The cover and title were enough to make me want to buy this book, but then I kept seeing it EVERYWHERE on Instagram, recommendation lists, social media, stores - literally, everywhere - and I knew I HAD to read it. I'm so so glad I did!! I adored this book. Maybe because I'm a writer myself, but I easily identified with the main characters, and I so enjoyed their struggles to stay true to their voices/hearts/minds. The build up to the romance was perfection, and I got all the butterflies while reading. There were some darker themes than I expected (probably due to the title and cover), but I thought it added to the romance, and there were still plenty of laughs. Overall, this was just the summer 'beach read' I needed! Highly recommend!

Now I need to go buy a paperback copy for my shelves... :)

*I got this on Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I loved Beach Read! It's a romance, yes, but it;s so much more than that. It's an exploration of broken relationships and rebuilding your life after a crushing blow. It's serious AND laugh out loud funny, smart and snarky, and beautifully written. A highly recommended read!

Beach Read by Emily Henry is the “it” summer romance of 2020, but don’t let the light and sweet cover and title fool you. This is a complex, emotional novel that deals with some pretty heavy topics like deception, grief, and loss of self, though there were some funny moments as well. While the narrator, Julia Whelan, was phenomenal as January, I think Beach Read is a book that needs to be read and not listened to. You kind of need to savor the words. I found myself hitting the 30 second back button a LOT and for two different reasons at different parts of the story: Sometimes to hear the beautiful wording again, and others because it was occasionally slow and I found myself losing focus.

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January Andrews is a romance writer whose father just died. Recovering from her own breakup and dealing with finding out about a lot of family secrets upon her father’s death, January has stopped believing in real love. So she is spending the summer at her father’s secret beach house to try to get over her writer’s block and get her book in by deadline. Augustus Everett was her nemesis in college. He always seemed to scorn her for her happily-ever-afters, but there was still an attraction between them. Now Gus is a bestselling author of literary fiction.
“I did what any reasonable adult woman would do when confronted with her college rival turned next-door neighbor. I dove behind the nearest bookshelf.”

When the two meet again, the snarky banter ensues, and I enjoyed their back and forth. Being right next door, these two can see each other in their homes as they both struggle to write their next novel, so they strike a deal to switch genres to prove how hard it is to write in the other’s genres, and whoever sells their manuscript first wins. This bet also includes weekly excursions to do things to hone their craft.

Since I like the light and fluffy, my favorite part of the book was the light stuff—the notes held up to each other through windows and the learning excursions that doubled as dates. As their friendship grew we were able to see how perfect they were for each other.

“As different as I’d thought we were, it felt a little bit like Gus and I were two aliens who’d stumbled into each other on Earth only to discover we shared a native language.”

Beach Read was a sloooow burn romance, I would say it is more of a mashup between women’s fiction and romance. It was beautifully written, and that’s why I think reading it really is the way to go on this one. I have both the book and audiobook, and when looking for the quotes for my audiobook review, I found the written word much more engrossing than when it was spoken. Emily Henry’s writing is meant to be savored, and I think the audio version missed the mark in that way.

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I loved the snarky banter and romance part of the novel, but there were some side stories happening that I wasn’t really in the headspace for. I picked up the novel because I love reading about authors and it looked light and fun. I needed an escape from the world and I found that Beach Read was a little sadder than I was looking for at the moment and kind of had me a little sensitive and depressed for the few days I listened.

Since both characters were writing books, I was really hoping to see the book-within-a-book come to fruition a little more. I wanted more detail on what they each wrote and I found myself hoping that the author will release both books as part of a series. I will read them in a second.

"When I watch you sleep," he said shakily, "I feel overwhelmed that you exist."

Likes:

•The snarky banter.
•The window notes.
•Completely original without a common trope.
•It was written extremely well. You can tell Emily Henry has perfected her art.
•I loved the premise of two authors switching genres.

Dislikes:

•I’m not a fan of the light and sweet cover for an emotional and deep story, whether the author is trying to be ironic or not.
•I really really wanted more about the books they were writing. I was hoping for more of the book-within-a-book situation.

The Narration:
Julia Whelan was PERFECT for January’s first-person POV. It isn’t the narrator's fault at all, but I think that Emily Henry’s writing is meant to be read and savored. It has a poetic prose feel that just didn’t come across as well in audiobook form.

The Down & Dirty:
Beach Read by Emily Henry will be on many people’s Best of 2020 lists. It’s written beautifully and if you are sitting down for a nice deep, emotional, funny, and sad read with some inspiring and tender moments, this one is for you. If you are looking for a light-hearted rom-com beach read, this isn’t quite what you are looking for. I think if I was prepared for it and I read instead of listened, Beach Read by Emily Henry would have been a 5 star read for me. But something got lost in the translation to audio despite having a fantastic narrator, and it had me a bit too emotional for a time when I was looking for an escape.

Rating: 4.25 Stars, 3 Heat, 4 narration

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This was such a fun read! I found myself alternately rooting for both of these characters and dying to find out how things would wrap up for them in the end. This is a great weekend novel, any time of year, if you need a delightful escape!

I don’t normally give books 5 stars, and I’m not giving this book 5 stars because it has changed my life in any way. But rather it is well-written but not pompous. It delivers on exactly what one would look for in a “beach read.” Beach Read is intelligently written and brings the romance and sexual tension one would expect, but it also brings beautifully complex characters with real problems and imperfect coping mechanisms. Just as one might hope, and the characteristic that prompted my 5 stars, is that it lies in a wonderful place between romance and literary fiction. Satisfying both desires and marrying the best of both genres.

This book tops my favorites list for the year. I was not expecting to love it so much - a wonderful story I’m still thinking about months later.

January Andrews is a romance writer, but when her dad dies and she finds out that he cheated on her mother her world is blown apart. How can you write a romance when the romance between you parents is a lie? Out of money and with a book due she retreats to the house her father left her, where he would meet with his mistress in his hometown. Her neighbor turns out to be her college crush Augustus Everett, also a writer but of a more dark and dangerous world. He envies her optimism and she thinks of him as a rival who mocks her happily ever after way of writing. Both with writers block they forge a game where she must write in his genre and he in hers. With field trips of the research kind into the depths of darkness and romance feelings start to emerge from these two broken souls but can they come together or are they too broken?

I wasn't sure I was going to like this book and it really caught my attention. The struggles they both face shines through their writing but they have to break through in the hopes that they can find something worth living for in the now. I really liked the writing style of the book and the characters came to life for me. It wasn't saccharine sweet and it wasn't a fast paced sexy bodice ripper either, this was more true, a slow unraveling, a coming together of two people who seem to have nothing in common but actually have more in common than they realize.

I really enjoyed this book. This author knows how to tell a great story. It had everything you could want in a romance novel. The title is a bit misleading but if you read the description it does its purpose!

Cute. Romantic. Funny. At times heartbreaking. A great concept and a great name. This book lived up to the title. Must have a place in your beach bag

This is now one of my new favorite books of 2020, if not my FAVORITE book so far of the year. There has been so much hype for Beach Read and all I can say is that the book absolutely lives up to the hype and love! Usually I go into hyped book a little wary, but after some friends I trust said they loved the book, I knew I had to dive in, and I'm so glad I did. It. Was. Brilliant!

This was my first book from Emily Henry. I had no idea who she was prior to this release and didn't know she was a young adult author as well. Beach Read is a romance, but I would say it also is borderline women's fiction as well. It is brilliantly written, swoony, full of great banter, and I LOVED our main characters! I loved the concept with January and Gus being writers, one a romance author and one a literary fiction author, and the two come together when they become new neighbors for the summer and try to get out of their writer's block. They are hilarious and witty together and truly have the most entertaining conversations. I had a smile on my face for most of the book, before things got a bit more intense and serious.

Everyone needs to read Beach Read. Once you read it, you'll understand why everyone loves it so much. It deserves all the hype and I am hoping desperately that Emily Henry will be writing more adult romances in the future!

I thoroughly enjoyed Beach Read by Emily Henry! This book dealt with grief and loss, family, love, writing, and friendship. The two main characters, January and Gus, were believable and nuanced. Recommended for fans of Writers & Lovers or Evvie Drake Starts Over. Heads up for a bit of steamy content.

This book was so much fun! I enjoyed the exploration of grief as well as the fun hate to love summer time romance. I loved the dynamics between the protagonists.

Beach Read was an enjoyable summer read.
It is so hard to categorize this book. It is a second chance romance for two writers who knew each other once upon a time. It is an enemies to lovers story for two people who seem to disagree about everything. It is a sweet romance that is fraught with discontent and sadness.
I appreciated reading about January and Gus and loved how they challenged each other. They were both compelling characters who were more than they initially seemed.

The Beach Read for the summer of 2020. Augustus Everett, award winning literary writer and January Andrews, a bestselling romance author both have writer’s block. They must finish their next novels by the end of the summer. January remembers Augustus from their college days where he was the big star and she had a crush on him that was not returned. Imagine her humiliation to find out that he is in the beach house next door to the one she has rented to work on her novel.

Their writing styles are very different and they challenge each other to write a novel in the other’s genre to see who has the most successful literary or romance novel by the end of the summer. As they engage in field trips together to learn about the other’s craft, they also learn more about each other and make unexpected connections.

It honestly took me awhile to get into this book, but I had read such high praise for it elsewhere I kept going and was ultimately won over. I enjoyed it and it but don’t think it lived up to “beach read” status and I have mixed feelings about it.

Despite being about a romance writer, I feel like Beach Read sort of mocks the genre and even the very concept of a beach read, which made me feel stupid for enjoying those things. Our heroine gets elevated to literary author and we never get to see the hero’s romance, which was a major part of the adhesion plot.

After seeing all the hype for this book, I was super excited to finally pick it up. Sadly, this one totally missed the mark for me. I struggled to connect with the characters and really didn't connect with their romance, which is kind of a miss for a contemporary romance book.

I did enjoy the excerpts of the novels Gus and January were working on and kind of wish we got more of them. But yeah, BookTube's summer fave was a major let down for me.

I really needed this book. It's funny, earnest, and smart. I've been in a slump, and this read provided some catharsis while also giving me motivation to start cracking books again. Henry is a writer I will seek out in the future.

“If you think the story has a sad ending, it's because it's not over yet.” I loved this so much. January and Gus' love story was at times awkward, raw, and the attraction between them was very heated. It made me laugh and cry. Oh man it played with my FEELS the entire read. It was the perfect balance of romance and sexual chemistry. This needs to be a movie. I can totally picture this joining other iconic Rom-com's like When Harry Met Sally, You Got Mail, and Sleepless in Seattle as an all time favorite in the genre. It is a must read!

This was not the book for me. I know many readers who enjoy this type of romance novel, and I can definitely see why it was on so many "Most anticipated" lists, but I really struggled to get into it. I need to be captured and drawn into the story right away, and this sort of fell flat.

This was definitely marketed incorrectly, including the cover. The setting isn't even an actual beach. It's a beach on Lake Michigan, but the characters spend all of their time on their porches, not on the beach. It's not a light read, although it is a romance. It's much heavier, more about family issues, & even includes a storyline about a cult as part of research for a book within the book.