After hearing so many RAVE reviews for this one, I knew I had to move it up on my TBR - and I'm glad I did, but not for the reasons I expected.

I ended up liking this book a lot, but in a way unlike what I was expecting. I had gone into this anticipating a light-hearted romcom with an enemies to lovers / grumpy / banterific feel, and although I definitely got some of that, there is also some HEAVY stuff going on here. Henry writes about the topics well, and I enjoyed the exploration of how we choose to deal with the more difficult aspects of our lives in terms of the two MCs.

Both January and Gus were coming to terms with awful things, and I liked reading about them going through it together. I don't know that I was as invested in their relationship as other readers seem to be (and didn't quite feel the chemistry throughout some portions of the book), but the overall story more than made up for it.

Thank you to NetGalley, Berkley & Penguin Publishing Group for the opportunity to read and review this book before it's publication date! This in no way affected my review, opinions are my own.

This is so much more than a straightforward romance or summer read. January lost her father, discovering he wasn’t who she thought he was, searching for some answers. While temporarily moving into a house he left her, she moves next to an old college crush, Gus. Gus is also a writer, but of literary fiction, something January always thought he made fun of in the past. As their relationship begins to evolve, more about their successes and challenges become evident. I really liked it and thank Netgalley for the ARC.

Beach Read is a delightful summer romance filled with quirky characters and funny moments, that make you want to set up a blanket by the shore and start reading.

I adored Beach Read and the characters that made it so immersive, fun, and enjoyable. Emily Henry manages to write a romance that is also a tribute to the romance genre-- in the best way! She takes on the tropes, the ridiculousness of the term "women's fiction," all while giving us what we want-- a sexy romance at on a lake!

If you love smart romances and women's fiction with a little more meat than a drugstore paperback, then this one is for you!

Beach Read is about January Andrews, a young writer who grew up loved and encouraged in spite of a difficult life. Her mother was diagnosed with cancer and went in to remission while January was in school. It came back as January was headed to grad school to pursue writing. Instead she dropped out to help her father take care of her mother, who valiantly fought the cancer and triumphed. Then January's father dies suddenly and she finds out he had another house and another lover, and that her mother knew about it. The story opens as January heads up to North Bear Shores to pack up and sell her father's house. She also has to finish writing her latest romance novel - a task she finds insurmountable since her belief in "happily-ever-after" has been shaken to the core. The town starts to grow on her as she meets people who have known her father since childhood and January is accepted as one of them, even as she rejects her father's mistress. To top things off, the cabin next door is occupied by the darkly handsome and VERY moody Augustus Everett. It turns out Gus and January were in the same writing course in college. Where Gus wrote "real fiction", January's stories always end happily and he gave her a very hard time about it. They almost hooked up once, at a party, but common sense prevailed and here they are years later. In an effort to punch through her writer's block, January makes a bet with Gus - she will attempt a more serious novel and he will try his hand at a happily ever after. The bet includes weekly classes in romance and reality that have disastrous, hilarious results. As January gets to know Gus she finds it very difficult to resist him again.

I laughed so hard reading this book I had to pass it on to my husband when I was finished. In spite of the awful circumstances, January is a wry, very funny character. Her relationship with her best friend Shadi and their conversations were hilarious and were her encounters with Gus, both good ones and bad. Yet Henry handles the more serious aspects of the relationships with compassion without being drippy. This book was so entertaining - it will make a great Beach Read but its also much, much more. There are some very sexy scenes - well-written and detailed, so for adults only. But adults of any kind. Thank you for the ARC - this is one I'll read again and give as gifts to friends.!!

If this is the first review you are reading for this book, I will echo what other reviewers have noted: the cover doesn't quite match the story. Yes, there is a sweet romance within, but this book is much more emotional than you may expect.

This a story of a woman beginning a do-over for her life. The path January Andrews initially set for herself, the belief in HEAs, has all been blown to smithereens. It began with death of her father, and discovery of his secret affair. That then led to her own relationship falling apart. So broke and emotional unraveling, she travels to her father's secret second home, for answers. And hopes along the way she can find her mojo and faith in the HEA, since its nearly a requirement in her field as a romance writer.

Day one does go to well, with the discovery of a loud neighbor.
Day two (or so) doesn't go much better when she discovers that that neighbor is her writing nemesis, so to speak, Augustus Everett.
From there, days pass in a blur, with January struggling to write the book she owes her publisher. But things turn around for her when Everett offers up a writing challenge, to trade genres and see if it helps to get those creates juices flowing again.

I liked how the relationship between January and Everett develops. From combative, to cordial, to supportive, and then to something more. The process felt natural and real. In addition, Everett is there for her as she tries to recover from the heartache her father left her with. There are a lot of tears shed as she slowly uncovers the truths about the father kept a secret. It's not a pretty process, but with time, comes forgiveness.

January came to this small town because she had no choice, and because she wanted answers. She gets those answers, but more importantly, she finds a new life path. One with a love story, and a new direction for her writing.

This was an enjoyable read, of a woman's path in reinventing herself. It's an emotional ride, but one that is worth it.

Beach Read was an absolute delight! The small town setting, well- rounded characters and layered romance put this book above others in the genre. Highly recommend.

3.5 stars

January is a believer in happy endings, in her books and in life. Or at least she was, before she found out that her parent's seemingly perfect marriage might have been a lie after discovering her father had carried on an affair while her mother was battling cancer.

She is still angry at her father, and hurt, a year after his death. Her parents had reconciled, and January is stunned to find out her mother knew about the other woman, and won't talk about it. January is forced to re-think all the truths she has known in the face of that one enormous lie.

Her father left her a house he secretly bought and she moves there to put her life back together again. A broken engagement and difficulty finishing her next novel propel her to get away. She soon runs into an enigmatic next door neighbor who turns out to have been a college classmate that she almost shared a night of passion with years ago.

Gus is the opposite of January. He writes realistic, grim books about people who have suffered unhappiness, and he scoffs at the idea of happy endings. Soon the two bet each other they can't each finish a novel in the other's viewpoint - Gus has to write a book where people find happiness together, and January has to allow people to suffer and for things not to come out all right.

There is more pain here than usual for a romance and some unresolvable hurts. I appreciate that January had a tough task: to forgive her father for inflicting considerable pain on her and her mother. And the author didn't tie up this part of the plot with a convenient and neat resolution.

Thanks to the publisher and to Net Galley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE! This was such a great book & releasing at the most perfect time. I loved the deeper elements of this story & the banter was amazing. Highly recommend!

I certainly enjoyed and delighted in this fun read! It was just what I needed. Light, Refreshing, and Breezy! It was a perfect book for the times we find ourselves currently in.

I don't normally read these types of books. I'm not really a "romance-y" type of reader.. however, I cannot deny that I truly appreciated this novel for what it was. What immediately drew me in was the fun cover. It was bright, colorful, and appealing. I immediately wanted to read it. The characters were endlessly addicting to read about. I especially enjoyed January. She was such a unique character. I also appreciated that this was a book about writers. I always like books about "bookish" things.

I would highly recommend this if you are looking for some way to escape at the moment. This would be it!

The story is told from January’s first person POV. I’m mentioning this because I know romance readers like to know if there’s a dual POV. I’m honestly glad we only had January’s narrative. I think also having Gus’s wouldn’t have told the story that needed telling.

I love the idea that Henry wrote a story about two authors that are both essentially having some form of writers block. Having them challenge each other into reigniting their creativity was a lot of fun to read.

What is always great about Henry’s writing is that she gets people. She writes like she gets it. She can make you laugh out loud because of adorable banter on one page and then make you weep from deep emotion on the next. Such is the way of life when you’re struggling through what January and Gus are going through. It’s hard to explain without spoiling plot points obviously. I’m just trying to say how impressed I am with how Henry pulled it off.

My next point might be considered spoilery, so if you don’t want to know anything about the book, avoid the rest of my review.

My favourite thing about this book was the relationship between January and Gus. It didn’t start with them full on lusting after each other. I can’t even say that they became friends first, because it’s so much more than that. They became companions, and it was beautiful.

I went into this book expecting a light and fluffy summer romance read, but that is not really what I got. This book broke my heart so many times and then put it back together again. This book has all of the funny, flirty banter that a typical romance novel has. I loved it, and found myself laughing out loud on a few occasions. However, there is also a lot of serious scenes in it as well.

The love story between Gus and January is so sweet and real. You can feel not only the chemistry, but the love between them. This story was written so beautifully. I also loved the character development and getting more and more glimpses into who the characters are as the story progressed. I don’t even know how else to put my love for this book into words. It was done so well, and will probably be a top of 2020 for many.

5 stars
I received this book for free in return for an honest review.

Let me just start off by saying I am not generally a huge Romance reader but maybe I’m a conovert after reading BEACH READ??

OH MY GOSH, this book was so much fun! The added complexity and character development that the author manages to convey, with January and Gus both individually and in their relationship, really sold me on this book and let the pages fly on by. These complex moments made the story feel more authentic to me and leveled out some of the plot points that could have easily skewed more to the cheesy side of things.

I’ve really had fun reading this in my hammock in my backyard imagining I’m actually somewhere on the beach (#quarantine). I actually took a break for a few days as I was approaching the last 30% or so because I just didn’t want it to end - usually I power through the last bit of books but I wanted to savor this one!

Thank you NetGalley & Berkley Publishing Group for the opportunity to read an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I saw this on Book of the Month club and was curious about it. I thought it had way more depth than your average romance and I couldn't guess how things were going to play out (even though I guessed what the end result would be) and I plowed through it in a couple of days. A little more swearing and sex content than I'm comfortable widely recommending.

This was such an unexpected book!

When you look at the cover and the title, you think that this is going to be a lighthearted book with quirky characters (main and side!) and witty banter between some possible enemies to lovers, taking place on the beach, of course! And it certainly does have those elements (minus the beach setting. For a book with that title and that cover there is a disappointing lack of actual beaches and swimming). You have the quirky townspeople and Gus and January have some hilarious banter. Gus doesn’t think of January as an enemy but she does think that he looks down on her and remembers him for that, although aside from being told that she thinks of them as rivals it doesn’t come across that way. January tells him how frustrating it is that people look down on women’s fiction because if you changed the name of the author and the name of the main character to men’s names, it would just be considered fiction. While the cover and title is most likely mis marketing, I’d like to think of it as meta on some level.

January has been suffering from writer’s block and moves into the beach house that her recently deceased father shared with his mistress, which January’s mother knew about but January just found out about. She goes there to clean the house up and also to work on her next book, which unfortunately she has been struggling to write. January is a romance author and whew that’s hard to write about when dealing with that drama. She bumps into an old college acquaintance of hers, Augustus, who always laughed at her for only writing happy ending stories in college when he always wants tragic endings. They end up making a bet to see who can write a book in the other person’s genre and sell it, with each of them teaching the other something about how to write in that genre.

While this book has several elements of that cutesy summer read (I particularly enjoyed the notes that Gus and January exchanged while working on their respective books), it also has dealing with the repercussions of infidelity, complicated familial love, and the exploration of suicide death cults.

The love scenes had some descriptions that were more hilarious than romantic, but ultimately this was a sweet book.

All about love and writing and stories and such. Actually, I really thought the part exploring the lives and stories of these two writers was interesting and added a lot of depth to the story. The romance is there but it’s mostly smoldering and also full of misunderstandings—but nothing too over the top.

This is definitely a good beach read with more substance than expected, like Red, White and Royal Blue.

Beach Read by Emily Henry comes out in May and gets ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ from me! You know what I loved about it? I loved that it’s an enjoyable read. The story has a great pace and the banter (and some uh tension 😜) between the characters instantly drew me in.

I gave this the fourth star because of the way the difficult issues (relationship changes, grief, job insecurity, family tension) were handled within the story. Sometimes we don’t realize how much we need that to read into that next layer even when we think we are just looking for a #beachread.

Thanks to @emilyhenrywrites @berkleypub and @netgalley for the advanced copy.

#bookreview #bookstagram #bookish #summerreads #aprilreads #librariansofinstagram #storydoorway #characterdoorway

Emily Henry could write the phone book and I'd read it. Her characters are always so vivid and complex, and I love her world and relationship building. I laughed, I cried, I enjoyed my favorite romance trope. Highly recommend to everyone (and to check out her other books!).

*Thank you to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing for this E-Arc in exchange for an honest review.*

Have you ever spent the last 45 minutes of a book ugly crying and then proceeded to let out a scream into the void after you've finished it? Yes? No? Well if not get ready for Beach Read.

This book shook me with how much it affected me emotionally. One minute I was laughing at the main characters optimism and snarky wit and then I was absolutely sobbing with her through all of her heartaches and hardships.

What I liked best about this book was that the romance was a vessel for the deeper hurt and emotions that our main character needed to work through. The romance was of course steamy, witty, and mildly enemies to lovers (which is just my cup of tea) but it also wasn't the only thing about this story that was real. There was so much emotional depth spun so expertly into the story that I didn't even realize it until the tears were on my cheeks. Bravo, I'll be watching out for more from Emily Henry in the future.

Content Warnings: Cheating, parent death, cancer, illness, child abuse

While processing grief and dealing with extreme writer's block (most likely related to said grief), January Andrews moves into a lake house in Michigan. Little does she know that her neighbor is her nemesis and writing rival Augustus (Gus) Everett who also displays the tell-tale signs of being unable to pen his next great novel. One night, the two strike up an interesting bet: they will write books in the other's genre to get inspired and out of their writing ruts. January agrees to go on research trips with Gus to learn his writing process if he agrees to live each meet cute and happily ever after she concocts.

I LOVED this book, and could not put it down. Emily Henry has a voice that challenges the romance naysayers of the world and shows that love goes beyond the meet cutes and happily ever afters. While Gus and January's relationship is heartwarming to watch grow in the novel, it's the familial relationships that really bring in the heart of the story. Both characters are complex and complicated, and both must learn and grow throughout the pages. I found Beach Read to be beautiful and full of truth and depth.

I recommend this to readers who enjoyed The Two Lives of Lydia Bird, Love Lettering, and books by Katherine Center.