Beach Read

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RATING: ★★★★★
TITLE: Beach Read
AUTHOR: Emily Henry
RELEASE DATE: May 19, 2020
SETTING: Michigan
PUBLISHER: Berkley Books
GENRE(S): Romance, Contemporary Romance, Chick Lit, Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, Humor, Rom-Com

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BLURB

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.

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I am just dying a quiet, slow death over here after just finishing this book. But it’s totally cool… I’m happy to go like this, with these words being the last thing I see and January and Gus’s story in my heart.

What was I expecting going into this book? I was hoping for a cute story of two rival authors who wind up neighbors, decide to write each other’s genre, and ultimately fall for each other.

What I got during this book was so much more than that! This was deeper than I assumed. There are really painful elements all throughout this novel that I adored. January is dealing with some really shitty stuff! But not only that, Gus is dealing with his own helping of crap-stew and watching the two of them slowly crack each other’s hard shells and bring some happiness into to one another was so rewarding.

There were two things that I loved more than anything in this book, though. One was the banter! I love when great banter is a huge part of a relationship. I think it helps you get a sense of the characters and how they interact, especially when it is believable banter. This was organic and hilarious and completely unforced. The second, watching the inevitability of the two of them falling in love and Gus’s declarations of, “no, before that.” Oh my goodness, talk about swooning!

I also really enjoyed the book about writers talking about writing and the process of it all: research, writing, publishing… that was a fun element.

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