessa D

Hey y’all!

I was so excited to finally get to this book! I read Beach Read by Emily Henry and I have seen this book all over social media. First of all, it took me a while to pick it up. I did take it with me on my girls weekend but like I wasn’t feeling it. I’ve come to realize in the last month or so that I’m a mood reader and unless I’m reading a book for a book club, if I’m not in the mood for it, then I’m not in the mood for it.

I have heard mixed reviews on this one. Some say it was boring. Some say it wasn’t bad. Some say this book and People We Meet On Vacation were like equally great. Some say it was better than People We Meet On Vacation, so I wasn’t sure what I’d think. Even when I picked it up the first time, I thought I was going to be bored with it. I was wrong!

Synopsis

A romance writer who no longer believes in love and a literary writer stuck in a rut engage in a summer-long challenge that may just upend everything they believe about happily ever afters. Augustus Everett is an acclaimed author of literary fiction. January Andrews writes bestselling romance. When she pens a happily ever after, he kills off his entire cast. They’re polar opposites. In fact, the only thing they have in common is that for the next three months, they’re living in neighboring beach houses, broke, and bogged down with writer’s block. Until, one hazy evening, one thing leads to another and they strike a deal designed to force them out of their creative ruts: Augustus will spend the summer writing something happy, and January will pen the next Great American Novel. She’ll take him on field trips worthy of any rom-com montage, and he’ll take her to interview surviving members of a backwoods death cult (obviously). Everyone will finish a book and no one will fall in love. Really.

Review

Dare I say it? I actually enjoyed this one over People We Meet On Vacation; not that that one was bad it was a great book.PWMOV was more lighter and a fun book in my opinion, whereas this one tugged at my heart.

Two broken people finding each other…I just love it. Plus I love how she makes her male characters go to therapy like YASSSS Emily!!!! When Gus said “I’m in therapy…and even learning to mediate” I was like omg!!!! I love it! We need to normalize men being open about going to therapy.

When there are some family secrets that you find out later in life, that legit sucks! I understand how January felt hurt and felt like her whole life was a lie when she found out about her dad’s cheating on her mom. It totally tainted her outlook on life (well that and her mom’s cancer). As for Gus, growing up in a tumultuous household did a number on him as well, what with his dad and all of his abuse. It was awful!!! I felt so sad for him.

I feel like we all need a Shadi in our life. She heard her friend crying on the phone and came right away, even though she lived in a different state and didn’t have the time off of work. She came, cooked, forced her to clean and shower, watched mindless tv with her and was just there for her when she felt she was at a very low point in her life. I love friendships like that. It was really sweet!

There were many quotes I highly identfied with but here are a couple of them:

• “That I’d let myself go broke. That my life was falling apart, and I had no idea how to fix it. That my heart was more broken than it had ever been and I was scared I couldn’t fix it”
• “…that every note from them, every call and text, was just one more reminder of how terribly far behind I had fallen. Was falling. Every moment of every day, I was tripping backward while the rest of the world marched forward.”

I identified with those quotes the most because well…that’s where I am in my life right now. I feel exactly how she feels. Like even though I wrote a book, I have three more in my head that I have to get on paper and I see people on instagram showing sneak peaks of their works in progress and I feel terrible because I haven’t officially started drafting none of the books I have planned. I also see lots of people getting married or having children or buying houses or whatever monumental life moment that has occurred and like, where am I compared to them? I can’t even get my crush to notice me! I feel really far behind my peers.

The romance in this book was perfect. As I said before, they were two broken people who found each other. This is a enemies to lovers trope versus the friends to lovers trope like People We Meet On Vacation was. So it was interesting to see how the romance will play out and let me tell you, it did not disappoint. There were clues here and there that Gus was interested in January, like remembering her dedication word for word or the fact that he held her hair as she vomited at the carnival. He read her books like actually read them. and just how he held her and hugged her and oh yes my fave: the forehead kiss. I could seriously die. Oh and the sex….there was more sex in this one than the other book and I was not mad about that at all!

I felt a little sad reading it because well one, my life is in shambles but also because of the romance. It doesn’t make any sense to me but I am a hopeless romantic, who’s never had a boyfriend and never had a guy show real interest. I feel doomed to be alone for the rest of my life. I want my person. I want my partner. I want my happily ever after. I guess not everyone gets to have a chance at happily ever afters, which sucks so much. I want my forehead kiss too!

I gave this a 5/5 stars and highly recommend this. Can’t wait to read Book Lovers, which comes out this Spring!

Have you read this book or the other one, People We Meet On Vacation? If so, what did you think?

XOXO,

Nessa D.