I am an unabashed fan of Emma Lord despite the fact that I am nowhere near the age of her target audience, but she has a way of writing characters that are easy to connect to and incredibly loveable. They always feel like a throwback to my teen years or like people I knew. It makes it very easy to fall into the story and root for the best possible outcomes for everyone.

The Getaway List is the story of two teens who are very lost but know they have each other no matter what.
When Riley graduates from high school feeling lost and with no plans for her future but free time and opportunity, she instantly gets on a bus to New York City to visit her best friend Tom, whom she hasn't seen in person in 4 years. That her mom isn't happy with her doing it or that Tom doesn't know she's coming is something she'll worry about later.
Tom has never felt a part of New York despite his mom's fame and career affording them the best. He's a loner who feels apart from everything except the best friend he left behind when his mom hit the big time. Until Riley shows up at his door and they decide to do the things they'd planned to do all those years go on what they called their Getaway List.
As they set off on their adventures across NYC, they find new and old friends to widen their world as well as the possibility of their friendship being a whole lot more than they ever thought possible.

It's a fun and heartfelt story that's full of great little moments of friendship and finding yourself. It did feel a little too heavy at certain times for what I look for in an Emma Lord book, but that's way more on me than on the book itself.


Very happy thanks to NetGalley and Wednesday Books for the excellent read!

The Getaway List is everything I love about YA fiction - a delightful cast of characters, achingly hopeful, relatable growing pains, and bonus, it's downright funny. Riley reminded me of my younger self and her adventures with Tom and her other friends made me want to go back in time and relive my younger years.

Thank you to Netgalley, Wednesday, and the author for the eARC in exchange for my review.

Emma Lord books are always so stinkin' cute! The whole cast of characters in The Getaway List feel so real and relatable. This is a perfect read for when you want a fluffy and wholesome new adult with substance.

3.5

I really enjoyed this. It reminded me a lot of Kasie West's books, which is one of the few contemporary romance authors I read regularly. I found the plot and characters to be engaging enough to want to keep reading, and I felt that New York was the perfect setting for it. I did find a couple of things to be slightly hard to believe with everything coming together the way it did, but it wasn't enough to detract from the story.

I like the idea of a getaway list. Similar to a bucket list, it was a way for Tom and Riley to connect and get away to experience life. I have no problems with bucket lists, but a getaway list does feel a little more "in the now" instead of "in the future", which I like. Through the list and her impulse decision to move to New York, Riley gets to experience much of life and grow as a person. And the streets of New York were a perfect place for this to happen. I can't imagine any other city that would have worked as well. Having been to New York a few times, I could imagine all the places that were described which helped get me into the story more. The supporting cast of characters was also well done and well rounded, which helped give more life to the story.

My biggest gripes were all the constant name droppings of popular things (TikTok and such), and all the Taylor Swift references (I get that most teens adore her, but I absolutely can't stand her and would love to go one day without some reference of her invading my life.) I also wish the author had discussed Tom's relationship with his mom more, as we are left in the dark about a lot of things. However, these things weren't enough to totally detract from the story. For anyone who enjoys Kasie West, Emma Lord, or contemporary romance, this is worth picking up.

I read my first Emma Lord book, Tweet Cute in 2021 and then proceeded to catch up with her backlist immediately as well as read every new book she released every January since. This is my fifth book by Emma Lord and I loved this one just as much as the others! Every book has felt so relatable that I feel like they were made for me. This one especially. It's like her books seem to find me when I need them most.

I really loved all the characters in this book so much and saw a little bit of myself in all of them! I loved the writing part of it a lot, the workshop as well as Luca and Riley's writing discussions, because it felt like continued motivation for me to keep doing what I want to do. I also loved the friendship dynamics between Riley and Tom and the inevitable change that relationships go though because of long distance and being apart for an extended period of time. I also really loved the conflict/ arc between the moms and Riley and Tom because it was way too real. I also really loved just revisiting New York from Emma Lord's lenses once again! I feel like I'm half in love with the city just because of the way she writes about it!

tbh, I feel a little raw still after just finishing the book so I don't have a more coherent review for it but I felt a lot of emotions, including happiness, joy, sadness, and pain. Typical experience of reading an Emma Lord book for me, it seems. Anyway, I loved it a lot a lot a lot. Feeling a little more prepared for the unmitigated chaos that 2024 will bring after reading this one :)

Emma Lord writes the sweetest coming of age romance novels, and this one is no exception! Wanting to do something different than what is expected after her high school graduation, Riley decides to go off to New York to reconnect with her best friend Tom. Their relationship hasn't been quite the same since his mother's job took him away, and Riley is looking forward to seeing him in person (and hopefully checking some things off of the Getaway List they created together). Through their adventures they connect not only with each other but some newfound friends. They also discover more about who they are as individuals. .

This is a very sweet story about finding your people and finding yourself. It's a great reminder to surround yourself with those who support your dreams and love you no matter what. Having a teenage daughter of my own, I also loved the mother/daughter storyline and growth. By the end of this book I had fallen in love with the friend group and the entire friends to lovers story. My teenager would love this one as well, and I won't hesitate to pick it up and give it to her when it is released.

Thank you to NetGalley and Wednesday books for the advanced copy to read and review.

This story of high school friends reconnecting in New York City during the summer after graduation was an engrossing read. I loved the friendship between main characters Riley and Tom, and the various little reveals about their history that deepened my understanding of both of them. I also loved the tension between Riley and her single mom. Being in my 40s, I'm finding myself sympathizing more and more with the parents in YA, but the conflict between these two was so well-done, I truly felt torn about who was right a lot of the time. Supporting character Mariella is also a bright spot in this book. Learning her background and how it intertwines with Tom's was one of my favorite threads of this story. This is a great read for high schoolers who have ever been separated from their own best friends or who are eagerly anticipating their first forays into independence.

With her latest novel, Emma Lord has penned one of the most relatable coming of age stories I’ve ever read. She perfectly captures what I think is a pretty universal experience for most young people as they turn 18, graduate from high school, and look to leave home and find their path forward as adults, in some cases, before their parents are really ready to let them go.

Riley finds herself in just such a situation when we meet her on her graduation day. She has been following a path her mom laid out for her but then fails to get into any of the colleges she applied to. Her mom is pushing her to go ahead and at least start community college, but Riley just isn’t feeling it and after some awkward exchanges with her mother where she really has to stress the fact that she is now an adult, Riley finally just tells her that she is going to NYC to see her childhood best friend, Tom, and to think about what she wants.

I loved seeing Riley re-connect with Tom. Their bond was clearly a special one and I especially loved that they still had this “getaway list” they had written years before and that they were now determined to actually complete the items on the list. Not only does this list help facilitate Riley & Tom’s re-connection but it also introduces Riley to several wonderful new friends who become like family for her. And while the list and its antics are meant to be fun, they also start to open Riley’s eyes and give her some concrete thoughts about what she might like her future to look like.

There is also a sweet romance brewing as Riley realizes she may have more than just friendly feelings for Tom, but at its heart, The Getaway List is really about Riley’s personal journey and Emma Lord has delivered her readers yet another gem of a read.

4 1/2 stars

This is the third novel by this author that I have read and this novel cemented the fact that I will read anything Emma Lord writes, This was a cute and heartfelt story with very relatable characters and relationships. I loved the bonds of friendships explored in this book. It was a terrific story.

This book equally gave me "You go Glen Coco!" vibes and also really tapped into my now I'm an adult and have lost a bit of that adventure and wanted to scream "There's no time for risks!"

YA romance, did I realize that? No, I did not. See I knew it was she just graduated high school but I expected it to lean more into NA and college-esque but it still read very YA and high school for me. Tom and Riley have a beautiful friendship and the grand adventures mixed with some simplicity and mundane was fun to ride along with them. New York is always the perfect setting for these crazy escape your life and start fresh tropes and of course it worked here well.

It's a very sweet coming of age novel that shed some light on relatable themes and though it's been a while since I've faced any of the decisions that are viewed as challenges here (news flash- I still don't know what I want or am doing either. Your twenties don't fix anything), it transported me right back to the time that I was facing similar challenges.

I wanted to love this one so much more than I did! I definitely think I would have enjoyed this more when I was younger, as the language and dialogue are very young adult. I could totally see myself in high school eating this up!!

riley’s future is unknown as she graduates from high school, only to find out that her best friend is taking a gap year. together, the two of them go on a journey to get through their bucket list - and boy, what a ride it was!

my favorite parts of this were definitely the different adventures - from small to large - and seeing how they accomplished them! however, the relationship and friendship were just too juvenile for me, and that’s most likely due to the fact that I’m at a completely different point of my life than these characters.

if you’re a huge friends to lovers fan, I would definitely give this one a shot!

thank you to macmillan and netgalley for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review!

rating: 3 stars
wine pairing: sonoma coast chardonnay

Reading this as my senior year came to a close was so so special.

First off, thank you so much to NetGalley for providing me an eARC of this beautiful book in exchange for my honest review. All the thoughts and opinions are my own.

"The Getaway List" follows Riley after her graduation ceremony, a bittersweet recollection of everything she did as well as everything she didn't. As her friends embark off to college with promises of reinventing themselves, Riley is left feeling alone and lost. After one of her close friends, Tom, opts for a gap year, the two decide to go on an adventurous quest and complete "The Getaway List" to have new experiences. In the process, Riley finds herself developing complex feelings for her best friend, leading her to recognize the risks that she must choose between. Must she risk her longstanding friendship for a possibility of something more? Or risk breaking out of her shell and finding personal growth?

Emma Lord enchants us with this heartfelt coming-of-age novel and I couldn't help but fall in love.

This one was middle of the road for me. I like the NYC setting and thought all of the adventures were fun, unique, and entertaining. I liked the main characters and thought they were relatable. There was also a fun set of side characters that added depth to the story. My main problem was in the plot development. I felt this book could have benefited from a little of Tom's POV because I think it would have lead to a richer story. The problems with Tom's mom seemed to be big but were really underdeveloped even though they contributed to major plot points. I also felt that the ending was rushed and the epilogue was really quick with tons packed in. Overall, this was a cute and entertaining YA book but lacked some depth.

No one knows teen angst better than Emma Lord. This book is exemplary of her ability to really understand all the uncertainty and energy behind young adults trying to figure out college, apartments, first loves, and friendships. And there's so much here for teens to relate to and get excited about: there's falling in love with New York City, fandom for a book, an exciting app where people can secretly send little presents of love to each other.

When Riley graduates high school, she has no idea what she wants to do next. All she knows is that she misses her best friend Tom who moved to New York. Her mother is afraid that Riley will make the same mistakes she did, so is unwilling to let her go. Riley moves to New York on her own, realizes she is in love with Tom, and makes wonderful friends along the way. Tom and Riley both have to figure out how to navigate their new relationships with their mothers, and also how to make their own ways in the world.

This is just a really lovely book. The kids are sweet and care for one another. Their adventures are funny, and you're always rooting for them. I highly recommend.

Thank you NetGalley for the digital ARC of this book.

Thank you so much Netgalley & Wednesday Books for my ARC e-book. My first Emma Lord book and overall thought it was a nice YA coming of age story.

As someone who loves NYC, I enjoyed navigating the setting and seeing it in the lens of Riley - essentially a love letter to NYC! There are so many activities that I want to check off my bucket list so Riley's expedition throughout the city felt fun. Tom and Riley's romance was a sweet friends to lovers story and the supporting friend group was a cherry on top. Also the humor!! Emma, you got a few jokes up your sleeve!

My only qualm was there were a bit too much plot that felt a bit disengaged in the story, but overall if you're looking for a coming of age story and love NYC - this is for you!

Thanks NetGalley for the advanced copy. I enjoyed The Getaway List, however, being 30 years old it’s hard for me to relate to drama with parents and coming of age stories. While I went into this knowing it was YA, I really enjoyed Tweet Cute and expected a similarly engaging plot, but this book didn’t really have one and I felt relatively board a lot of the book. May resonate better with people from NYC or a younger audience.

YA is not normally my genre, but I am a big Emma Lord fan. And as a NYC girl myself, I can never help but enjoy seeing my favorite city shine through books. And shine it did! This felt really authentic; especially considering that for Gen Z; college at 18 isn't always the "default" expectation right now. Her exploring the city, working a crap job, and finding herself with her friends is REAL- and that's why I liked it so much.

Thank you so much Netgalley & Wednesday Books for my ARC e-book. This is my first Emma Lord book (I know, I am behind) & it didn't disappoint.
Riley feels lost, so the day after graduation she leaves her home town in search of the best friend that can help her find herself. Tom moved to New York 4 years ago, separating the best friends. In the absence of best friend shinnanigans, they started The Getaway list. An adventure bucket list. Tom and Riley along with a great cast of supporting characters make their way through the list, while figuring out who they are, what they want, and the pain & uncertainty of growing up.
A super cute YA rom-com. The cast of characters are wonderful & the storyline is fun and adventurous. There were a couple of areas that dragged for me but not enough to interrupt the flow of the book. I loved Jesse. I didn't love the many many mentions of his Taylor Swift obsession. I did love the parent child relationship with Riley and her mom. Recommended for anyone who likes YA romance. Now I must add the rest of Emma Lord's books to my TBR.

I am officially obsessed with every single thing Emma Lord writes. She might honestly be the queen of YA romance.

Such a beautiful story of finding one’s self and adventures with a rag tag group of new and old friends in New York City.

Friends to lovers, found family, friendship “bucket” list, and all the shenanigans a group of 18 year old nerds can get into in NYC.

Thank you to Netgalley & St Martin’s Press/Wednesday Books for the opportunity to read this ahead of its Tuesday release in exchange for an honest review.

I am typically not drawn to YA but Emma Lord is an exception. Her books are delightful, fun, feel good contemporary romances that keep me deeply invested. The Getaway List is no exception. This novel will appeal to a broad audience. Engaging and well written