Book Review: Book Lovers by Emily Henry

Book Details:

Author: Emily Henry

Series: Standalone

Genres: Fiction, Romance, Contemporary Romance, Humour, Chicklit, Adult

Page Count: 384 pages

Publisher: Berkeley Books

Published: May 3, 2022

Blurb:

One summer. Two rivals. A plot twist they didn't see coming....

Nora Stephens’ life is books—she’s read them all—and she is not that type of heroine. Not the plucky one, not the laidback dream girl, and especially not the sweetheart. In fact, the only people Nora is a heroine for are her clients, for whom she lands enormous deals as a cutthroat literary agent, and her beloved little sister Libby.

Which is why she agrees to go to Sunshine Falls, North Carolina for the month of August when Libby begs her for a sisters’ trip away—with visions of a small-town transformation for Nora, who she’s convinced needs to become the heroine in her own story. But instead of picnics in meadows, or run-ins with a handsome country doctor or bulging-forearmed bartender, Nora keeps bumping into Charlie Lastra, a bookish brooding editor from back in the city. It would be a meet-cute if not for the fact that they’ve met many times and it’s never been cute.

If Nora knows she’s not an ideal heroine, Charlie knows he’s nobody’s hero, but as they are thrown together again and again—in a series of coincidences no editor worth their salt would allow—what they discover might just unravel the carefully crafted stories they’ve written about themselves.

Review:

Thanks to NetGalley, Penguin Publishers and the author for giving me this e-arc in exchange for an honest review

Now, where do I start? Or better, where do I stop? Where do I stop gushing about about a book that surpassed my expectations by light years?????

When I saw that there was new EH book in the works- a love story of two ppl who love books with the title ‘Book Lovers’, I immediately requested an ARC. This is my third EH book and I’ve read all of her releases since 2020. I loved Beach Read, loathed/was let down by PWMOV and so going into this, I only said- I don’t need u to be 5/5 stars, just don’t be a waste of my time. AND IT DIDN’T DISAPPOINT ME.

Throughout the book, my mental rating never went below 4 stars. The story starting from the prologue is damn good- it lays bare the small town romance tropes, it introduces a heroine that’s not the heroine of the tropes we just talked about and a hero who matches the heroine in her reputation of being scary. Their nicknames in publishing industry just made me think that we could’ve named this as The Romance of SharkGirl and StormBoy- in case, you didn’t catch the ref(due to not wasting your time as a kid on shitty movies), I referenced The adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl.

Nora and Charlie have an absolutely electrifying chemistry(a very different kind of chemistry from the one January and Gus had iirc)- That sassy backforth, delicious banter with healthy doses of caring for each other, tenderness, some sweet clichés, etc…so good. Their conversing through emails reminded me of my days using emails to chat with my friends instead of the usual social media(we were just bored lol)- it made me simultaneously nostalgic and regretful at the same time that I didn’t get to banter-flirt like this with hot guy whose energy matches my ‘nightmare brain’(“I love your nightmare brain”- that would’ve been a top tier compliment to me, *sighs*).

EH’s writing is really good. She can WRITE characters. The only other relationship that got a significant pagetime- the relationship of Nora and her sis- was well done too. The rest of the supporting characters weren’t always the best- some leaned too far into their stereotypes- but it didn’t bother that much ‘coz I was so consumed by everything that was MC related. Nora and Charlie were really well-developed protagonists and ones that entered my fav couple lists right when they started bantering with each other.

Overall, it was such a fun book to read(I binge read it), there were some heavier moments sprinkled through but they didn’t weigh the og rom-com plot down by much. This is definitely one of my favourite books that I read this year. Looking forward to reading more books by EH <3

My Ranking so far(16/11/2022):-

Book Lovers > Beach Read > Happy Place > People We Meet on Vacation

Final Thoughts:

Goodreads Review here