REVIEW: Book Lovers by Emily Henry

Hello readers! 💙

How are you?
If you’re following me you probably knew this review would arrive (I hoped it would be sooner but the last months have been a nightmare!).  
I mean, could I ever not talk about one of my favorite authors? Of course not.

So, let’s start!

 

Title: Book Lovers
Author: Emily Henry
Publishing Date: July 8th 2021 (May 3rd 2022)
Publisher:  Berkley Books
Pages: 400
Price: 12,85 €

Plot: 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.

 

Rate:  

5+/5 stars!⭐

Review:

Lots of people think that contemporary romances are a sort of second class literature. I don’t think so. In my opinion, this is a restricted way of thinking. You cannot enjoy a genre, you can dislike the dynamics or the general storylines and that’s absolutely okay.  It’s a personal opinion and, for that, something to be respected. Nonetheless, it’s wrong to generalize, declassifying an entire category without even reading a book. That said, I think Emily Henry is the demonstration that kind of assumption about contemporary romances is absolutely erroneous.

One of the things I love the most about this author is her ability to create something that is always so powerful in its own special way. She has an ironical and sarcastic writing style, not excessively cheerful, that always fascinates me. In this particular case, the first pages killed me! THAT was an amazing introduction to Nora, and I’ve LOVED how Emily worked with the stereotype as “the other woman”, the obnoxious one that always ends dumped at the end of a typical romance story. Nora is that woman and she doesn’t keep it secret. She’s proud of who she is, even if others see her just as a workaholic person, maybe snob too. I usually dislike a character like that, but Henry gave her shape, depth, and a background that explains a lot of her.

She’s not a villain. Nora is a person with her virtues and flaws, and even if the latter are maybe the first that stand out, it doesn’t mean she’s not more than that! She’s passionate about her work, she really cares about her authors and she defends them fiercely when necessary (poor Charlie, sorry Dusty, I love you too). She loves her sister, because if that wasn’t true, she wouldn’t accept to indulge her going in this three weeks’ vacation with such a terrible list of things to do (but it was so fun to “see them on stage”!). Plus, she adores books and stories, and that is reflected in the way she handles her job as a literary agent. The story itself isn’t a sort of “redemption”, because she doesn’t need it, but it’s the chance for Nora to discover more aspects about herself, reconnect with her sister (and maybe understand each other better) and open herself to love, despite everything.
At the end of the book, maybe a little bit surprisingly, I’ve adored Nora. Her stubbornness, her passion, her commitment to her work, her suffering for being considered only a heartless person, her pain for the loss of her mother, her traumas… She’s complex, she makes decisions I didn’t always agree with, but she’s so human you can see her by your side.

And then there’s Charlie. I fall in love with every Emily’s male characters. It’s impossible not to, and he’s not an exception. If I compare him with the other two main figures of Beach Reads and People We Meet on Vacation, I think Charlie is the most direct one. He’s outspoken, he doesn’t say things compromising between what he thinks and what people desire to hear, and he knows what he wants. He has a steadiness that enchants me, together with a longing for being accepted for who he is and what he loves to do for living. But that doesn’t matter because when it comes to family, Charlie (as much as Nora) puts it in first place. In Game of Thrones there’s a famous phrase that Jamie Lannister says: “The things I do for love”. I think that describes appropriately many things that happen in the book, both past and present ones. Love is frequently the engine of good or bad choices, and often people don’t realize how much others do thing for them just for real affection, even if it’s something that costs them a lot. All becomes a little granted or unseen, and that’s unfair. This book made me think about that a lot. It’s not “just a romance”, it’s a book about family and how it affects our growth and life choices. It remembers  us that we have to take into consideration other things different from our wishes and the sacrifices that others made for us. At the same time, it stresses that it’s okay if the person we love takes a path different from ours; we have to accept it will make them happier. Being different doesn’t mean that affection is gone. We can’t make them like us, we have to let them free. This is love, even if it breaks us.

And, since we’re talking about love: the romance. I’ve loved Nora and Charlie from the start. Their first encounter (which I was also lucky enough to hear read by Emily herself in a live on Instagram) has been so full of sparks and underlying misunderstandings I found myself giggling all the time and looking forward to their next meeting with even more expectation. Their chemistry is undeniable and it was so sweet seeing how Charlie manifested his interest in Nora and, most of all, his admiration for her job – even if she didn’t get it. They don’t change during the book for no one – as I said above, they didn’t need to. However, spending time together and discussing between them (and not only about books), make them understand some aspects of themselves better, allowing Nora and Charlie to comprehend and be more open with each other and the rest of the people they love. I think this is a wonderful change of perspective in comparison with what we usually find in a story. And speaking about that, another peculiar thing is that sort of bittersweet atmosphere that follows the reader during the whole “journey”. And it destroyed me inside, because I was craving for a happy ending with tooth and claw, but you don’t really know how it ends until the very last pages (and that’s why I ended up crying like a baby in the penultimate chapter). I won’t make any spoiler, but keep your handkerchiefs close.

Last but not least, this is a novel about books. If in Beach Read we have the creation of them, in Book Lovers we focus on what happens during and after an author writes a novel. In my little way, it was cool to see something similar to my job in those pages. Not to mention the fact that for me it’s awesome to read about someone that shares my same passion for books and stories without being a caricature. Making things believable and real for the readers is not something easy to do, but I think Emily has this precious gift (as much as Emily Wibberley and Austin Siegemund-Broka, the authors of The Roughest Draft), that is probably one of the many reasons of all the success she has – and deserves – and I’m sure she’ll reach with this new book of hers.

So, how can I describe Book Lovers other than “remarkable” and “inspiring” as always?
Thank you Emily for another beautiful contemporary romance and for all the laughs (and tears!!) you gifted me and thanks for the free book PRH International.

 

Until the next review! 💙

Chiara