REVIEW: Here We Go Again by Alison Cochrun

“Life is the prickly pear. It’s always going to be a combination of beauty and hurt, no matter how hard you try to protect yourself from the hard parts. There is no way to avoid pain.”― Alison Cochrun, Here We Go Again.

I have already read and loved Charm Offensive by Alison Cochrun, so I was excited to start this one. I decided to listen to it as an audiobook, and I’m so glad I did! The book is in a dual POV between Rosemary and Logan, and the audiobook has two different narrators for each character, making it seem more authentic.

Rosemary and Logan were best friends in middle school and turned enemies in high school. Now in their thirties, they are both teachers at their school. Their well-loved high school teacher, Joe, calls both of them to see if they will take him on one last road trip from Washington to Maine because he is dying of cancer. How will Logan and Rosemary manage that much time together on a “death trip?”

Here We Go Again feels like a big, warm, queer hug. It is laugh-out-loud funny while also being a deep emotional journey. Each character goes through self-discovery throughout the book, and the characters reflect on their lives. Here We Go Again also handles grief and trauma well. I also really liked the ADHD representation through Logan and Rosemary, mainly because it shows that ADHD can present itself differently with different people. There was also second chance romance, enemies to lovers, many LGBTQ+ references, and even a drag show in a church.

Here We Go Again was truly a delight to read. The characters are well-developed, which makes you care about them. This book is perfect for smiles and laughs with lots of love and emotions. It was perfect for what I needed right now.

Thank you, Netgalley and Atria Books, for the free advanced copy for my honest review!

Here we go again is a charming, heartfelt story about queerness and the paths we take in life.

Logan and Rosemary (former best friends who once kissed) are reunited when their shared mentor Joe asks them to take him on a road trip as his final wish before he dies. Along the way, they discover it’s really about the journey, and Logan and Rosemary get an opportunity to reconnect.

Overall, this is a story I enjoyed. Joe is my favorite character by far, and I found Logan and Rosemary’s love story to be more of a side plot to Joe’s story and the road trip plotline. I enjoyed them together but I wouldn’t necessarily market this as a romcom. I’d recommend this for anyone looking for a touching and humorous queer story about love, life, and grief.

Alison Cochrun somehow manages to pack so much queer joy, hope and grief all in one 350 page story with a found family you will both laugh and grieve with and a romance formed through connections once burned. You love every character, you know the worst from the start and yet it still hurts all the same when it happens but this story remains worth it regardless. Life is worth the experience, its worth not being so fearful of the end of still finding joy and new things to love and seeking closure. I loved this a lot and cried a lot.

There is something so beautiful about knowing how it ends from the start but wanting to be there for the road trip anyway.

Some of the descriptions had me cringing so hard I struggled to finish this book. The characters were full grown adults acting like children which was a huge turn off

So I am a little back and forth with this one. I LOVED kiss her once for me so I was really excited to read this one. However, compared to KHOFM this just slightly fell short of my expectations. I am not a fan of the miscommunication trope and there was too much of that. There were many moments they felt childish and things just got old pretty fast.

This book though did have a beautiful ending maybe even shedded a few tears.

It’s on me for having my expectations so high but I do still really love her other books!

Thank you NetGalley for an ARC!

• best friends-turned-professional rivals take a cross-country road trip with their dying former english teacher
• a journey of self-discovery for every character, with both logan & rosemary sorting thru their own histories & traumas
• drag show in a church basement!
• very good dog!!!
• really beautiful treatment of the grief that comes with watching a loved one die

I was skeptical of rom-com and death going well together but Alison Cochrun does it beautifully.

Former best friends-turned-enemies take their mentor on a cross country journey to fulfill his last wish.

This is a heartwarming, emotionally heavy story, that might very well make you sob, with the levity you would expect with a rom-com.

Thank you Atria Books and NetGalley for an advanced reader copy.

Thank you, Net Galley, for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review. I love Alison Cochrun and was so excited to receive an ARC of her most recent book. I was immediately excited about the road trip premise of the story, because I love a good road trip! I loved the tension between the couple, and the romance was top tier. Cochrun does such a fabulous job writing romance novels, and I love the LGBTQ representation. What a wonderful story!

Alison Cochrun is truly one of the best lgbt writers out there. She makes me feel seen. This one was my favorite one yet!

There’s something about Alison Cochrun’s sapphic romances that is just absolute magic. I absolutely adored this one, even if it had me ugly crying in public.

I LOVED THIS BOOK. I laughed, I cried. It was so beautiful and heartfelt. I really just loved every minute.

This story was beautiful. I loved ALL the characters, and the whole idea of the FMC’s taking their dying high school teacher on his cross-country “death trip” was so sweet! I was absolutely sobbing by the time it ended.

There were definitely a few parts that seemed a bit drawn out, but the attention to detail and all the images of the world around them as they were going through their road trip was so vivid I felt like I could perfectly picture it.

I loved all the queer and neurodivergent representation. The way the author was able to include two main characters, both with ADHD, and yet presenting in polar opposites was so accurate! There’s the chaos, and then there’s the structure. So true!

I thought this was very good and I will have to add this to the shop shelves. Thank you for the chance for us to review.

Such a cute book! I love an LGBTQ+ romance and this one did not disappoint. The enemies-to-lover trope picked up at a great point and was full of some laughs while also encouraging deeper conversations about our purpose.

I loved the journey they took with the old man. I loved how he pretty much set the two girls up and how they got to explore all new places. Great story overall.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC in exchange for an honest review of Here We Go Again. Phew I really wanted to love this book because I've enjoyed some of Alison's work in the past. However, it was a slow read for me and hard to get through. I did enjoy his past lover and the artwork he created of him.

A sapphic, opposites-attract, road trip romcom about two former best friends turned enemies who reunite to drive their dying former teacher across the country.

There is SO much to love about this book. The banter is delightful, the characters are beautifully written, and the emotional arc had me crying almost immediately. And of course, Odysseus the dog is a delightful road trip companion and responsible for many critical hijinks throughout.

I also loved Alison Cochrun’s @alisoncochrun Instagram post about all the tropes and themes in the book, including “There’s only one bed x100,” “A critical subplot involving nudes,” and most importantly, “A giant dog/toddler horse named Odysseus.”

Alison Cochrun has written another winner for me. I have firmly established that For Your Consideration is my all time fav romance novel of all time and while I did love Kiss Her Once For Me I haven't felt the urge to revisit it since the first read. However, I already know that this will be a book I come back to and roll around in in the future.

Here We Go Again is a love letter to road trips, your favorite high school English teacher, death, and that universal sapphic experience of the homoerotic codependent middle school friendship you never really move on from. While my homoerotic middle school bestie and I emerged from childhood as friends this story as them begin as adults to begin as enemies to get the enemies to lovers rolling. While I am generally not an enemies to lovers fan I loved both of these characters their perspectives and the Nurodivergent and Ace rep I always find in Cochran's books.

This book made me laugh, made me cry and made me want to take a long road trip even though I hate driving.

this book was outstanding. The banter, as always from Alison Cochrun, is hilarious. I definitely identified with one of the main characters so much that I cried when the other MC understood and appreciated her flaws. Crying is inevitable with this one.
Sorry! This is a very character driven book, so you will become very attached to the characters even down to the dog, Odie. But in the end you'll be better for reading this book.

(from Goodreds)

AHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, I expected to cry (maybe not sob so loudly I scared my cat, but here we are). I expected to be emotionally punched in the face. I *did not* expect to be called out by yet another rom com, but apparently that's what we're doing these days, so cool.

The way this book has consumed my mind for the 24 hours since I finished it, however, was the most unexpected thing about it. I read half the book sitting at a park during the solar eclipse, and then read more before bed, and then finished it when I woke up and I cannot stop thinking about it. Lately the rom coms I've been picking up (and absolutely devouring) haven't been simple love stories, but deep and complex in ways I didn't expect. I don't consider myself to be judgmental (deragatory) about genres (I'm very much one to encourage people NOT to be), but clearly I've been making assumptions if I'm being constantly surprised like this.

Maybe how I read this kind of book has changed, or maybe norms in the genre are changing, but assuming rom coms are going to be light and fluffy probably won't be my default anymore. I'm okay with having to be more conscious of that moving forward if it means getting more like this though. I don't know if I'll ever fully recover from this one - and honestly? I'm okay with that.

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria for providing an ARC in exchange for my honest thoughts (even if I did end up buying the book without having read the ARC)